Richard Tuttle

NotThePoint (artist's book) , 2009, 18x13", mixed media

Five hand bound books on handmade paper arrange themselves on handcrafted holder of sycamore wood.  "Each of the five books focuses on the source of each color's origin within the ideal context of human experience."  The texts were written by the artist.

This small installation begs to be picked up and explored.  The tiny, subtle books hold stories to know.  Uniform geometric line from left to right emphasizes the little books.

art net.com

Muybridge inspired time - based project: Acconci, Goldsworthy & Kentridge

Muybridge  was a leader in two fields of photography - motion pictures and his photography of Yosemite. In Yosemite he considered different angles and times of day to show light and shadow.  He then went on to observe movement of objects as time passed beginning with animals and progressing to people.  He expressed change over time in anything he photographed.  He also did urban scenes, framing them to capture cultural and social relevance.  In other words he used photography to express change.  The three artists below also use their art to express change.  And all of them are eccentric in many ways or to put it differently they are the few who express more than is usually seen.  They challenge reality.   

Vito Acconci

Instant  House, 1980

Vito Acconci created Instant House pulled together by ropes by the viewer inside.  The panels combine performance with installation.
He often uses sound in his work and in the 1970s his presence was only know by his voice.

mona.org; core77.com

                                                     Andy Goldsworthy

Dandelions with Hole
                                                           

Incredible serpentine tree root

Goldsworthy does environmental, site specific installation and sculpture.  He's done many variation on leaves, flowers, feathers and other natural items arranged in beauty in the outdoors and then allowed to disintegrate by the elements of wind, heat, cold.  

In his Shadow  video he laid on the ground until coverd with snow.  Then he got up and left.  The snow covered the bare spot... a reminder of nature's continuing cycles.

morning-earth.org;

William Kentridge

                                               I am not me, the horse is not mine

                                                     Breathe, Dissolve, Return

Kentridge moves things around demonstrating change in patterns, in pictures, in stories.  His performance art is part theatrical, part lecture and part installation.  I am not me, the horse is not mine explores Russian modernism and the idea of the artitst;s control or lack of it through the presentation of multiple selves.  He superimposes himself in film so that he appears three times.
 Hs says that art is the way we understand who we are.

In 2008 he performed Breathe, Dissolve, Return.  Small pieces of torn black tissue swirl and fall making patterns.  A singers breathing conducts the movement.
Disslove shows Kentridge conducting with the singer bathed in reflections of water where images ripple and dissolve.
Return shows Kentridge's sculpture rotating first abstract then a clear image.

mariangoodman.com; moma.org; sfmoma.org


My ideas will include something using Goldsworthy's ideas of building something in nature.  I might us some superimposing or pulling with string as well.

William Wegman

Hansel & Gretel, 2007, 24 x 20', Color Polaroid

Cher ( Dog in Wig)

On Set, 1994

Wegman's video artist, conceptualism, and photography, humorously juxtapose dogs and people.

Hansel and Gretel look out inquiringly at their surroundings.

"Cher's" frontal stare and lengthy face balance and emphasize the long stands of black hair.

A foreshortened dog looks longing out waiting for the day to end On Set.

wegmanworld.com; art net.com

Kiki Smith

Wolf with Birds III, 2010, bronze with gold leaf, 44 x 54 x  2", Pace Gallery

Everywhere (Sitting Fawn), 2010, ink & etching on paper & collage, 19 x 29"

Rabbits and Rosebush, Installation, Gallery Fortlaan 17, Belgium

Smith uses sculpture, prints, installations and other forms to express ideas about gender, politics, spiritually, nature.  She focuses on nature, fairy tales, women, and the spiritual power of myth.

In the Moments of Clarity  show in Munich  the Fawn, oblivious to the viewer, curls up looking gently out toward the light.  Stars send curling streams of light from the eyes, evoking tender mystery.

Wolf with Birds uses simple bronze forms recombine in poignant images.  Smith says ideas are often as stubborn as shy animals.  Quiet, simple forms offer powerful contrast in animals of dramatically different natures.

Rabbits and Rosebush humanizes rabbits as they study the rosebush sculpture with interest.  One point perspective draws the eye along the line of rabbits toward the sculpture.  They stand silently viewing the piece, heads inquisitively cocked to the side.

Symbolic, fleeting ideas and Smith's ability to look closely define and deepen ideas she presents.

artspace.com; mona.org 12-2003 to 3-2004, huffingtonpost.com

M C Escher

Stars,  wood engraving, 1948

Contrast (Order and Chaos), 1950

In Stars  organic shape of chameleons play and contrast with the geometric angles of the cubes and tetrahedra,  math plays with nature.  In Contrast the beauty of the sphere contrasts with the disorder of the surrounding items.  The window behind the piece is reflected in the star.  Geometric shapes repeat and float.

Escher created spatial effects by combining various often conflicting vantage points.  He moved on to the idea of metamorphosis, one shape or object turning into another..  complex architectural mazes and impossible spaces.  His work is said to teach that surrealism is latent in reality if we would take time to look.

Two impressive things he said:

"I don't want to grow up.  In me is the small child of my early days."

"The things I want to express are so beautiful and pure."

nga.gov; mcescher,com; encyclopedia.com; platonicrealms.com

Nancy Spero

Panel from Torture of Women, 1974-1976, 14 panels, 133 ft long

Maypole/Take No Prisoners, 2008

Torture of Women brutally depicts violence against women as a  universal condition.  The central placement of the nude, bound woman forces attention on her torture.  Purple dramatizes the horror and fear.

On the Maypole grisly heads dangle from black and red ribbons.  The mixed metaphors of the maypole and the folly of war starkly contrast with each other.  The neutral colors emphasize the gruesome piece. Hideous skulls bluntly represent the horrors of murder and war.  Spero exposes viewer to horror but does not rationalize, soften or explain it.

nytimes.com; the guardian.com

Sarah Sze

triple point close up

triple point (gleaner), 2013, Venice

Still Life With Flowers, 1999

Sze combines many found objects to give them new life by careful placement and consideration of their nature.   Her work, Still Life With Flowers, seems a meaningless, random selection of boring things floating in midair.  Junk floats in attempt to mimic a floral arrangement.

In triple point she makes a mess in a courtyard.  Assembled objects attempt to recall models, machines, and a laboratory.  It's the "artist's effort to inscribe a very fragile order in a disordered universe."

Very popular and well received by many, the installations look like junk.  They're not pleasing or informing or comforting or abject, just boring piles of junk! The installations sadly comment on modern consumerism and materialism.  Some critics say her installations are intricate works that manipulate space...disorient and reorient the viewer.

victoria-miro.com; design boom.com

Hiroshi Sugimoto

Polar Bear, 1976, Getty Museum

Movie Theater, Canton Place, Ohio, 1980, silver gelatin print, size varies

Black and white creates dramatic simplicity, inviting imagination to play with the photos of Sugimoto.

The Polar Bear focuses on eating with no mind toward who is watching.   The photo uses the "found material" of a diorama in the Americn Museum of Natrual History.  All of the extra diorama was cut out in an attempt to show the experience of nature and capture a moment in time.

In his Theater series Sugimoto uses a folding 4x5 camera to photograph entire movies.  He opens the shutter as the film starts and closed it at the end of the movie two hours later.  The resulting white light on the screen questions what is really seen in a movie.  The relationship of photography and time explore the nature of reality


pace gallery.com; gagosian.com; getty.edu; c4gallery.com

Jim Hodges

Untitled, 2011, Gladstone Gallery, New York

Untitled (one day it all comes true), 2013

With the Wind, 1997, scarves, thread, 90 x 99 x 5”, Private Collection

Hello, Again,  1994-2003, Brass & pins, 25 x 21 x 7”

Hodges uses every variety of common items to create installation and collage offering visual images for universal ideas of love, beauty, identity and nature.  From the gigantic boulders to delicate fabric he presents visual delights.   

In Untiled, 2011, four huge boulders placed in a circle sparkle with metallic color painted on the inward facing surfaces as their texture changes from rough to smooth.  Originally placed on a hill top, the boulders threw out radiant color drawing people toward them.  Viewers standing in the center experience the enormity of nature and dazzling color.  Size & placement dramatize the installation.  

While driving in the country Hodges was inspired by an approaching storm to create Untitled (one day it all comes true).  Foreboding storm clouds swirl around piercing rays of light.  Denim fabric scraps and shreds twist and shift in violent change from almost white to darkest indigo.     

With the Wind moves to a more ephemeral experience of soft summer breezes. A collection of light, airy scarves wave  and flow in gently drifting soft colors.

Walkerart.org; Artnews, Jan 2014, p78-83

Martha Colburn

Myth Labs, 2008

Chaotic scenes of early America include juxtaposed pipes, matches, junk from today used in a meth lab.  Violence and mayhem reign in short film depicting meth labs.  Jesus has meth in his bible.  Babies are neglected by addicted adults.  American settlers attempting to find spiritually get side tracked by meth addiction.  Violence and contradiction draw attention to materialist consumerism.

A collage of bright colors, arbitrary placement of overlapping objects, direct outward gaze of the Native American, all add to the dramatic violence of the poster and of the film.  History collides with pop culture. Frenetic energy fills the picture with urgency and pessimism.

marthacolburn.com: Hortongallery.com; artinamericamagazine.com




Triumph of the Wild, 2008, Animaition, 11:02  Horton Gallery.com  depicts war

Artinamericamagazine.com
Dolls vs Dictators, 2010  she did to the leaders what they did to people, boil them

Theo Jansen

Strandbeest creatures creep and run across sandy beaches propelled by ocean winds.  Geometric skeletons of sea creatures move quickly in unison across the sand, energized by the wind captured in their wings.  Lifelike skeletons made of plastic tubes play in the elements of nature, unaware of the confused humans watching them.

Jansen compares the beasts to evolutionary process.  He says  he hates the wind but it gives energy for the beast installations.  The creatures do  not seem to have  individual names.  They're only called  "beest."

strandbeest.com; bloginity.com

David Chihuly

                                                 Desert Botanicl Garden, Phoenix, ongoing

            Vibrant non representation shapes nestle among the desert plants.  Organic curves of blue twist and mimic the plants while tall slender columns stand as sentinel companions in contrast to organic cacti.  Glass curls & snakes throughout the garden contrasting and blending with the plants.  Illuminated at night the glass changes character with the change of light.   

Azfamily.com; dbg.org; Visions of Arizona,Youtube

Alfredo Ramos Martínez

Self Portrait, 1838, tempura on newsprint, 20 x 15 ", private collection

Head  of a Nun, 1934, tempura on newsprint, 20 x 15", Ramer Collection



Martínez was born in Mexico and many of his paintings reflect his Mexican heritage.  He uses canvas, board, paper and newsprint.  Often the newsprint includes curious verbiage juxtaposed on the art.  He romanticizes  his country and her people, frequently using portraits composed with bold simple line.  His work has  been compared to Diego Rivera.  He also borrows from Picasso, Cèzanne and Gauguin.

American Fine Art, Jan/Feb 2014, p104-106.

Georgina Starr

                                                                        Splitzing

                                                                   Bubble Portraits
                                                                   

                                                       The Cats, detail

                                                         The Cats, detail

The Cats

The Brain

Before Le Cerveau Affamé (Before The Hungry Brain), 2013, Dundee

The four part installation Before Le Cerveau Affamé , provides space for the artist to explore a variety of  possibilities of herself entering the abyss of past, present & future using bubbles from the gum to "secure a passage to the other side."   Pale pink and pale yellow throughout  unify the installation.  Taro cards, brains of bubble gum, and bubbles create portraits of people in altermnate possible situations.  Bubbles emerge from mouths and vaginas.

The human brains made of bubble gum share space with sculptured cats, beautifully glazed, sitting  in a variety of poses that only cats can assume.  Brought together in one room, irreverent and peculiar ideas merge in a world that's described as part dance hall, part sculpture studio.  She combines kitsch, the peculiar, retro and performance to provoke and enrage viewers. 

Moussemagazine.it; thescotsman.com