Asheville Art Museum “Beyond the Lens: Photorealist Perspectives on Looking, Seeing, and Painting”
Through February 5, 2024.
THE ART. DEALER LOUIS K. MEISEL formulated the word “Photorealism” in 1969 to define artists whose art depended on photographs that typically projected onto the canvas letting the image be simulated with exacting precision and exactness. Oft the artist used an airbrush,that was specifically designed to retouch photographs, so to intensify the accuracy of the picture. The term first appeared in print the following year for the Whitney Museum’s exhibition “Twenty-two Realists.” The Photorealism movement coincided with Conceptual Art, Pop Art and Minimalism. Photorealist artists along with some makers of Pop art reestablished the importance of process, deliberate planning and exacting brushwork over that of extemporization and automatism.
SPECULATING ABOUT THE FUTURE is an endlessly fascinating pursuit. In his 1895 novel THE TIME MACHINE, H.G. Wells set his story at the dawn of an apocalyptic new age of modernity. Fritz Lang’s 1927 movie METROPOLIS portrayed a futuristic city where a highly-cultured utopia merrily squatted on top of a bleak underworld of workers. On a much lighter note, Robert Zemeckis’s 1985 sci-fi comedy film BACK TO THE FUTURE inserted a teenager in a time-traveling DeLorean car and sent him back 30 years to 1955 to make sure his future parents would fall in love (to thereby produce him!), and then return him to his 1985 present. In August, an Olivier-award winning musical based on BACK TO THE FUTURE will open at Broadway’s Winter Garden Theatre.
This Fall, the National Portrait Gallery in Washington, D.C., has opened a “One Life” exhibition spotlighting architect/designer/sculptor Maya Lin. The Gallery’s Curator of Painting and Sculpture, Dorothy Moss, had first thought of doing a video portrait of Lin, but as she explored her subject, she began to think instead of an exhibit that portrayed Lin’s unique career. Lin’s work has an intriguing hybrid quality that embraces photography, sculpture, liquids, and solids–an approach she defines as “existing on the boundaries–between East and West, public and private.” (Maya Lin to Dorothy Moss)
Today ceramic objects are taken for granted, including earthenware, brick or even fine porcelain because of their omnipresence. We eat from plates, drink from cups and mugs and decorate our dwellings with vases filled with flowers. The ceramic industry is one of the oldest that goes back thousands of years, perhaps because clay was plentiful, the process basic and people figured out how to make useful and decorative things with it. One of theearliest pieces ever created using fired clay dates back to the late Paleolithic period 28,000 BC. A female statue of a nude woman, known as the Venus of Dolní V?stonice, was discovered in the Paleolithic site Dolní V?stonice in the Moravian area south of Brno in the Czech Republic. Also found at this same site in a horseshoe shaped kiln were hundreds of clay figurines representing Ice Age animals ––bear, lion, fox, horse and owl along with over 2000 balls of burnt clay.
In China pot fragments dating back to 18,000-17,000 BCE have been found. Historians believe that China’s use of pottery successively spread to Japan and the Russian Far East region where archeologists have recovered shards of ceramic artifacts dating to 14,000 BCE. However, progress toward porcelain making evolved very slowly in China since its production is far more challenging than that for earthenware or stoneware. Porcelain is the most prestigious kind of pottery because of its delicacy, strength, and radiant translucent, white color and was finally produced about 2,000 to 1,200 years ago in China.
The Connecticut River cradles the city of Middletown (f. 1653), at a modest bend in its course, a place originally called Mattabesset, Algonquin for “end of the carrying place.” Tranquility now prevails over the city’s waterfront park, with its east-facing view of neighboring Portland (once called Chatham), and expansive southerly vista toward Haddam’s broad navigable channel.
“Opium has a harm. Opium is a poison, undermining our good customs and morality. Its use is prohibited by law…However, recently the purchasers, eaters, and consumers of opium have become numerous. Deceitful merchants buy and sell it to gain profit.” ~ ~Qainlong Emperor (known as Hongli), 6th in Succession, Qing Dynasty (1793)
The Samuel Russell House occupies a prominent place on the Wesleyan University campus, a neoclassical ‘wedding cake’ located on the corner of Washington and High Streets. Its prominence speaks to the career legacy of the man who planned and coordinated the 1827-28 construction of architect, Ithiel Town’s design for the home. But, many are not aware of the fact that Russell’s rise to prominence in Middletown derived from his accrued fortune in the sale of opium, tied to the early 19th century China Trade. The detailed historical records left behind by Samuel Russell speak volumes about his skills as a fastidious financial record-keeper and prescient businessman, but little about the heart and soul of the man who accomplished so much for himself, his family and the busy trading hub of his birthright, Middletown, CT.
“Civilisation has been a series of rebirths. Surely this should give us confidence in ourselves.” ~Lord Kenneth Clark
In the latest in their series entitled, ‘Essays in Film,’ documentary film makers, Michael Maglaras and Terri Templeton (217 Films) have once again shed light on a complex historical theme, placing it in the context of our vast American cultural narrative. After tackling topics like, Art in the Gilded Age, Arts of the Works Progress Administration, and the 1913 Armory Show, among others, this time their sights came to rest on British art historian and BBC star, Lord Kenneth Clark, and his much-touted 1970’s TV series, “Civilisation.” The video’s late-2020 release celebrates the 50th anniversary (1970-2020) of the American public television premiere of Lord Clark’s ground-breaking, thirteen-part BBC documentary series. Featuring archival footage from the original programs, as well as contemporaneous interviews with Sir David Attenborough and James Stourton (Clark’s definitive biographer), this documentary, entitled, “Civilisation and America,” focuses on the ways in which the series, airing in American homes in the midst of a time of great political and social upheaval, was received on this side of the Atlantic.
George Washington may be revered as the tradition-setting first President, but Abraham Lincoln remains the President we turn to in dire times. His words and understanding have a timeless human sensibility–his accessibility makes him “present” when we need national reassurance. Lincoln’s ability to remain high on our radar is reflected in how often he’s been showcased. In 1922, the Lincoln Memorial was dedicated on the National Mall. Architect Henry Bacon created a neoclassical temple, and Daniel Chester French designed the remarkable interior Lincoln sculpture that looms over the Mall.
Hemmed in by Covid19 strictures that keep us apart,
creative people have discovered imaginative new ways to connect. Drive-in movies (remember those, Boomers?)
are enjoying new popularity, providing safe social distancing along with the
community experience movie fans crave.
The Metropolitan Opera’s recent “Gala” featured its major
artists—singers, orchestra, chorus—in Zoom performances that gave opera lovers
fascinating glimpses into the talents and personalities of favorite performers.
Dance wizard Mark Morris has been conducting Zoom rehearsals with his troupe,
and a piece he originally choreographed for this summer’s Tanglewood Festival
has now been reimagined as a video entitled “Lonely Waltz” that streams on his
website. (markmorrisdancegroup.org)
Artists have also joined the virtual fray. In partnership with the Art Production Fund, artist Nancy Baker Cahill launched an “Augmented Reality” animation entitled Liberty Bell on July 4th. The Fund’s Executive Director, Casey Fremont, explained that the idea was to give viewers “the opportunity to reflect upon their personal experiences of liberty, injustice, and inequality” by displaying this prime symbol of American Independence.
“Liberty Bell,” AR drawing geolocated at the Lincoln Memorial Reflecting Pool. Photo by Joy Asico/BFA.com courtesy of Art Production Fund, Washington D.C.
The work is accessible by Baker’s free “4th
Wall” app, and a viewer simply aims a cell phone at the intended site for the
bell to appear. There are six Liberty
Bell sites: in Boston where the Tea Party occurred, at Fort Tilden in
Queens, Fort Sumter in Charleston, the “Rocky Steps” leading to the
Philadelphia Museum of Art,” the Edmund Pettus Bridge in Selma, and the Lincoln
Memorial’s Reflecting Pool in the nation’s capital. In Washington, the bell
animation takes up 37,000 square feet and is composed of red, white, and blue
ribbons that seem to be unraveling. A soundtrack accompanying the AR features a
bell ringing from a lulling sound to something much more urgent. (https://nancybakercahill.com/4th-wall-ar-app)
The appearance of Liberty Bell on the National Mall made me think about how the Mall
serves as a platform for all kinds of expression—for national celebrations, for
protests, and as a canvas for art.
When George Washington instructed Pierre L’Enfant to
design the Federal City in 1791, L’Enfant envisioned a “grand avenue” lined by
gardens and stretching from the proposed Capitol to an equestrian statue of
George Washington that would be placed south of the President’s House. In 1802, a map described the grand avenue as
“the Mall”—a tip-of-the-hat to London’s Mall, where people promenaded
fashionably near Buckingham Palace.
America’s Mall had a haphazard look until the 1902 “McMillan Plan” (left). Inspired by the “city beautiful movement” of the late nineteenth century, McMillan extended L’Enfant’s Mall further west and removed a conglomeration of unrelated structures—including greenhouses, a railroad station, and a Central Market—and replaced the clutter with an open expanse of grass lined by four rows of American elm trees. In the 20th and 21st centuries, the Mall has been festooned by Smithsonian museums, the National Gallery of Art, and a growing armada of memorials commemorating iconic national figures (Lincoln, Jefferson, FDR, Martin Luther King), and wars (Korea, Vietnam, World War II).
Civil Rights Movement: The March on Washington, August 28, 1963. Colourized from a black and white, 35mm film negative. Jordan J Lloyd/Dynamichrome image courtesy of the Library of Congress, Washington D.C.
The Mall is the site for celebrations like
presidential inaugurations, Fourth of July fireworks, and the National Cherry
Blossom Festival. It has also served as the rallying platform for such major
national events as Marian Anderson’s 1939 concert, Dr. King’s March on
Washington in 1963, and a major anti-Vietnam protest in 1972.
But the National Mall has also emerged as a stage for creative expression. There are permanent art installations in both the Hirshhorn Museum and National Gallery of Art’s Sculpture Gardens, but there have also been several temporary artworks showcased. In 1987, the AIDS Memorial Quilt (left. Photo: Richard Latoff), was displayed in a massive showcase of 2,000 panels created by family and friends of those who had died of AIDS.
In 2012, the Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden
commissioned Doug Aitken to create a video work that illuminated the entire
façade of the building, transforming it into “liquid architecture” by using
eleven high-definition video projectors that splayed across the museum’s curved
exterior. Entitled “SONG 1,” the video
was accompanied by an “urban soundscape” that featured the 1934 Harry Warren-Al
Dubin song “I Only Have Eyes for You,” originally composed for the Warner Bros.
film Dames. The Aitken projection was visible on the Mall
from sunset to midnight, March 22 to May 20, 2012.
In October 2014, the National Portrait Gallery contributed the next major work of Mall art. Nik Apostolides, then Associate Director of the Gallery, persuaded Cuban American artist Jorge Rodriguez-Gerada to create one his enormous “facescapes” on the Mall (right). Rodriguez-Gerada photographed 30 anonymous young men of all races and blended them into an enormous composite portrait that stretched over six acres at the base of the Washington Monument. Calling his portrait “Out of Many, One,” the artist required 2,500 tons of sand and 800 tons of topsoil to create a vast face that was viewed from the top of the Washington Monument. He explained, “My art aims to create a dialogue about the concept of identity, and it questions the role models who are chosen to represent us in the public sphere. These works have no negative environmental impact and are created to poetically blend back into the land.”
In July 2019, the National Air & Space Museum celebrated the 50th anniversary of the Apollo 11 mission by projecting a 363-foot image of the Saturn V rocket onto the Washington Monument (left). On two nights, a 17-minute projection called “Apollo 50: Go for the Moon” recreated the launch of the Apollo 11 mission that took astronauts Neil Armstrong, Buzz Aldrin, and Michael Collins to the moon.
Sponsored by the Hirshhorn Museum in Washington, Nancy Baker Cahill’s Liberty Bell (below, with hands of the artist pictured), continues the idea of using the National Mall as a canvas for artistic expression. Unbound by a museum’s four walls, her AR animation evokes freedom in its identity as ‘virtual.’ Yet the artist has described her intention as conveying the essence of American identity. “What I’m trying to do with this piece,” she has said, “is asking people to consider, ‘What is liberty?’”
It’s a potent question for our times. Will the pandemic affect our ideas about liberty and freedom? A recent New Yorker article by Lawrence Wright (2020 article illustration, below, left) describes how earlier pandemics—notably, the plague that ravaged Fourteenth Century Italy—pointed people to new directions that remarkably led to the Renaissance.
The social tumult caused by the Black Death helped lead to the Renaissance. Illustration by Bianca Bagnarelli
Wright wonders, as we all do, if our “new normal” will lead us to reimagine the old and create something wonderful–or will the worst and most irrational ways of thinking produce cesspools of unreason? He writes, “Like wars and depressions, a pandemic offers an X-ray of society, allowing us to see all the broken places….the racial inequities, the poisonous partisanship, the governmental incompetence, the disrespect for science, the fraying of community bonds.” Wright ends on a hopeful note—“when people confront their failures, they have the opportunity to mend them.” (Lawrence Wright, “How Pandemics Wreak Havoc—And Open Minds,” THE NEW YORKER, July 20, 2020.)
The question is, will we? Are we still “one,” or
have we become intractably “many”?
By
Amy Henderson, Contributing Writer
Liberty
Bell will be accessible on all six city sites through
July 4, 2021.
After performing around the world, Bonobo, the internationally acclaimed Chilean experimental theater company finally made its way to New York City’s Baryshnikov Arts Center, with Tú Amarás (You Shall Love), a socio-political offering with a surreal touch that examines what is an enemy, how do we create one, and how do we connect to others?
