sculpture September 2017

Vol. 36 No. 7

A publication of the
International Sculpture Center
www.sculpture.org
From the Executive Director

The September issue of Sculpture explores diverse experiences of sculpture today, from Rana Begum’s contemporary Minimalism and John
Duff’s totemic austerity to Lin Tianmiao’s immersive installations of textiles, ribbons, and sound objects, Kevin Killen’s neon spatial render-
ings of time and motion, Maria Nepomuceno’s energetic evocations of growth and dynamism, and Mariana Villafañe’s abstract geometric
renderings of sound and movement.
As we all return from summer break, it’s time to start thinking ahead to fall events. It’s not too late to sign up for our 2017 conference
in Kansas City—see pages 14 and 15 for details. If you want to know more about Kansas City’s vibrant art scene, make sure to read “Made
in the Middle,” beginning on page 56 of this issue. Then continue your exploration in person, meeting colleagues and friends at conference
programs while sampling the city’s offerings. If you’ve never been to Kansas City, you’ll be amazed. 
Page 80 features a recap of the 2017 Lifetime Achievement Award gala, honoring Lynda Benglis and Tony Cragg. We are thrilled
to announce 2018 recipients, Alice Aycock and Betye Saar. See page 12 for details about the upcoming celebration in their honor or
visit <wwww.sculpture.org>.
—Johannah Hutchison
ISC Executive Director

ISC Board of Trustees Lifetime Achievement in

Chair: Ree Kaneko, Omaha, NE Contemporary Sculpture Recipients
Vice-Chair: Robert Duncan, Lincoln, NE Magdalena Abakanowicz
Treasurer: Prescott Muir, Salt Lake City, UT Lynda Benglis
Secretary: F. Douglass Schatz, Potsdam, NY Fletcher Benton
Fernando Botero
Jack Becker, Omaha, NE Louise Bourgeois
John Clement, NY Anthony Caro
Dana Martin Davis, NC Elizabeth Catlett
Carole A. Feuerman, NY John Chamberlain
Carla Hanzal, Charlotte, NC Eduardo Chillida
Eugene Lemay, NJ Christo & Jeanne-Claude
Andrew Rogers, Australia Tony Cragg
Frank Sippel, Switzerland Mark di Suvero
Fisher Stolz, IL Nancy Holt
George Tobolowsky, TX Richard Hunt
Phillip King
Chairmen Emeriti: John Henry, Chattanooga, TN William King
Peter Hobart, Italy Manuel Neri
J. Seward Johnson, Hopewell, NJ Claes Oldenburg & Coosje van Bruggen
Josh Kanter, Salt Lake City, UT Nam June Paik
Marc LeBaron, Lincoln, NE Beverly Pepper
Robert Vogele, Hinsdale, IL Judy Pfaff
Arnaldo Pomodoro
Founder: Elden Tefft, Lawrence, KS Gió Pomodoro
Robert Rauschenberg
George Rickey
Ursula von Rydingsvard
Advisory Board George Segal
Bruce Beasley Joel Shapiro
Robert Edwards Kiki Smith
Craig Hall Kenneth Snelson
David Handley Frank Stella
Jim & Karen Linder William Tucker
Elizabeth Strong-Cuevas Bernar Venet
Hans Van de Bovenkamp

4 Sculpture 36.7
 sculpture September 2017
Vol. 36 No. 7
A publication of the
International Sculpture Center

30

34

Departments Features
16 Itinerary 22 Color Coded: A Conversation with Rana Begum by Rajesh Punj
80 ISC News
30 John Duff: Achieving Necessity by Amy Lipton
34 The Work Takes Control of Itself: A Conversation with Mariana Villafañe by María Carolina Baulo
Reviews
72 New York: Whitney Biennial 2017 40 Kevin Killen: Drawing Time From Light by Brian McAvera
73 Washington, DC: Christian Benefiel 46 Everything Is Alive: A Conversation with Maria Nepomuceno by Robert Preece
74 Muncie, Indiana: “SHIFT: Jogil Ma, Christopher 52 Revisiting Lin Tianmiao by Ann Albritton
Smith, Corban Walker” 56 Made in the Middle: Art and the Crossroads of Kansas City by Annie Raab
75 Boston: Andy Moerlein and Donna Dodson
76 New York: Heinz Mack
77 Seattle: Akio Takamori
73
78 Cologne, Germany: Norbert Prangenberg
78 Dispatch: Art Prospect

On the Cover: Rana Begum, No. 670 (detail),

2016. Powder-coated steel, dimensions variable.
Photo: Jack Hems, courtesy Parasol unit founda-
tion for contemporary art.

46

56

Sculpture September 2017 5

isc
I N T E R N AT I O N A L S C U L P T U R E C E N T E R
Executive Director Johannah Hutchison
Publisher/Director of Marketing Cathy Christino
Office Manager Maria Apodaca
Membership Benefits and Services Coordinator
Manju Philip
Membership Program and Education Coordinator
Jeannette Darr
Web Manager Karin Jervert
Conference and Events Manager Jennifer Galarza
Conference and Events Coordinator Karen Swanson
Advertising Services Associate Rebecca Leahy
ISC Headquarters
14 Fairgrounds Road, Suite B
Hamilton, New Jersey 08619
Phone: 609.689.1051, fax 609.689.1061
E-mail: <isc@sculpture.org>
SCULPTURE MAGAZINE
Executive Editor Glenn Harper Address all editorial correspondence to:
Editor Twylene Moyer Sculpture
Editorial Assistant Hannah Zuckerman 1633 Connecticut Avenue NW, 4th Floor
Design Eileen Schramm visual communication Washington, DC 20009
Advertising Sales Manager Brenden O’Hanlon Phone: 202.234.0555, fax 202.234.8016
Contributing Editors Maria Carolina Baulo (Buenos E-mail: <editor@sculpture.org>
Aires), Joyce Beckenstein (New York), Roger Boyce Sculpture On-Line on the International
(Christchurch), Susan Canning (New York), Marty Carlock Sculpture Center Web site:
(Boston), Jan Garden Castro (New York), Collette <www.sculpture.org>
Chattopadhyay (Los Angeles), Ina Cole (London), Ana
Finel Honigman (Berlin), Matthew Kangas (Seattle), Zoe Advertising information
Kosmidou (Athens), Angela Levine (Tel Aviv), Brian McAvera E-mail <advertising@sculpture.org>
(Belfast), Robert C. Morgan (New York), Robert Preece
(Rotterdam), Brooke Kamin Rapaport (New York), Ken
Scarlett (Melbourne), Peter Selz (Berkeley), Sarah Tanguy
(Washington), Laura Tansini (Rome)
Each issue of Sculpture is indexed in The Art Index and
the Bibliography of the History of Art (BHA).

I N T E R N AT I O N A L S C U L P T U R E C E N T E R C O N T E M P O R A R Y S C U L P T U R E C I R C L E
The International Sculpture Center is a 501(c)3 nonprofit organization The ISC Board of Trustees gratefully acknowledges the generosity of our
that provides programming and services supported by contributions, grants, members and donors in our Contemporary Sculpture Circle: those who have
sponsorships, and memberships. contributed $350 and above.

Benefactor’s Circle ($100,000+) Chairman’s Circle ($10,000–49,999)

Magdalena Abakanowicz Marian Goodman Gallery
Atlantic Foundation Anonymous Foundation Marlene & Sandy Louchheim
Fletcher Benton Sydney & Walda Besthoff Martin Margulies
Karen & Robert Duncan Janet Blocker McKay Lodge Conservation Laboratory, Inc.
Blue Star Contemporary Art Center Patricia Meadows
Mrs. Donald Fisher Bollinger Atelier Creighton Michael
Grounds For Sculpture Tom Bollinger & Kim Nikolaev Lowell Miller
John Henry Fernando Botero Deedee Morrison
Debra Cafaro & Terrance Livingston Morton Rachofsky Philanthropic Fund of the Dallas
Richard Hunt Canvas Wines Jewish Community Foundation
J. Seward Johnson, Jr. Sir Anthony Caro Barrie Mowatt
Johnson Art & Education Foundation Cheim & Read Sharon & Prescott Muir
Chelsea College of Art & Design Manuel Neri
Ree & Jun Kaneko Chicago Arts District/Podmajersky, Inc. New Jersey Cultural Trust
Joshua S. Kanter John Clement New Orleans Museum of Art
Kanter Family Foundation Clinton Family Fund Sassona Norton
Richard Cohen Ralph O’Connor
Gertrud & Heinz Kohler-Aeschlimann Contemporary Arts Center New Orleans Ogden Museum of Southern Art
Marc LeBaron Linda & Daniel Cooperman Nancy & Steven Oliver
Dana Martin Davis Polich Tallix Fine Art Foundry
Lincoln Industries David Diamond Stanley & Harriet Rabinowitz
National Endowment for the Arts David & Gladys Wright House Foundation Zach Rawling
New Jersey State Council on the Arts Digital Atelier Patricia Renick
Jarvis & Constance Doctorow Family Foundation Pat Renick Gift Fund
Mary O’Shaughnessy Geraldine R. Dodge Foundation Henry Richardson
I.A. O’Shaughnessy Foundation Richard Dupont Melody Sawyer Richardson
Beverly Pepper Lin Emery Andrew & Judy Rogers
Fred Eychaner Russ Rubert
Estate of John A. Renna Carole Feuerman Sakana Foundation
Jon & Mary Shirley Foundation Bill FitzGibbons Salt Lake Art Center
Dr. & Mrs. Robert Slotkin Jeff Fleming Carol L. Sarosik & Shelley Padnos
James Geier Doug Schatz
Boaz Vaadia Alan Gibbs Mary Ellen Scherl
Bernar Venet Gibbs Farm Robert & Polina Schlott
Michael & Francie Gordon June & Paul Schorr, III
Major Donors ($50,000–99,999) Ralfonso Gschwend Joel Shapiro
Agnes Gund Judith Shea
Anonymous Foundation David Handley Armando Silva
Chakaia Booker Carla Hanzal Frank Sippel
Ann Hatch Kenneth & Katherine Snelson
Erik & Michele Christiansen Richard Heinrich Fisher Stolz
Terry & Robert Edwards The Helis Foundation STRETCH
Rob Fisher Daniel A. Henderson Mark di Suvero
Michelle Hobart Takahisa Suzuki
Robert Mangold Peter C. Hobart Aylin Tahincioglu
Marlborough Gallery Joyce & Seward Johnson Foundation Cynthia Thompson
Fred & Lena Meijer KANEKO Steinunn Thorarinsdottir
Mary Ann Keeler Tishman Speyer
Frederik Meijer Gardens & Sculpture Park Keeler Foundation Tmima
Frances & Albert Paley Anna-Maria & Stephen Kellen Foundation George Tobolowsky
Pew Charitable Trust Phillip King Brian Tune
William King University of Nebraska Medical Center
Arnaldo Pomodoro Anne Kohs Associates University of the Arts London
Walter Schatz Nanci Lanni Robert E. Vogele
Kiki Smith Jo Carole & Ronald S. Lauder Philipp von Matt
Cynthia Madden Leitner/Museum of Outdoor Arts Ursula von Rydingsvard
William Tucker Toby D. Lewis Philanthropic Fund Georgia Welles
Nadine Witkin, Estate of Isaac Witkin Jim & Karen Linder Elizabeth Erdreich White
Mary & John Young Lisson Gallery
About the ISC
The International Sculpture Center is a member-supported, nonprofit organization
founded in 1960 to champion the creation and understanding of sculpture and its
unique and vital contribution to society. The mission of the ISC is to expand public
understanding and appreciation of sculpture internationally, demonstrate the power
of sculpture to educate and effect social change, engage artists and arts profession-
als in a dialogue to advance the art form, and promote a supportive environment for
sculpture and sculptors. The ISC values: our constituents—Sculptors, Institutions, and
Patrons; dialogue—as the catalyst to innovation and understanding; education—
as fundamental to personal, professional, and societal growth; and community—as
a place for encouragement and opportunity.
Membership
ISC membership includes subscriptions to Sculpture; access to International
Sculpture Conferences; free registration in Portfolio, the ISC’s on-line sculpture
registry, and Opportunities; and discounts on publications, supplies, and services.
International Sculpture Conferences
The ISC’s International Sculpture Conferences gather sculpture enthusiasts from all
over the world to network and dialogue about technical, aesthetic, and professional
issues.
Sculpture Magazine
Published 10 times per year, Sculpture is dedicated to all forms of contemporary
sculpture.
www.sculpture.org
The ISC’s award-winning Web site <www.sculpture.org> is the most comprehensive
resource for information on sculpture. It features Portfolio, an on-line slide registry
and referral system providing detailed information about artists and their work to
buyers and exhibitors; the Sculpture Parks and Gardens Directory, with listings of
over 250 outdoor sculpture destinations; Opportunities, a membership service with
commissions, jobs, and other professional listings; plus the ISC newsletter and
extensive information about the world of sculpture.
Education Programs and Special Events
ISC programs include the Outstanding Sculpture Educator Award, the Outstanding
Student Achievement in Contemporary Sculpture Awards, and the Lifetime
Achievement Award in Contemporary Sculpture and gala. Other special events
include opportunities for viewing art and for meeting colleagues in the field.

This project is supported This program is made possible in part

in part by an award from by funds from the New Jersey State
the National Endowment Council on the Arts, a Partner Agency of
for the Arts. the National Endowment for the Arts.
New Jersey Cultural Trust

Director’s Circle ($5,000–9,999)

Ana & Gui Affonso Ric Collier Herbert J. Kayden Brian Ohno Roselyn Swig
George Ahl Connells Bay Sculpture Park Joseph Kernisky Claes Oldenburg & Coosje van Bruggen Tate
Lisa Arnett Demeter Fragrance Library Eugene Lemay Dennis Oppenheim Julian & Jacqueline Taub
A.R.T. Research Enterprises Lina Deng Susan Lloyd William R. Padnos The BWF Foundation, Inc.
Auckland Art Gallery Christine and Richard Didsbury Mattress Factory Paula Cooper Gallery Laura Thorne
Patty & Jay Baker Naples Museum Bob Emser Merchandise Mart Properties Donald Porcaro Tulane University
of Art Jan and Trevor Farmer Jill & Paul Meister Richard Gray Gallery Alderman Tom Tunney
Jack Becker FreedmanArt Gerard Meulensteen Riva Yares Gallery University of Cincinnati
Kimberly Beider Galerie Lelong Michael Miller Bill Roy Hans Van de Bovenkamp
Belmont Harbor Yacht Club Jo and John Gow Jesus Moroles School of the Art Institute of Chicago Vector Custom Fabricating, Inc.
Bloomberg LP Haunch of Venison Steve & Debbie Mueller Peter Scotese Harry T. Wilks
Brick Bay Wines and Sculpture Trail Bryan Hunt Museum of Arts & Design Sculpture Community/sculpture.net Isaac Witkin
Otto M. Budig Family Foundation John S. & James L. Knight Foundation Museum of Contemporary Art, Chicago Sebastián Xavier University of Louisiana
Carnegie Mellon University Michael Johnson Nathan Manilow Sculpture Park Eve & Fred Simon
Maureen Cogan Tony Karman National Gallery, London Lisa & Tom Smith
Lisa Colburn Gallery Kasahara Kristen Nordahl Duane Stranahan, Jr.

Patron’s Circle ($2,500–4,999)

The Andy Warhol Museum Barbara & Steve Durham Lostn Foundation National Academy Museum Janice Perry Scottsdale Public Art Doris & Peter Tilles
Carnegie Museum of Art True Fisher Michael Manjarris John P. & Anne Nelson Joyce Pomeroy-Schwartz Todd Smith Webster University
Elizabeth Catlett Headland Sculpture on the Gulf Susan McLeod Katerina Paleckova, Angel’s Princeton University Art Museum Spar Street
J. Laurence & Susan Costin Barbara Hoffman Moore College of Art & Chocolate Rifle Paper Co. Elisabeth Swanson
Des Moines Art Center Laumeier Sculpture Park Design Philip Palmedo Eric Schieber Laura Thorne

Friend’s Circle ($1,000–2,499)

Abe Zale Foundation Lucas Cowan Olga Hirshhorn Robert E. Meyerhoff & Rivers of Steel National Heritage Jeff Thomson
Adobe Eduardo da Rosa Paul Hubbard Rheda Becker Area & Carrie Furnaces The Todd & Betiana Simon
El Anatsui Henry Davis Gloria Kisch Microsoft Corporation Michelle Rapp Foundation
Anonymous Donor Guerra de la Paz Paul Klein Ruth Aizuss Migdal Leslie Robertson & Sawteen See UBS Financial Services
Dean Arkfeld Terry Dintenfass, Inc. A. Eugene & Barbara Kohn Millennium Park, Inc. Roger Smith Hotel Edward Ulhir
Doris H. Arkin Michele Oka Doner Joel Koppelman David Mirvish Ky & Jane Rohman Umbra, Ltd.
Lee Bartell Fred Drucker Eleas Kostis Naples Illustrated Salvatore & Corinne Romano Robert M. Kaye & Diane Upright
Verina Baxter Constance & Blair Fensterstock Gary Kulak George Neubert Roy Lichtenstein Foundation Frederico Uribe
Bruce Beasley Sue Gardiner Chuck Levy NOVA Chemicals Inc. Ambassador Nancy H. Rubin Steve Vail Fine Arts
Abigail Bernhardt Gill Gatfield Carol LeWitt Ralph O’Connor Morley & Jane Safer Hans Van De Bovenkamp LTD
Ambassador & Mrs. Alan Blinken Bill Gautreaux Chi-Yu Liang Olivella, Umbria Olii Vicki & Roger Sant Richard & Karen Vierk
Melva Bucksbaum & Jenny Gibbs Lincoln Park Conservatory International Carolina Sardi John & Lynn Vinkemulder
Raymond Learsy Mr. & Mrs. Stephen Graham Glenn & Susan Lowry Tom Otterness Greg & Laura Schnackel Alex Wagman
Tom Butler Louise Grunwald Dayle Mace Enid J. Packard Sculpt Nouveau Wellington Sculpture Trust
Giancarlo Calicchia Haligon Fine Art Roger Machin & Carmella Saraceno Paula Panczenko Sedgwick Productions John Wiederspan
Edouard Duval Carrie Craig Hall Joel Mallin Raul Perez Jenny and Andrew Smith Yoram Wind
Cause Contemporary Gallery Dr. LaRue Harding Steve Maloney Barry R. Perlis Steinberg Shebairo LLP Charles & Barbara Wright
Cedar Rapids Museum of Art Ed Hardy Habit/Hardy LLC Eileen & Barry Mandel Troy & Cathy Perry Storm King Art Center Jim Yohe
Chicago Gallery News John Hatfield Edward Mayer Pittsburgh Center for the Arts Elizabeth Strong-Cuevas Lisa & Don Zaretsky
Jim & Jane Cohan Gail & Wilfred Heilbut Maxine & Stuart Frankel Foundation Pittsburgh Office of Public Art Meryl Taradash Zealandia Sculpture Garden
The Columbus Museum Ursula & Joseph Helman Deborah McCormick Thai Metal Crafters Glenn Zweygardt

Professional Circle ($350–999)

John Adduci•Susan Amorde•Porter Arneill•Becky Ault•Michael Aurbach•
Helena Bacardi-Kiely•Bill Barrett•Jerry Ross Barrish•Carlos Basanta•Ghada
Batrouni•Anne Baxter•George Beasley•Lucy Begg•Joseph Becherer•Raine
Bedsole•Edward Benavente•Joseph Benevenia•Gary Berg•Meredith
Bergmann•Ronald Berman•Rita Blitt•Shelley Bogaert•Christian Bolt•
Chris Booth•KuBO•Gilbert V. Boro•Christine Bourdette•Walter Bruszewski•
Steven Burns•Simon Burns-Cox•Keith Bush•Anthony Cafritz•Stephen
Canneto•Kati Casida•Dave Caudill•Vincent Champion-Ercoli•Anna Chromy•
David Cianci•Jonathan Clowes•Ellen Coffey•Stefan Cretu•Andy Cunningham•
Amir Daghigh•Anju Datta•Carlos Davila•Martin Dawe•Albert Dicruttalo•
Art Di Lella•Konstantin Dimopoulos•Kenneth Dipaola•Dorit Dornier•Richard
Downs•George Drake•Philip S. Drill•Anita Durst•Ron Eady•Eric Eigen•
Charles Eisemann•Ciara Ennis•Diana FerTalley Fisher•Basil C. Frank•Rusty
Freeman•Allen Friedman•James Gallucci•Jan Gardiner•Aristotle Georgiades•
Beatriz Gerenstein•James S. Gibson•Helgi Gislason•Joe Gitterman•Stuart
Goode•John Grande•Francis Greenburger•Carolyn Enz Hack•Joan Hall•
Wataru Hamasaka•Mike Hansel•Ruth Hardinger•Jens Ingvard Hansen•
Steve Hardy•Richard Henriquez•Alessandra Marchitelli Hess•Dion
Hitchens•Jack Howard-Potter•Yoshitada Ihara•Eve Ingalls•Ronn Jaffe•Wes
Jones•Eric Jorgenson•Nathan Joseph•Michael Kammerer•Uwe Karlsen•
Ray Katz•Cornelia Kavanagh•Maureen Kelly•Robert E. Kelly•Lita Kelmen-
son•Chippie Kennedy•Wendy Klemperer•Gene Koss•Mako Kratohvil•Jill &
Peter Kraus•Olusola Kukoyi•Lynn E. La Count•Jim LaPaso•Won Lee•Beju
LeJobart•Boruch Lev•Hao Liang•John R. Light•Linnaea Tillett Lighting
Design•Marvin Lipofsky•Oleg Lobykin•William Logan•Sharon Loper•Charles
Loving•Winifred Lutz•Lynden Sculpture Garden•Thea Macker•James
Mages•Andrea Malaer•Isabel McCall•Tom McCormick•Colin McIntyre•
Darcy Meeker•Ron Mehlman•Montserrat Mesalles•Carol Mickett & Robert
Stackhouse•Darren Miller•Brian Monaghan•James Moore•William Moore•
Keld Moseholm•W.W. Mueller•Lyubov Muravyeva•Tallur L.N•Arnold Nadler•
Nathan Manilow Sculpture Park•Mary Neubauer•James Nickel•Bruce
Niemi•Donald Noon•Sam Noto•Jospeh O’Connell•Michelle O’Michael•
Thomas Osgood•Ralph Paquin•Carol Peligian•Emily Nelms Perez•Joel
Perlman•Darrell Petit•Robert Pfitzenmeier•Hubert Phipps•Jean Jacques
Porret•Stephen Porter•Wayne Potratz•Clifton Prokop•Kimberly Radochia•
Marcia Raff•David Reif•Jeannette Rein•Roger Reutimann•Claudia Rodriguez•
Ann Rorimer•Kate Ruddle•Constance Rush•Miroslaw Rydzak•James Sagui•
Hitoshi Saito•Tom Scarff•Fred Schlatter•Ryan Schmidt•Antoinette Schultze•
Sculpture for New Orleans•Joseph H. Seipel•Debra Silver•Leslie Smith•
Yvette Kaiser Smith•Stan Smokler•Hans Somey•Virginia Sperry•Gregory
Spitzer•Howard Springer•Michael Stearns•Eric Stein•Charles Stinson•
Richard Stravitz•Cordell Taylor•Joan Truckenbrod•Muzaffer Tunca•Victor
Uribe•Jennifer Vanderpool•Vasko Vassilev•Vassiliki•Jill Viney•Julian Voss-
Andreae•Mark Warwick•James Watts•Robert Western•Jim Wheeler•Alan
White•Lynn Fawcett Whiting•Etta Winigrad•Jean Wolff•Holly Wright•
Yorkshire Sculpture Park•Hisham Youssef•Bernard Zubrowski
D73295sclp.indd 1 7/8/17 1:10 PM
ads_sclp_sept_2017.qxp_sclp ads 7/21/17 2:08 PM Page 10

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Richly illustrated with 281 co
olor plates, this book offers a unique insight into the
complexities of public sculpture in America by focusing on one of its pioneers,
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27th International Sculpture Conference:
Intersections + Identities

From October 25-28, 2017 the 27th International Sculpture

Conference: Intersections + Identities will seek to bring
sculptors and arts professionals together to discuss how
our work, our practices, and our selves intersect. Join us in
Kansas City, MO for three days of programming where we
will explore new communities and discuss exciting topics in
contemporary sculpture.

Collaborators & Sponsors:

@IntSculptureCtr @IntSculptureCtr IntSculptureCtr #sculpturecon

All information true at time of printing.

Kansas City, Missouri
October 25-28, 2017
With Optional Trips & Workshops: October 24, 25, & 29

Join Us Experience the sights Register Now

This four day conference will include: and sounds of KC! · Register online at www.sculpture.org
· Annual ISC littleSCULPTURE Show · Antique shopping and gallery · Space is limited
· ARTSlams & Mentor Sessions hopping in West Bottoms · ISC Members and Chapters receive
· Brewery Tours discounted registration
· Opening Reception & Artist Studio
Tours at Studios Inc. · Delicious Kansas City-style barbecue · Student Rate Available
(on first come basis)
· Keynote Address · Cool nightlife and craft eats in Westport
· Registration closes September 28, 2017
· Seven Engaging Conference Panels · Crossroads Arts District
· For more information, visit www.sculpture.org
· Evening Parties & Networking Events · Jazz in the 18th and Vine District
or contact the events department at US
· 3D Printing, Laser Cutting & CNC Milling and at the American Jazz Museum
(609) 689-1051 x302
Workshops at Kansas City Art Institute* · Huge Haunted Attractions
· Iron Pour at Wickerson Studios* (its Halloween!)
· Belger Crane Yard Studios Tour* · National World War I Museum Book Your Stay
· Glass Blowing Demonstration at and Memorial
Monarch Glass Studio* · Unique museums including: Arabia The Kansas City Marriott Country Club
Steamboat Museum, Leila’s Hair Museum, Plaza is the official conference hotel. Special
· 2017 ISC Student Awards Exhibition
Toy and Miniature Museum, and rates only available till September 30, 2017!
· Post Conference Iron Pour & Wood Carving
many more To receive the special conference rate, visit
Workshops at University of Kansas*
www.sculpture.org/KC2017.
· Gallery Hop in the Crossroads Arts District
And much more!
* Additional fees may apply

Please indicate if you require any accessibility accommodations by contacting the events
department at 609.689.1051 x302 or events@sculpture.org. The International Sculpture
Center is committed to ensuring that all events are accessible to all of our patrons.

Image Credits (L-R): All photos courtesy of Visit KC. – 1. Downtown Skyline, photo by Dan White.; 2. Mark Di Suvero, Rumi, 1991, at The Nelson Atkins Museum of Art. Steel
with paint, 24 feet x 8 feet 9 inches. Gift of the Hall Family Foundation. © Mark di Suvero.; 3. Louise Bourgeois, Spider, 1996, at the Kemper Museum of Art. Bronze with dark
polished patina, cast 1997. 133 x 263 x 249 inches.; 4. Bicycle riders in front of the Kauffman Center for the Performing Arts.
itinerary
Doris C. Freedman Plaza
New York
Liz Glynn
Through September 24, 2017
Glynn’s work frequently references
historical objects to trace shifts
in political, cultural, and economic
value over time. RANSOM ROOM
(2014, SculptureCenter), for instance,
focused on a moment of total loss—
the melting down of a large cache
of precious metal artifacts during
the Spanish conquest of the Incan
empire. Mining such lost material
cultures, Glynn considers how objects
embody, preserve, and challenge val-
ues and social systems, in their own
time as well as in ours. Open House
shifts from rapacious destruction and
obliteration to the umbilical cord
of gold that chains art to wealth and
power. Like Darren Waterston’s Filthy
Lucre, which re-envisions Whistler’s
Peacock Room as a Dorian Gray-like
portrait of corruption lurking beneath
a mask of undefiled beauty, Glynn’s
Open House reduces Gilded Age
excess to a “ruin.” Inspired by one of
Sanford White’s grandest interiors
(a demolished Fifth Avenue ballroom
for the politician William C. Whitney),
her opulent furnishings—reproduced
in ghostly Miss Havisham-gray con-
crete—lay the specter of vanished
luxuriance to rest in an anti-monu-
16
ment that renders exclusivity (or at
least the remains of the feast) acces-
sible to all.
Web site
<www.publicartfund.org>
Fondazione Memmo
Rome
Giuseppe Gabellone
Through October 15, 2017
Gabellone’s elusive, enigmatic sculp-
tures systematically renegotiate
relationships to traditional material
and historical referents—monument,
site, architecture, and landscape.
Following some of the medium’s
greatest (Italian) innovators, including
Medardo Rosso, Umberto Boccioni,
and Arturo Martini, Gabellone
emphasizes dialogues between light
and shadow, form and space, while
incorporating other techniques and
practices, particularly photography,
in boundary-defying acts of synthe-
sis. His new interventions follow the
same strategy, breaking down sepa-
rations between natural and artifi-
cial, interior and exterior space. In
this fusion of opposites, the works
do not so much depend on their
surroundings as respond to them,
ironically gaining power through
the interaction. A minimally illumi-
nated, almost barren space acts
as a container modeled by “the force
of reduction,” reverberating with
its own content, which encourages
Left: Liz Glynn, Open House. Top: Rosa
Barba, installation view of “From
Source to Poem to Rhythm to Reader.”
Above: Giuseppe Gabellone, Untitled
(Orange).
apparent transformations of matter
and shifting states of being in
casual-seeming objects built of hid-
den labor, carefully constructed situ-
ations, and uncanny realities.
Web site
<http://fondazionememmo.it>
HangarBicocca
Milan
Rosa Barba
Through October 8, 2017
For years, Barba has experimented
with the languages of film and sculp-
ture, reflecting on the poetic qualities
of the natural and human landscape
while exploring place as a vessel
of memory and dismantling the struc-
ture of linear time. She chooses her
raw materials carefully, setting both
physical and intangible elements
to work in multi-track narratives that
take on form in film installations,
sculptures, and publications. Though
she borrows the properties of light,
sound, movement, and time from
cinema, as well as its associated
hardware of celluloid and projector,
she embeds her anachronistic 16mm
projectors in machine sculptures
GLYNN: JAMES EWING, COURTESY THE ARTIST, PUBLIC ART FUND, NY, AND PAULA COOPER GALLERY / BARBA: AGOSTINO OSIO / GABELLONE: DANIELE MOLAJOLI
that display all the anarchic life and
personality of Tinguely’s kinetic
works. The disposition of these pro-
jectors—facing each other in public
debate, held in precarious balance,
or wrapped in straitjackets of cellu-
loid strips—adds additional inter-
pretative strata to their generated
images. “From Source to Poem
to Rhythm to Reader” features 14
densely layered works, including
a meditation on Vesuvius as a meta-
phor for contemporary Italian politics
and a sensorially jarring deconstruc-
tion of the Audio-Visual Conservation
Center at the Library of Congress
that transforms collected data into
a maelstrom of Babel-esque white
noise. Like Barba’s machines, her
once-innocuous working assumption
that “reality is a fiction based
on individual interpretations of real
events” threatens to take on a life of
its own, escaping theory to descend
into chaos.
Web site
<www.hangarbicocca.org>
Sculpture 36.7
 Legion of Honor Museum
San Francisco
Sarah Lucas
Through September 17, 2017
Lucas’s provocative sculptures exalt
in coarse visual puns, common vul-
garities, and a defiant, bawdy humor.
Created from an idiosyncratic mix
of everyday materials, including worn
furniture, clothing, fruits and vegeta-
bles, newspapers, cigarettes, cars,
resin, plaster, and light fittings, their
grungy, sometimes haphazard
appearance only reinforces serious and
complex subject matter. Lucas makes
sculpture of and from the human
body—a time-bound, decaying object
that requires maintenance and
care—and her quasi-narrative sce-
narios question gender definitions
and defy macho culture. As she puts
it, “With only minor adjustments, a
provocative image can become con-
frontational, converted from an
offer of sexual service into a castra-
tion image.” “Good Muse,” her first
museum exhibition in the U.S.,
features two new works, as well as
a selection of recent sculptures,
LUCAS: © THE ARTIST, COURTESY SADIE COLES HQ, LONDON AND FINE ARTS MUSEUMS OF SAN FRANCISCO / GILARDI: FRANÇOIS FERNANDEZ
installed in dialogue with the Legion
of Honor’s Rodin collection. Con-
fronting the palpable eroticism of
Rodin’s nudes with blatant, naked
truths, Lucas’s surreal hybrids and
fragments emphasize how far repre-
sentations of sexuality and gender
have progressed, and how far they
haven’t, challenging artistic as well
as social proprieties in pursuit of
a new balance in human relations.
Web site
<https://legionofhonor.famsf.org>
Lismore Castle Arts
Lismore Castle, Co. Waterford,
Ireland
Anthony McCall
Through October 15, 2017
A key figure in the London Film-makers
Co-operative in the 1970s, McCall
began his career with documenta-
tions of outdoor performances
Sculpture September 2017
Above: Sarah Lucas, NUD CYCLADIC 7.
Top right: Anthony McCall, Swell.
Right: Piero Gilardi, installation view
of “La Leçon de choses.”
involving the elements, particularly
fire. From these early works, he
quickly moved on to develop a more
radical and personal approach to
avant-garde filmmaking. Blurring
the boundaries between film,
sculpture, and installation, his “solid
light” works upend cinematic princi-
ples to exploit light, time, and experi-
ence as ends in themselves, rather
than means to representational ends.
These projected forms, as he explains,
“exist in the dark, in three-dimen-
sional space, and they have to
be found and explored by a mobile,
thoughtful visitor.” Works such as
Line Describing a Cone (1973) and
the new Swell (both featured here)
are based on simple, animated line
drawings grown into projections
that emphasize the sculptural quali-
ties of light beams. Installed in
murky, haze-filled rooms, they con-
jure an illusion of solid form—waves,
ellipses, and flat planes that gradu-
ally expand, contract, or sweep
through space to confront the viewer,
who has the power to merge with
and modify their virtual manifesta-
tions.
Web site
<www.lismorecastlearts.ie>
MAXXI
Rome
Piero Gilardi
Through October 15, 2017
An important contributor to the birth
of Arte Povera, Gilardi has devoted
his career to creating an “inhabitable”
art, one that establishes a permanent
interaction between individual
and environment. All of his projects,
including the well-known Nature
Carpets (polyurethane rolls that sim-
ulate natural phenomena such as
riverbeds, leaves, and fruit), use tech-
nology as a tool to restore contact
between urban man and nature.
Fiercely independent, he has put his
political beliefs into practice by mak-
ing art an accessible part of ordinary
life—in the late ’60s, he dropped
his own work in order to conduct
creative therapy with psychiatric
patients and factory workers, moving
from the studio into the street to
support youth, labor, and environ-
mental actions. Though he returned
to more conventional forms in the
’80s with a series of interactive, com-
puter-based environments, he
remains an activist, championing
artistic autonomy over commodity,
variety of expression over monolithic
hegemony, collaboration over sin-
gular authorship. “Nature Forever”
brings together more than 60 mili-
tantly inspired works from the entire
span of his 50-year career—from
hyper-realistic artificial renderings of
natural scenes (“disguises” exorcizing
the death of nature) and new media
experiments to political animations
and the culminating achievement
of his approach to art “within life”—
the founding of the Parco Arte
Vivente in Turin, a “museum beyond
the museum,” conceived as a total
living organism.
Web site
<www.fondazionemaxxi.it>
Milwaukee Art Museum
Milwaukee
Rashid Johnson
Through September 17, 2017
Johnson’s installations, sculptures,
photographs, and videos offer deep
meditations on the phenomena that
shape African American culture while
questioning the uniformity of the
17
itinerary
“black experience.” Wading through
dense thickets of reference and infor-
mation, he blends personal and
historically loaded objects (including
books, album covers, and shea but-
ter) into complicated aggregates that
defy taxonomy and confound collec-
tive identity. To that base of race and
history, the works in “Hail We Now
Sing Joy” add a nerve-wracking anxi-
ety and the temptation to escape—
emotions that Johnson started to
explore in the run-up to last year’s
election. For him, “anxiety is an alert
system” and potential motivator,
when it doesn’t paralyze or destroy.
This possibility hangs over the
agitated black soap and wax faces
of Anxious Audience (collectively
responding to the endless police
shootings of unarmed black men,
as well as to broader social tensions
deliberately inflamed by politicians
seeking to widen a fracture into
an unbridgeable divide). Though the
unease is (somewhat) relieved by
the bucolic imagery of the Escape
Collages, escape can only be a tem-
porary state, not a solution. The real
answer lies in the jazz track of
the show’s title, with its themes of
18
Left: Carolee Schneemann, Flange
6rpm. Right: Rashid Johnson, Unti-
tled (shea butter table). Bottom
right: Pierre Huyghe, After ALife
Ahead, from SPM 2017.
“meeting” and resolution, and
in Antoine’s Organ, a towering grid
structure bursting with potted plants,
videos, lights, sculptures, and books
(including Paul Beatty’s The Sellout
and Deborah Dickerson’s The End of
Blackness), which creates a lush oasis
where creative expression can trans-
form anxiety into action.
Web site <www.mam.org>
Museum für Moderne Kunst
Frankfurt am Main
Carolee Schneemann
Through September 24, 2017
Schneemann, who was awarded the
Golden Lion at this year’s Venice
Biennale, is best known as a pioneer
of performance art. Whether under-
mining gender roles or ecstatically
celebrating desire and female sexual-
ity, her body-based works—including
the subversively explicit Fuses, Inte-
rior Scroll, and Meat Joy—blazed
a path for subsequent generations
of artists kicking at the traces of pro-
scriptive identities and social norms.
But her contribution to the history
of contemporary art extends beyond
these actions, so intimately tied to
the New York avant-garde scene
of the ’60s and ’70s. At an early stage
in her career, she was already using
simple mechanisms to set paintings
in motion and integrating photo-
graphs and found objects into works
that she referred to as “painting con-
structions.” Focusing on this aspect of
her work, “Kinetic Painting” demon-
strates how her drive to take painting
beyond the canvas and into the
realms of action and space perme-
ated every aspect of her production,
from the now-iconic assemblages
and performances, including the full-
body take-down of Abstract Expres-
sionism in Up to and Including Her
Limits, to the recent Flange 6rpm.
Suspended against a backdrop of
projected foundry fires, these seven
motorized units set the history of
sculpture (from hand-crafting to lost
wax casting to extended media) into
motion, their unpredictable energy
leading to unforeseen outcomes.
Web site
<www.mmk-frankfurt.de>
Skulptur Projekte Münster 2017
Münster
Through October 1, 2017
This year, SPM celebrates a half-cen-
tury of public sculpture with a huge
exhibition of new and former com-
missions installed in 35 locations
around Münster and, for the first
time, in the neighboring city of Marl.
Ignoring thematic parameters, cura-
tors Britta Peters, Marianna Wagner,
and co-founder Kasper König con-
tinue to redefine what art can be
in the public realm (embracing video,
performance, and tattooing in the
case of Michael Smith’s Not Quite
Under_Ground) and how it can
mediate spatial/social experience.
Past milestones and achievements
also find acknowledgement in this
anniversary edition, in occasionally
cheeky form. Cosima von Bonin and
Tom Burr’s Benz Bonin Burr, a huge
SCHNEEMANN: AXEL SCHNEIDER, COURTESY THE ARTIST, P.P.O.W GALLERY, NY, HALES GALLERY, LONDON, GALERIE LELONG, PARIS AND VG BILD-KUNST, BONN 2017 / JOHNSON: COURTESY THE ARTIST AND HAUSER & WIRTH / HUYGHE: OLA RINDAL
Mercedes Benz loader parked in front
of the Kunstverein, not only blocks
a Henry Moore bronze, it’s also poised
to crane, pack, and ship the sculpture
away in a custom-sized crate. The
joke goes back to the first SPM, which
defied expectations by jettisoning
the safe familiarity of Modernist
outdoor sculpture. This year’s works
carry that legacy forward with res-
ponsive, and constructive, approaches
to current political and quality-of-
life issues: Oscar Tuazon’s concrete
Burn the Formwork doubles as an
oven for those without shelter, and
Ays˛e Erkmen’s submerged bridge,
On Water, puts people before com-
merce, allowing pedestrians to cross
a section of the port by eliminating
access to vessels of any kind. Action
takes precedence over preaching and
hand-wringing in many projects—
even exhibition tours simply accept
Germany’s diverse social fabric as a
given—they’re conducted in Arabic,
Turkish, Farsi, and basic German
for beginners—without making a
fuss. The highlights are many, with
participating artists entering niches
and chinks in the urban fabric where
they can unleash dramatic force,
but Pierre Huyghe’s re-invention of
an abandoned ice rink may be the
stand-out. Despite its bombed-out
Sculpture 36.7
 appearance, the barren, muddy land-
scape of After ALife Ahead, (patterned
on 3D puzzles used for IQ tests) sup-
ports life; in fact, the entire installa-
tion is a living, breathing organism,
a bio-technological incubator for nur-
TUAZON: HENNING ROGGE, © SKULPTUR PROJEKTE 2017 / SMITH: DIRK PAUWELS, COURTESY THE ARTIST AND KOW BERLIN / FRITSCH: © ARTISTS RIGHTS SOCIETY (ARS), NY / VG BILD-KUNST BONN, GERMANY
turing cancer cells, whose growth,
in turn, triggers augmented reality
sequences. Weaving together
biological entities, real and symbolic
environments, visible and invisible
processes, and static and dynamic
states, this precarious symbiosis
expresses itself as an amoral system
running without a creator, without
concern for human interests—a fit-
ting metaphor for the post-human
world order currently in the making.
Web site
<www.skulptur-projekte.de>
Stedelijk Museum voor Actuele
Kunst (S.M.A.K.)
Ghent, Belgium
Michael E. Smith
Through October 1, 2017
Smith’s sculptures are made from
everyday things that can be found
on any street or in any dump—
household items, dead animals, and
organic materials—and yet he man-
ages to invest this worthless, mun-
dane detritus with atmosphere and
power. Hoses, basketballs, bathtubs,
toilets, and articles of clothing come
together to almost alchemical effect,
forcing us to question what precisely
we are looking at and why. Coalescing
in pared-down collections of materials
that suggest the fundamental need
for nourishment, warmth, and
protection, his assemblages evoke
Sculpture September 2017
Left: Oscar Tuazon, Burn the Form-
work, from SPM 2017. Top right:
Michael E. Smith, Untitled. Right:
Katharina Fritsch, Pistole. Bottom
right: Jimmie Durham, Tlunh Datsi.
demolished buildings or abandoned
urban lots, redolent of transience
and mortality (though not without
morbid humor and sympathy). Filled
with PVC foam, hardened with resin,
or covered in canvas, Smith’s trans-
formed debris inhabits another
dimension, an alternative zone in
which respect is restored and natural
processes can redeem even the worst
of manmade horrors. “How beautiful
it is and how easily it can be broken”
expresses the pessimism that lurks
just beneath the surface of Smith’s
critique through absurdity—natural
or manmade, we have the capacity
to ruin it all.
Web site <www.smak.be>
Walker Art Center
Minneapolis
Jimmie Durham
Through October 8, 2017
An artist, performer, poet, essayist,
and activist, Durham abandoned the
narrow strictures of identity politics
years ago in favor of a broad-based
approach to justice, freedom, and
equality—a move reinforced when
he left the U.S. in 1987 to live first
in Mexico and then in Europe. In his
work, as well as in his life, he strives
to follow his “mentor” Italo Calvino
and elude all constraints. Rather
than making obvious political state-
ments, his work has evolved to
embody a political/philosophical
stance through materials, forms,
and processes. He once expressed
his credo as “against architecture,
against narration, against structure.”
This defiance of the law—any law—
characterizes all of his work, from
performances with stones as the
medium, or tool, of a formless, scat-
tered reality to icon-like sculptures
made out of animal parts, recycled
PVC pipes decorated with feathers,
tortured furniture, and found stones.
“At the Center of the World,” his first
major exhibition in the U.S. since
1995, features nearly 200 works,
including degraded readymades evok-
ing global wastelands; object-poems
adorned with capricious inscriptions,
tags, and scars; spurious totemic
shrines; and compositions of garbage
that might just harbor talismanic
power. With strategic wit and skill,
these charged assemblages reveal Walker Art Center
sculpture as a medium tactically and Minneapolis
conceptually intertwined with every- Katharina Fritsch
day life while demonstrating a vision Through October 15, 2017
of united progressivism, unfractured Fritsch’s iconic and singular sculp-
by specialized interests and commit- tures play on the tension between
ted to critical thinking and critique, reality and apparition, between the
no matter what the subject. familiar and the surreal. Like the
Web site <www.walkerart.org> insidious images of advertising, her
19

objects, installations, and sound
works seem to imprint themselves
indelibly on the mind. Hearts,
crosses, skulls, bottles, umbrellas,
body parts, and religious figurines
play on common resonances and
shared fantasies, but they are trans-
formed through color and material
into open-ended and mysterious
presences—latent, private notions
transfigured into primal, deeply
symbolic forms. “Multiples” spans
Fritsch’s career with more than 40
works selected to accompany the
debut of her 20-foot-high, ultrama-
rine blue Hahn/Cock, recently
installed at the Minneapolis Sculp-
ture Garden. Rooted in collective
experience, these recurring icons
trace a kind of general mental
archive addressing primeval, and
very ordinary, ideas, desires, and
fears.
Web site <www.walkerart.org>
Westfälischer Kunstverein
Münster
Tom Burr
Through October 1, 2017
For almost three decades, Burr’s
sculptures, writings, and collages
have proposed alternative relation-
ships between the built environment
and subjectivity, focusing on access,
site-specificity, and the confluence
of public and private space. His sculp-
tures appropriate the formal vocabu-
lary of Minimalism but violate its
most sacred principle, smuggling ref-
erence and narrative into seemingly
neutral shapes and materials. Every-
thing from the emancipation of
subcultures to autobiographical allu-
itinerary
Tom Burr, installation view of
“Surplus of Myself.”
sions, architectural influences, and
icons from the worlds of music, liter-
ature, art, and politics finds its way
into his forms and anti-forms. If
this infraction of the creed weren’t
enough, he also interferes with its
macho bias, reinscribing hard-edged
THORSTEN ARENDT, COURTESY THE ARTIST; GALERIE NEU, BERLIN AND BORTOLAMI, NY
rigor with (illicit) desires, most
notably a “softness” in certain forms
and gestures. “Surplus of Myself” fea-
tures five new sculptures set amid a
selection of earlier works, all notable
for their fearless embrace of con-
tradiction, apparent ugliness, rough
edges, disparity, and disintegration—
qualities underscoring the similarities
that Burr finds between human and
architectural bodies, and their con-
striction and malformation under
authoritative codes.
Web site <http://
westfaelischer-kunstverein.de>
22-29_sclp_sept_2017.qxp_Layout 1 7/21/17 11:29 AM Page 22

Color Coded
Rana Begum
A Conversation with

BY RAJESH PUNJ
22-29_sclp_sept_2017.qxp_Layout 1 7/21/17 11:29 AM Page 23

JACK HEMS, COURTESY PARASOL UNIT FOUNDATION

FOR CONTEMPORARY ART

No. 670, 2016. Powder-coated steel,

dimensions variable.
22-29_sclp_sept_2017.qxp_Layout 1 7/21/17 11:29 AM Page 24
No. 93, 2005. Resin on hazard tape and wood, 50 x 50 x 5.5 cm.
For the American sculptor Donald Judd, simplicity focused
attention on the object in space: “It isn’t necessary for a work
to have a lot of things to look at, to compare, to analyze one
by one, to contemplate. The thing as a whole, its quality whole,
is what is interesting. The main things are alone and are more
intense, clear, and powerful.” These codes of conduct have
since come to serve an unlikely devotee of the minimal method.
Moving from figuration to a fascination with form, light, and
color, Bangladesh-born, London-based Rana Begum espouses
some of those same principles and pushes them further. She
chooses materials over subject matter, following Judd in “getting
rid of the things that people used to think were essential to art.”
Begum argues that the removal of the motif allows for some-
thing much more fundamental—the interplay of light and color
within a form. For her, everything comes as a consequence
of seeing art as a set of absolutes, assembling materials as the
basis for alternately independent and integrated objects illumi-
nated by light and conditioned by color. At their most funda-
mental, her configurations of simple geometric forms define
her as a modern Minimalist, seeing, as Dan Flavin did, light
and line as the marks of our existence.
24
Rajesh Punj: Could you explain your early works?
Rana Begum: Those works represent a period of
research preoccupied with light and form, and the
tape piece, No. 94 (2005), is representative of that. I
love color, but I really struggled with paint, and how
one color works with another. I knew at the end of
the first year of my MA that I was ready to work with
color, but paint wasn’t something that I could use.
RP: Was that because of your wish for a certain kind
of finish, a certain kind of precision?
RB: It was because of precision. When I mixed colors,
they would end up being muddy and mucky, and I
wasn’t able to achieve that solidness that you have
when you open a tub of paint. It was at that moment
that I realized I had a collection of adhesive tape. And
I thought, “Why don’t I just use the tape to study
color?” I made a series of paintings using this adhesive
tape.
RP: You define those works as “paintings” and not
as colored objects?
RB: I feel like they are. I can describe them as objects,
but I think it is neither here nor there. It doesn’t
restrict the works or how you look at them. At the end
of the day, you still notice the material, the color
interaction, and the “objectness.” I think that kind of
shouts out. I spent quite a few years exploring those
materials, and the palette expanded when I looked at
vinyls as well. There are some areas where I actually
introduced paint, but it is paint straight out of the
tub. At the time, what proved fascinating for me was
how even the thinnest strip of color could change the
mood of the work.
After a year, people became interested in purchasing
these works, and I couldn’t sell them, because I knew
they would fall apart. So, I had to find a way of keeping
the tape down on the surface. I tried many different
things, and then I found a two-part resin that generates
heat when you mix the two parts together, but not
enough to lift the tape off the surface; it remained
intact. Even though the resin acted as a technical tool,
it actually added something, which was how it reflected
the shape—something that I was unconsciously
thinking about anyway. The fact that the work was
reflecting everything made me think more about
three-dimensional space and the need to come away
from the wall. And that’s where No. 93 (2005) came
in. Those works really made me think about the
PHILIP WHITE, COURTESY THE ARTIST
“sculpturalness” of what I was trying to make, how
the two research elements came together.
RP: Are your works about a homogenization of painting
and sculpture, a blurring of categories or classifica-
tions?
RB: I am not interested in each thing as a discipline.
I don’t start a work saying that I want to do some
Sculpture 36.7
22-29_sclp_sept_2017.qxp_Layout 1 7/21/17 11:29 AM Page 25
Left: No. 245 L Fold, 2011. Paint on mild steel, 90 x 125 x 35 cm. Right: No. 475 S Fold, 2013. Paint and lacquer on copper, 55 x 46 x 23 cm.
painting or that I want to make a sculpture—that is not how it
works. It is about one work feeding into another and leading to
something else that becomes something else, that grows.
RP: So, the works moving from the wall to the floor was inten-
tional?
RB: It just became a natural progression within that series. The
reflective surface made me think about three-dimensional space,
reflecting it back onto the work. In that piece, the interaction of
color and form is happening simultaneously. But it was an accident,
something I wasn’t expecting to happen. When it did happen, for
me, it was like a disaster. I thought it was completely wrong, that
it wasn’t what I wanted to do. I don’t mix colors, but the fact
that it was happening naturally, and that it was creating this whole
PHILIP WHITE, COURTESY THE ARTIST
other layer of geometry and color, was incredibly fascinating,
and I was blown away. I have been exploring that relationship ever
since in this series of works.
At that time, I was also becoming more interested in the perime-
ter of the work, and that came about through folding pieces of
paper. When I was folding, I was thinking about my earlier research
into form and light, and I thought, “This is really interesting.” I
Sculpture September 2017
like what is happening in works like No. 245 L Fold (2011), No. 475
S Fold (2013), and No. 479 S Fold (2013). I used the paper pieces
to study color, and the more I worked on them, the more I under-
stood them as works in themselves and that I needed to push
them further. Those paper works became larger sculptural pieces
(reliefs), which I had the chance to explore in different materials.
RP: When I look at those works, I think of Ellsworth Kelly.
RB: He was a huge influence early on, along with Donald Judd,
Sol LeWitt, Frank Stella, and Anish Kapoor.
RP: Were you interested in them as colorists?
RB: It was a big deal, but it took me a long time. I was looking at
them during my foundation year in 1999, or possibly even before
that. When I was at the Chelsea College of Arts, I was still making
work with a very muted palette, originally going toward and then
temporarily moving away from color. And then on the MA, I
was ready to explore color again. One of the reasons I applied for
my MA was to have an opportunity to talk to the artist Tess Jaray,
whom I ended up assisting for about five years. She is amazing
with color. Her approach to working with color and paint proved
very influential on my work.
25
22-29_sclp_sept_2017.qxp_Layout 1 7/21/17 11:29 AM Page 26
Left: No. 521 F Fold, 2014. Paint and lacquer on mild steel, 46 x 31 x 25 cm. Right: No. 207, 2010. Drinking straws and UV lights, dimensions variable.
RP: You appear to have retained your interest in vibrantly intense
colors.
RB: Yes, keeping their original strength was important, because
the intensity reflected onto the white, and the white changed and
vice versa. So, folded works like No. 518 F Fold (2014) and No. 521
F Fold (2014) became more freestanding and sculptural. I started
another series of drawings during my residency in Beirut through
the Delfina Foundation. “The Space Between,” my Parasol Unit
show (2016), featured an installation downstairs in a tiny room
with glowing drinking straws lit by UV light. No. 207 (2010) was
based on those drawings. I wanted to try and make them more
substantial and stronger, something that lasts. So, I started making
them in mild steel.
RP: And you still explain them as drawings?
RB: Yes, for me, they are drawings, because that was the intention.
Works such as No. 620 M Drawing (2015), No. 622 M Drawing
(2015), and No. 623 & 624 M Drawing (2015) are sculptural works
26
LEFT: PHILIP WHITE, COURTESY THE ARTIST / RIGHT: BEGUM STUDIO, COURTESY THE ARTIST AND DELFINA FOUNDATION
as drawings. When I was doing them, I was asked to exhibit in a
group show curated by Paul Carey-Kent and installed in a house.
He and others had curated seven shows prior to the house being
renovated, and they asked me to choose a room to show these
works. I made my decision based on the previous artist’s work—
you could see the drawings of the landscape underneath. That
was really interesting, because I was thinking about a landscape
when I was making the work. I installed my pieces on the walls
over this image. There is something about the drawings that
relates to landscape and the urban environment at the same time.
I started to see shapes form, and that’s where certain colors
came up. The drawings became freestanding pieces and outdoor
works, which led to a series of paintings that stemmed from the
box pieces, whereby the colors overlap and create a whole other
layer of geometry. I wanted to make that interaction more tangible,
more physical, drawing attention to something that was there
through its materiality.
Sculpture 36.7
22-29_sclp_sept_2017.qxp_Layout 1 7/21/17 11:29 AM Page 27

The mesh pieces, including No. 606 M

Mesh (2015), No. 610 M Mesh (2015), and
No. 648 L Mesh (2015), came about as a
consequence of the basket installation that
I did for the Dhaka Art Summit, No. 473
(2013–14), which stemmed from two sep-
arate childhood memories, one of which
has to do with light. That is one of the
strongest memories I have of growing up
in Bangladesh, of the light and the atmos-
phere being amazing. The space that I was
allocated had intense light coming in, and
I wanted to take advantage of that and
create a calm and meditative environment
that people could enter and experience. In
material terms, what I took from that was
the aspect of how light flittered through
the installation, and I thought of how I
could find something that was more per-
manent. Again, I work with materials that
sometimes don’t last, and I have to find
a way to make them last. And I wanted to
try and embody color in the work as well.
The mesh works were a response to the
basketwork. I had been looking at Josef
Albers for a while. I haven’t been able to
read his books, though, because I hate
reading—I’m dyslexic. I have to read the
same paragraph 10 times over. Hence, I
have always taken a specific approach to
my research. My research into light and
form wasn’t done through books; it was
done by physically working with materials.
The same with my research into color—it
was done through physically working with
colored materials. Here, I felt like these
materials related to Albers in terms of the Installation view with (left) No. 623 M Drawing, 2015, vinyl and powder-coated mild steel, 67 x 75
colors. x 73 cm.; and (right) No. 624 M Drawing, 2015, vinyl and powder-coated mild steel, 64 x 74 x 46 cm.
RP: Homage to the Square?
RB: Yes, stacks of colored squares on top RB: That is a really good question. I have always been interested in objects as things,
of one another. My work references that, and I see furniture as something that isn’t solely about the purpose for which it is made.
and I have been really excited by it. Then There is also a beauty to furnishings, involving a sculptural side. If they are in a space
there are the outdoor sculptures and where there is a play of light or reflection of light, it can be really amazing; and that is
drawings from the straw pieces, and again, how I see it. So, I don’t have the burden of the history and intention of design as a disci-
I love the contrast between light and pline; I am seeing it purely for its elemental aesthetics.
heavy, fragile and harsh. In the case of my RP: We think of furniture as utilitarian, but what is intriguing about your furniture is that
furniture, I love blurring the boundaries the objects become interesting when they are not being used. It is a shift of focus in how
PHILIP WHITE, COURTESY THE ARTIST

between painting, sculpture, design, and we consider something omnipresent.

architecture.
RP: Your move into physical forms as furni-
ture is incredibly interesting. Do you feel
burdened by the exercise of design, or
are you able to move into that realm very
easily?
RB: Furniture, even in how it is placed within a space, becomes interesting for me, and it
is that side of the object that has a function in works like No. 372 Bench (2013) and No. 431
Bench (2013). This also goes back to the materials that I sometimes use in my work.
Adhesive tape has a function; it is not made for aesthetic reasons. But by my action, I am
turning it into something else. Hazard tape has a function, reflectors have a function—
they are made for a purpose. This is the same approach that I take in terms of the furni-

Sculpture September 2017 27

22-29_sclp_sept_2017.qxp_Layout 1 7/21/17 11:29 AM Page 28

Above: No. 648 L Mesh (detail), 2015. Paint on

stainless steel, 227 x 137 x .5 cm. Left: No. 610 M
Mesh, 2015. Paint on mild steel, 113 x 143 x .5 cm.

ture. Yes, the pieces can have a function,

but at the same time, they can be objects
that exist in space.
RP: Do you collaborate on the production?
RB: No, the furniture is solely my own work.
I was asked to design something for an Ital-
ian company. I designed a bench, and then
they chose not to make it. I ended up
making it for my second show at Bischoff/
Weiss, and it took off; it did really well.
RP: Your work is sophisticated in its Mod-
ernist simplicity. Does it, like the sculptures
of Flavin or Judd, require knowledge of
certain disciplines to understand it as art?
RB: It is not easily relatable, because the
work doesn’t have a narrative. There isn’t
a story, and I don’t title my works; they are
titled in the order they are produced. There
isn’t something there that someone can
connect to easily and say, “Oh yeah, I recog-
nize this because it is this landscape, it is
PHILIP WHITE, COURTESY THE ARTIST

this building, or it is that person.” There is

none of that—it is abstract. It has totally
to do with light, surface, color, and form.
These are all things that we see around us
and that many people don’t notice. For my
part, I am taking those elements from the
outside and relocating them inside, on a

28 Sculpture 36.7
22-29_sclp_sept_2017.qxp_Layout 1 7/21/17 11:30 AM Page 29
Above: No. 431 Bench, 2013. Paint, lacquer, and walnut laminate on MDF, 45 x 220 x 50 cm. Below: No. 604, 2014–15. Paint on plywood, 84 x 50 x 25 cm.
TOP: PHILIP WHITE, COURTESY THE THIRD LINE / BOTTOM: PHILIP WHITE, COURTESY THE ARTIST
wall; by doing so, I draw attention to them. I just didn’t think the
response would be that great, to be honest.
RP: Not only is the work visually minimal, but you are asking view-
ers to think more reductively, asking them to enter a space with
a select number of objects while removing themselves entirely from
the outside world.
RB: Exactly, but then at the same time, I am engaging with
Sculpture September 2017
materials and forms that are universal and recognizable—the
square, the triangle, the rectangle, the circle. Which means that
anywhere in the world, anyone of any background or religion can
connect with the work. It is a universal language that everyone
can understand.
Rajesh Punj is a curator and writer based in London.
29
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30-33_sclp_sept_2017.qxp_Layout 1 7/21/17 11:35 AM Page 31
John
Duff
BY AMY LIPTON
STAN SCHNIER PHOTOGRAPHY, COURTESY THE ARTIST AND HILL GALLERY
Opposite: Installation view of “John
Duff Sculpture,” 2016. This page:
Inverse Ratio, 2012. Urethane resin
and steel, 101 x 31 x 31 in.
Sculpture September 2017
John Duff, a New York-based sculptor long associated with abstract,
austere, and often totemic-looking objects, exhibited a new and
decidedly different body of work last year. His first solo exhibition
in 12 years, it was held in an unconventional setting. Friend and
fellow artist Neil Jenney presented Duff’s new work in his West
Broadway Gallery, in the one-time artist’s neighborhood of SoHo.
The exhibition was sponsored by the Hill Gallery of Birmingham,
Michigan, which also produced a lush catalogue with essays
by Deborah Solomon and Pierre Hohenberg, Professor Emeritus,
New York University Physics Department.
Created over the past several years and titled “Achieving Neces-
sity—Arithmetic Constructions,” this new body of work, in Duff’s
opinion, is the most complex and original of his 50-plus-year
career. For anyone familiar with Duff’s history and the singular
vision and steadfastness of his work, it is easy to see why this is
true. The new works are created by casting found spheres in ure-
thane resin, using steel rings at the points of contact between
the spheres, and casting the interior space created by their
assembly, resolving what would otherwise be an uncastable space.
This allows the viewer to comprehend what would not normally
be seen. Duff makes the invisible visible and offers an uncanny
vision of presence and absence. The resulting sculptures are pro-
foundly eccentric objects and a radical departure.
31
30-33_sclp_sept_2017.qxp_Layout 1 7/21/17 11:35 AM Page 32
Above: Two Moves, 2015. Polyurethane resin and steel, 25 x 91 x 28 in. Below: The Torch, 2014. Urethane
resin and steel, 75 x 31 x 31 in. Right: Inside the Kepler Conjecture III, 2010. Urethane resin and steel,
47 x 22 x 22 in.
Known for process-driven, spare yet ele-
gant, post-Minimalist sculptures, Duff has
exhibited in major museums in New York
City and across the country since 1969. He
was one of the youngest artists (in his early
20s) included in Marcia Tucker’s landmark
1969 Whitney Museum exhibition, “Anti-
Illusion: Procedure/Materials.” Considering
the works that made Duff’s reputation, one
could not have predicted the turn taken by
his recent sculptures. These bold, thought-
fully constructed objects based on mathe-
matical concepts have a commanding
presence. Quirky, organic abstractions, they
relate to the natural world, but only in the
strictest sense, in terms of nature’s repeti-
tive forms. Honeycombs, hornet’s nests,
insects, ocean creatures, and coral reefs come
to mind, but the sculptures themselves are
pure abstractions. Though Duff is not inter-
ested in illusionistic or referential work,
the columns can still be felt as looming pres-
ences, imposing and alien, with lush, trans-
parent, almost painterly surfaces.
A stalwart loner, Duff has been seques-
tered away in his studio for years and rarely
looks at other art. He has a rigorous work
ethic and daily studio schedule, driven by
dedication to his craft and to the importance
and purity of abstraction. To his credit, the
new works resemble very little else in con-
temporary sculpture; they are in a category
of their own. Duff admits that the past 12
years of freedom, with no pressure from a
commercial gallery to influence his produc-
tion, played an important role in this out-
pouring of creative expression. He operates
32
at what he calls “the level of necessity,
in imitating the processes of nature and
working with the forces of time and mat-
eriality.”1
Duff began as a ceramic artist. He was a
Southern California surfer, who started
working with clay at age 18 while a high
school student in Newport Beach. The glaz-
ing of ceramic surfaces has carried forward
into the gorgeous, complex colors of his
fiberglass and resin-based work. His process
of pouring black and white urethane resin
into the interior space of the assembled
spheres or molds also derives from glazing.
Duff says, “When I discovered ceramics, I felt
that the work was as fun as surfing but
something that I could keep doing through-
out my life.” In the new works, he allows the
liquid-pouring process to work with gravity.
The resulting surfaces nicely demonstrate STAN SCHNIER PHOTOGRAPHY, COURTESY THE ARTIST AND HILL GALLERY
John Cage’s theory of chance operations.
I recently had the rare opportunity to
view several of Duff’s early works—Rainbow
Bridge (1969), Tie Piece (1969), Triangle
Piece (1971), and Sloping Column (1974)—
along with one of his newest works, Pillar of
Salt (2013), when I was invited to visit the
collection of Jasper Johns, who has been an
ardent supporter of Duff’s work over the
decades. Since the ’60s, Duff has worked in
a variety of materials, including clay, wax,
wood, cement, plaster, bronze, steel, fiber-
glass, and resin. Whatever the material, his
Sculpture 36.7
 interest has remained true to non-refer-
ential abstraction, the work’s exterior
surfaces, colors, and tones exuding a recal-
citrant beauty. Seeing these works in rela-
tion to one another in Johns’s collection
made clear the consistency of Duff’s interest
in formal beauty, as well as the delicacy,
precision, and rigor that he has applied to
decades of sculpture. As he states, “Nature
is beautiful because of its absolute coher-
ence. This operates on a level we can’t
understand, but we know and accept it. In
my work, the nature of the piece asserts
itself; I follow its lead.”
Duff’s new works have been inspired by
and adhere to mathematical and scientific
principles—namely the Kepler conjecture,
formulated by the 17th-century mathemati-
cian Johannes Kepler. This hypothesis relates
to the close packing of equally sized spheres,
which results in a greater density than the
74.04 percent achievable by a process that
mathematicians call hexagonal close pack-
ing.2 Duff asserts that the 24.6 percent of
empty space is his sculpture. Duff discovered
STAN SCHNIER PHOTOGRAPHY, COURTESY THE ARTIST AND HILL GALLERY
the Kepler conjecture in 2008, when he saw
a printed card announcing “Starting with
the Universe,” a Buckminster Fuller exhibi-
tion at the Whitney Museum. The image
had six circles around one larger circle and
represented the smallest unit of hexagonal
close packing. In his new work, Duff is cast-
ing the space left over from a physics model
into a solid—an exploration that continues
to delight and surprise him. As he says,
“I knew if I could create an artifact that con-
tains an arithmetic order, I wouldn’t have to
trouble myself about trying to make it beau-
Sculpture September 2017
tiful; or even its appearance. A work in a Above: Conjoined Hexagon, 2015. Polyester, ure-
perfectly attuned state of coherence and thane resin and steel, 21.5 x 76 x 57 in. Below: Die
interdependence and necessity is ipso facto Fackel, 2012. Urethane resin and steel, 80 x 23.5
a beautiful mathematical object.” x 23.5 in.
Duff’s new sculptures, based on these
mathematical principles, result in iconic
forms. They take on an archaic presence.
The forms are containers, hollow and open.
Volume and line become one; there’s an
internal logic and interdependence. These
works are impossible to pin down to a spe-
cific time or place in terms of an art move-
ment. With no single visual message, they
are in constant flux, imbued with a life
force. Duff’s obsessive and ongoing inquiry
into the meaning of abstraction presents
itself clearly in this work. Aesthetics and sci-
ence are intertwined, activated by the artist
and the viewer’s engagement with the
process and materials. As Duff explains, “To
engage with sculpture ‘in the manner of
[nature’s] operation’ is to be moving in the
same area, the same field, as science,
hence the reciprocal flow of content. The
struggle (or dance) between nature and
human nature is the motive force of the
work, or, as Marx said, ‘The effort that goes
into the work is recorded in the work.’”
Notes
1 Quotations from the artist are from a series of interviews conducted in
2016. More information about John Duff can be found at <www.hillgallery.
com>.
2 Walter Idlewild, “The Two Levers of Meaning,” Language and Philosophy,
July 2015.
Amy Lipton is a curator and writer and the
director of ecoartspace in New York.
33
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The Work Takes

Control of Itself
A Conversation with

BY MARÍA CAROLINA BAULO

34-39_sclp_sept_2017.qxp_Layout 1 7/21/17 12:01 PM Page 35

Pasaje, 2015. 8 acrylic disks, LEDs, and motors, 200 x 100 cm.
34-39_sclp_sept_2017.qxp_Layout 1 7/21/17 12:02 PM Page 36
Mariana Villafañe’s work emerges from the study of geometric-morpho-
logical patterns, a dialogue between mathematics, pure geometry, and
abstraction that gains focus from a sensorial point of view. Villafañe
tries to find visual means of representation for movement, as well as
the sounds and vibrations that it generates. A student of architecture
and visual arts, she attended seminars with outstanding artists, critics,
and international curators. Her works have been exhibited at contempo-
rary art fairs and shows in Buenos Aires, Bogotá, Miami, Lima, Santiago,
New York, Paris, and Berlin. In 2016, she had a solo exhibition, “Paisajes
Audibles” (“Audible Landscapes”), at the Recoleta Cultural Center in
Buenos Aires. Her work is represented by Galerie Mark Hachem in Paris.
36
Above and detail: Vibratum I, 2016. 15 acrylic disks,
motors, and tablets, 300 x 200 cm.
María Carolina Baulo: Your work references
Marcel Duchamp, Max Bill, Gyula Kosice,
and Concrete art. How did you discover
these influences? How do you think they’ve
affected your work? And how did you
strengthen or neutralize them by adding
your own creative point of view?
Mariana Villafañe: Concrete and abstract
art were very difficult to approach. On one
hand, their aesthetics subjugated me, and
at the beginning of my career, I found it dif-
ficult to associate them with my own work.
This dysfunctional bond led me to investi-
gate those artists more closely; I discovered
and became passionate about the mathe-
matical and philosophical theories, the
intrinsic metaphysics, within their works.
My first training was in architecture. I am
familiar with the management and study
of forms.
Duchamp’s Rotoreliefs (1935) particularly
resonated with me. He used a turntable
to display and reproduce drawings that, as
they moved, produced an optical transfor-
mation in the viewer. The record player
wasn’t a minor object for me; it had great
meaning. That first contact with Duchamp’s
work was reinforced by Bicycle Wheel (1913),
the genesis of kinetic art and the first sculp-
ture of frequency. Duchamp inverts the rela-
Sculpture 36.7
34-39_sclp_sept_2017.qxp_Layout 1 7/21/17 12:02 PM Page 37

Top: Installation view of “Paisajes Audibles,” 2016. Above left: Torriente y transformacion, 2016. Acrylic disks, motors, and motion sensor, 150 cm. diameter. Above
right: Piedra al agua, 2016. Acrylic disks, motors, and motion sensor, 150 cm. diameter.

tive importance of the object and the process that is set in motion
in the artistic endeavor—the result is creative activity.
With Max Bill, I’m interested in his logic. Fifteen variations on a
single theme (1938) could be the synthesis of that logic—the work
as a result of the application of different laws to an ordered struc-
ture. In both cases, and with most of the artists to whom I’m drawn,
I try to imagine how they would think if they were immersed in a
contemporary context, how their works would be today.
MCB: The critic and curator Rodrigo Alonso refers to your most
recent work as triggered by certain childhood memories, which led
you to study the links between visual patterns and the poetic mate-
rialization of memory. Following his analysis, your work does not
respond to scientific questions but tries to merge immaterial sound
with physical materiality, all evoked by memories. As an example,
could you talk about the series “Wish You Were Here” (2013)?
MV: I always wanted to materialize the immaterial. How do we
shape what has no shape? How do we treasure memories? How
we can modify them? The preceding sound and vibration, the human
substance that connects us, how can these things be visually repre-
sented? I keep investigating. It is like developing a program to trans-
late sound into forms—that is what I have been doing subjectively
in my work. But it will always remain subjective, because the prede-

Sculpture September 2017 37

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termined choice of forms is subjective. If it were a program, it would create a
non-textual universal language, but my work, of course, is subjective. Being
less ambitious, my works have a visual effect produced by fragmentation and
repetition, which creates, for me, rhythm and movement translated into sound.
“Wish you were here” is a series of juxtaposed morphological patterns,
part of the first lines that I made with a musical instrument adapted to draw.
The device draws lines but never repeats paths, resulting in a pure random-
ness that generates the sensation of vibration and movement in a static sup-
port as if drawing on paper.
MCB: The “Cajas de Resonancias” (“Resonance Boxes,” 2014) and “Resonancias”
(“Resonances,” 2015) series were created by using an object (a turntable) to
develop random designs on paper and fabric, which then have the final touch
given manually. Could you explain the process?
MV: In “Cajas de Resonancias,” I understood that in order for the materialization
to take place, I should give some space to the tracks made by the modified
record player that once belonged to my father. I decided to put the resulting
graphics onto paper and superimpose them within transparent acrylic boxes.
38
Metrónomo, 2016. Black acrylic, mirrored sheet, and hardware,
90 x 30 x 10 cm.
This task requires great precision because it is fragile
and subtle. By superimposing the graphics in layers
held by tiny transparent supports on black paper, I
could create a third dimension, but at the same time,
they are contained in clear boxes that protect them.
They become like internal voices, invitations to listen to
ourselves deeply. I can’t help thinking about the body of
a guitar vibrating, an internal voice in the solar plexus.
MCB: How much do you leave to randomness?
MV: Because of my way of working, my obsessions
and demands, I think that I control everything until
the work takes control of itself. That space for wonder
fills each piece with meaning; it must function as
a resonance box prior to any process of signification.
MCB: Your body of work has an aesthetic coherence.
Expanding from small-format works to the installations
is almost like observing the growth of fractal patterns.
There is the movement, for example, from Vibratum,
Torrente y Transformación (Torrent and Transforma-
tion), and Piedra al Agua (Stone to Water) to the large-
scale Pasaje (Passage).
MV: Pasaje was the first of my kinetic installations; it’s
the result of my observations about the changes that
take place when reproducing patterns with real move-
ment. This is where I rediscovered and appropriated
Duchamp’s Rotoreliefs and variation number 14 from
Bill’s Fifteen variations on a single theme. These two
works are included in Pasaje as a tribute. I start from
the abstract shape of the black circle in the original
graphics, move to the works of Duchamp and Bill, and
finally end in an illuminated graphic—eight pieces with
engines and lights that produce vibrations in their inter-
sections and overlaps. It must be read from the dark-
ness into the light, from left to right. At that instance,
you understand that, without movement, there is
no transformation; and there’s no visual transformation
without a personal inner movement. Transformation
equals evolution.
MCB: You reduce the palette to black and white, a
choice which is not purely aesthetic. It reflects scien-
tific standards for measuring the aural spectrum.
MV: Definitely. I am fascinated by spectrometers and
scientific graphics, and I wanted, in this series particu-
larly, to avoid color information, to maximally reduce
it in order to achieve a greater abstraction, a more pre-
cise, pure, specific reading of the work—an extreme
reduction with minimal resources. This work already
contained a lot of information in its genesis—what the
curator of the exhibition, Rodrigo Alonso, called
“the hook”—and I didn’t want any other interferences.
Renato Rita, curator of the exhibition “Paisajes Audibles”
Sculpture 36.7
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Right and detail: Transformacion, 2015. 1980 record player

with drawing device attached to the plectrum, drawings on cot-
ton paper drawn with the record player according to the math-
ematical theory of Gödel, graphs of light frequency, rotation,
and sound vibration, quartz, geodes, music box, and mirrors,
150 x 150 x 70 cm.

called it “the shadow of color,” which I found extremely

revealing, along with his concept of “magnified draw-
ing,” drawing without limits, a drawing that is also
painting and installation but that is still determined
by the presence of the line.
MCB: “Paisajes Audibles,” your show at the Recoleta
Cultural Center in Buenos Aires, was designed as a large
installation in which a geometric mural and two mov-
ing acrylic circles interacted. This minimal configuration
allowed enough space to walk around without getting
caught in the vertigo generated by the dynamism. How
did you make this installation so imposing?
MV: The exhibition was conceived from the beginning
as a great installation. The layout of the room invited
movement. There was a luminous white, calm, rotating
vortex (Stone to Water) facing—with 35 meters of sepa-
ration—a dynamic, chaotic, rotating black vortex (Tor-
rent and Transformation), and between them were the
viewers. A 12-meter-long mural accompanied the walk
between them, inviting reflection on the idea of the
magnified drawing (which is also painting), a line with-
out limits, a journey, a path, a medium, a space of
travel, and expansion. Renato Rita helped me make the
decision not to show too much, since the two moving
pieces were intense enough.
MCB: How do you think about particular elements—
how they work separately and how the installation
articulates them? Do you make sketches or go straight
to the final materials?
MV: I think and think and think. I think a lot before each
work, and I make sketches before the final piece. In the
case of the kinetic installations, I work with an anima-
tion program. I test them to know if they produce what eries, tests, and inventions. The most common thing is to see me stripping
I expect. The program allows me to reproduce the cables and connecting transformers.
sketches at the actual speed of the engines. In the case MCB: How important is the concept in your work?
of public installations, I use renders. These days, I’m MV: It is everything.
working with an architecture studio to install one of my MCB: You have shown your work in spaces as diverse as galleries, fairs, and
works on the façade of a building in Buenos Aires, and the outdoors. What would be the ideal space to present your installations?
we are also producing the scale models together. MV: I don’t think there is an ideal space; the work must function every-
MCB: I understand that you work with teams of people where. There are spaces that are kinder to certain works and those that need
who help you to produce the works. a more intimate reading. But I prefer my work to reach people in the way
MV: It is difficult for me to delegate the production that it has to and then gain significance. Sometimes I hear people comment
of my works. I am absolutely present in everything, on my work without recognizing me as the artist, and I enjoy that a lot,
although lately I am relying on industrial designers and because I always discover that the message is the same—it’s common to
electronics specialists to finish shaping my ideas and everyone.
materializing them as I want them to be. It is not easy
to combine art and technology—a whole field of discov- María Carolina Baulo is a writer based in Buenos Aires.

Sculpture September 2017 39

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Drawing Time From Light

40-45_sclp_sept_2017.qxp_Layout 1 7/21/17 12:51 PM Page 41

Kevin Killen BY BRIAN MCAVERA

CHRIS BAR

Certain Moments, 2015. Neon, 60 x 180 cm.

40-45_sclp_sept_2017.qxp_Layout 1 7/21/17 12:51 PM Page 42

Above: Certain Moments, 2015. Neon, 60 x 180

cm. Right: Captured Movement, 2014. Photograph
of light drawing.

Artists who use neon, an expensive medium,

are not thick on the ground in Ireland.
Those of us who are, shall we say, of a
mature generation, probably think of Dan
Flavin’s Minimalist sculptures or perhaps
of François Morellet’s pulsing forms, both
bodies of neon works dating from the early
’60s onward. We might think of Robert
Irwin’s more painterly shapes, Keith Son-
nier’s abstracted figuration, or of Bruce
Nauman, who often deployed neon for its
consumer-cultural references. Artists as
various as Joseph Kosuth and Tracey Emin
have produced neon text pieces—rigorous
in the case of Kosuth and sentimental in
the case of Emin—while Iván Navarro has
upped the ante, creating large-scale and
often freestanding installations. So where
does Kevin Killen fit, if at all, in this partic- public art, producing, with PEACE money (a financial dividend funneled into projects for
ular constellation of artists? peace and reconciliation), numerous large-scale sculptures for local communities, hospi-
Killen was born in the Downpatrick area tals, and most recently, the Wellcome-Wolfson Institute for Experimental Medicine at
TOP: CHRIS BAR / BOTTOM: COURTESY THE ARTIST

of Northern Ireland in 1977. His father,
who owned a small farm, was also a scrap-
man, and not surprisingly, the young
Killen learned how to weld at an early age.
Exposure to various metals and to various
techniques of working with them, com-
bined with the practical business ethic of
his father, would come to fruition later,
when he developed a parallel practice in
Queen’s University in Belfast, where he made a globe-like structure based on a mapping
of his left eye—a fitting motif for a research center specializing in eye diseases.
Killen studied art in England, at the Surrey Institute of Art & Design (now the University
for the Creative Arts), where he spent an initial year in three-dimensional design before
transferring to fine art. As a student, he became interested in the sculpture of David
Smith and in repetitive forms, patterns such as repeated archways, doorframes, and
lamps. After college, he traveled for a year and a half in Australia and America, where
he was first struck by Aboriginal art and then by the works in the sculpture park at the
Walker Art Center in Minneapolis.

42 Sculpture 36.7
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Unlike many Irish artists, Killen didn’t just drift into his career. With his
father’s business background in mind, he was determined to make a living out
of art, and when he returned home, he set about analyzing the art sector and
meeting the relevant people. After a long period in which his work was domi-
nated by the craft element, he decided that it was time to pursue his own inter-
ests. Because “Northern Ireland is very guarded in relation to techniques”—
people tend not to share information—he went back to the U.S. in the summer
of 2009 “to get the knowledge and the skills,” taking a six-week course with 83-
year-old Ed Waldrum at the School of Neon in Dallas.
For Killen, it was playing with “the light which emanated and spilled into
space. The question was how to manipulate it.” He noticed that often, “once
guys had learned how to bend a piece of neon, they stopped,” whereas he
wanted to explore: “It’s a seductive material. It can be loud and aggressive and
TOP: SIMON MILLS / BOTTOM: CHRIS BAR
imprint on your eyeball, so I wanted to quiet it down a little.” He wanted
answers to questions such as: Why do a bend? What’s the purpose? He realized
that “everything has a source point, so what I do is deconstruct and translate
into light.”
When he returned home from the U.S. for the second time, he started to spe-
cialize in neon works, developing two different strands of practice more or less
concurrently—one concerned with capturing the movements of dancers and
Sculpture September 2017
Above: A1 to F.E. McWilliam Gallery, 2015. Neon, 100 x 240
x 30 cm. Left: A24 & M1 to Great Patrick St, 2015. Neon, 270
x 240 x 90 cm.
performance artists and the other with recording the
cartography of urban landscapes. With Killen’s rural
background, going to a big city meant that he “was daz-
zled by the noise, the busyness, and the images invading
my space.” As a result, he “started to play with photog-
raphy,” a technique that would be seminal for his two
different practice strands.
In relation to the movement-related works, such as
Neon Dance, he is quite clear about his techniques and
objectives: “In [this] work, light plays a role in trans-
lating ephemeral movement into tangible sculptural
forms. The light compositions are created through col-
laborations between performance artists, dancers, and
myself. My initial role is that of observer and photo-doc-
umenter, studying the patterns created when the artist
performs. I then create site-specific neon light sculp-
tures and installations, which are the aftermath of our
combined experience. In this way, the static sculptures
embody the transience of the performance.” To achieve
his initial documentation, Killen connects a dancer to
one or more lights, which results in a complex record of
the lights in motion, following kicks or arm movements
in fluent arabesques that read as predominantly linear
images. These records are made using a GoPro camera
and a Canon 450 DSLR.
The performances take place in a darkened space.
Killen explains, “As their performances begin, I photo-
graph their choreography using the camera as a drawing
tool—long exposures that track the staccato beams
of light and their gestures over time. The result is pho-
tographic drawings that trace the lines of their actions;
as the camera moves with the dancers, accidents occur,
adding spontaneity and playfulness to the drawings.
In a sense, the line drawings are a re-enactment of the
performances, with the end results extending beyond
the original performances both as an archive and a vehi-
cle for creating the neon work.” For him, “the viewer
43
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can move around the sculptural works, imagining the path of the performers’
bodies and our collaboration within the space.”
Killen, however, does more than trace movement. Taking his work a stage
further in terms of replication—or translation—he also wants to incorporate
the heartbeat and breathing of the dancers. He “correlates the different inhala-
tion rhythms to match the sequence of the neon lights as they turn on and
off, embodying the real-time kinetics of the original performance, activating the
space with dark pauses in one instance and bright glows the next. In some
ways, I’m questioning how far the human emotion and gesture of performance
can be captured in my final neon sculptures.”
Killen began his second type of work—mappings of the urban landscape—
with a series of test pieces in 2011 and 2012 based on Belfast motorways,
44
Tipping Point, 2016. Neon, 60 x 120 cm.
including the M1 J5 Belfast to South, the M2 J5 Belfast
to Templepatrick, or the M1 J1 West Link. These works,
often in bright primary colors, were presented against
large slabs of wood covered in black primer and car
paint to produce a shiny surface play of shadows and
reflections. “We take technology, such as the flow of
traffic, for granted,” Killen explains. He took his photo-
graphs at night, under cloudy conditions, with no full
moon and no rain. The exposures, which varied
between three to 15 seconds, again captured lines of
light. Sometimes, he would mount the camera on the
dashboard of his van.
For a site-specific installation at the F.E. McWilliam
Gallery in 2015, Killen took advantage of the gallery’s
location on the edge of a motorway. One night, when
the road was quiet, he used a 15-second exposure to
create a light painting of the flow of traffic coming from
the A1 toward the gallery. A much larger piece than
usual, this complex work is still predominantly linear.
That same year, Killen made a series of works for
“Endless Wander” at the Golden Thread Gallery in Belfast.
The exhibition paired him with Clement McAleer, who
produces abstracted landscapes based on memory
images rather than accurate cartographic observation.
Killen responded to the show’s theme by walking around
Belfast at night and recording his journeys in images of
passing vehicles and city lights. He then spliced together
two of these images at a time, thereby suggesting a
horizon line, before turning them into neon works.
In 2016, he created an installation for QSS Gallery in
Belfast called Tipping Point. For three months, in May,
June, and July, he walked around the area adjacent
to the gallery with his GoPro camera. He wanted to cap-
ture the kinetic aspect of the walks and the palette of
the city itself, which, as he has noted, reveals “a hidden
world when you use a long exposure: like jewels in the
night.” He also recorded sounds—a passing fire brigade,
the screech of seagulls, people laughing and talking—
and translated that noise, the heartbeat of the city, into
the pulsing of the neon in the final work. In the same
way, he translated the palette of the city into the colors
of the neon. For the sculpture, he selected two photos
from those he had taken, asking himself questions such
as: “What can I pull out of that one—an orange line?
A green line?”
Killen’s work involves a lengthy process. First, there
is the “drawing” with the camera. Then, there is the
selection of the drawings from which he will extract
lines and patterns. On occasion, and increasingly so of
late, Killen cuts the drawings up or collages them
SIMON MILLS
together. He then makes the individual lines in 10-mil
steel bars, twisting and bending them to draw with the
Sculpture 36.7
40-45_sclp_sept_2017.qxp_Layout 1 7/21/17 12:51 PM Page 45
Tipping Point, 2016. Neon, 60 x 120 cm.
steel. Sometimes, he colors this rough template. With Tipping
Point, he wanted to juxtapose two of the drawings, so he used Pho-
toshop to work out the options, which is how the triangular shape
of the piece eventually emerged. Finally, the template form is trans-
lated into neon. In the case of Tipping Point, Killen painted some of
the neon black to represent the lampposts and poles that appeared
on the drawings as black bands.
For Killen, “the city streets are my canvas. The city light is my ink,
and my camera is the drawing tool. I control the freehand long
exposure of my camera, allowing me to track trails of light. Objects
and people imprint as black marks as they obstruct the light from
the traffic and city lights. I later deconstruct and visualize these
photographic images in three-dimensional neon installations, trans-
lating the urban setting into kinetic light pulses.” He “constructs
each aspect of the neon sculptures. Through this, I gain a degree of
SIMON MILLS
control and can challenge the medium by removing the industrial
maker and adapting traditional neon techniques to free the
Sculpture September 2017
medium from its conventional restrictive space. This allows me an
unreconstructed approach to both my research and my practical
work. I’ve attempted to ‘tame’ the medium so that the neon light
whispers, inviting the viewer in closer to the work.”
So, where does Killen fit into the world of neon art? He has a
strong preference for the work of artists like Sonnier and Morellet,
but he owes little to them. Like photo artists such as Peter
Richards or Martina Corry, what Killen does is register compressed
time. His cartography and choreography—whether of motor-
ways, cities, or human beings—form a literal mapping, as well
as a psychological and emotional re-creation of particular places
and events. By using night images as his baseline, he demonstrates
that there is an alternative reality to be unveiled. His process,
from collage and Photoshop to metal templates, has evolved to
transubstantiate individual, partial views into a new vision, one
that moves progressively from two to three dimensions, all through
a dance with time as it intersects with space.
Brian McAvera is a playwright and critic based in Northern Ireland.
45
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46-51_sclp_sept_2017.qxp_Layout 1 7/21/17 1:17 PM Page 47

Everything Is Alive
A Conversation with

Maria Nepomuceno
BY ROBERT PREECE Dynamic forms, organic shapes, and bright colors
loaded with implied growth and energy characterize
Maria Nepomuceno’s work. “Everything is in transfor-
RAUL TABORDA, © MARIA NEPOMUCENO, COURTESY THE ARTIST AND VICTORIA MIRO, LONDON

mation,” she says. “Everything is alive in the work.”

Opposite and this page: Untitled, 2016.
Ropes, beads, ceramic, and braided
straw, 200 x 100 x 90 cm.
Beginning with a point and a line—via a bead and a
string—Nepomuceno builds up forms and composi-
tions, creating sculptures and installations that aim to
exchange “affection” between artworks and viewers/
participants. This affection has clearly resonated,
prompting invitations for solo exhibitions at the Victoria
Miro Gallery in London (2016–17), the Barbican Centre
in London (2016), the Museu de Arte Moderna in Rio
de Janeiro (2013), Turner Contemporary in Margate,
England (2012), and Magasin III in Stockholm (2010).
Born in Rio de Janeiro, Nepomuceno continues to live
in and draw inspiration from that city.

Sculpture September 2017 47

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Robert Preece: In the multi-part AMOR ball, you document reactions to per-
formances in various places around the world. It was first performed on a beach
in Rio in 2003, then at the Rio Carnival in 2009, and in Margate (on the occasion
of your solo exhibition at Turner Contemporary) and in a rural village in north-
west Brazil in 2012. Could you tell me about this work?
Maria Nepomuceno: The idea started from a very particular situation. It was a
Sunday, and I had tickets to see the play Alice in Wonderland with my daughter.
On the same day, there was a demonstration on the beach protesting the Amer-
ican declaration of war against Iraq. I was watching the play, but my thoughts
were on the demonstration. I was totally distracted when, suddenly, the actors
threw a giant inflatable ball at the audience, and when I realized what was hap-
pening, the ball was almost on me. I had to interact with it so that it would not
48
Above: Installation view of “Tempo para Respirar,” 2013. Left:
AMOR ball, 2012. View of performance in rural village in Acre,
northwestern Brazil.
hit me full on. AMOR ball was born from my mixed feel-
ings at that moment—torn between Alice in Wonder-
land and the declaration of war. The object took the
form of an inflatable pink ball, two meters in diameter,
with the word “AMOR” written on it.
The actions worked a bit like caring-terrorist attacks.
The ball was thrown into crowds on the beach and at
TOP: PEPE SCHETTINO, © MARIA NEPOMUCENO, COURTESY THE ARTIST AND MAM RIO DE JANEIRO / BOTTOM: COURTESY THE ARTIST
Carnival, and people were forced to interact with this
giant object, feeling a mixture of desire and fear. The
same action, performed on my trip to an indigenous
Huni Kuin community in Acre, in northwestern Brazil,
was very important because it promoted a transfor-
mation in the work. Because there was no electricity,
it was not possible to inflate the ball with a compres-
sor. So, I decided to create a different AMOR ball. It
had several valves and people filled it by using their
mouths. From my point of view, this completely
changed the work. The object was no longer so threat-
ening, since the participants had contact with the
empty ball first. Using air from their own lungs, they
gave life to the AMOR ball.
This piece relates to my work as a whole because it
is a great sphere, a form that I frequently use to evoke
macro- and microcosms and to foreground the rela-
tion between the object and one’s body. The word
“AMOR” is inscribed with the desire for physical con-
tact, in a caring way—though that has not always been
the case during these activities. My work as a whole
aims at an exchange of affection with the viewer/
participant. This is the essence of the work.
Sculpture 36.7
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RP: Your work is characterized by organic
shapes and, often, bright colors. To what
extent do you consider these forms and col-
ors to be from nature? Are they more influ-
enced by Surrealism, or maybe fantasy?
MN: In my choice of colors, there is the
desire to create an imaginary nature that
would be a mixture of all natural organ-
isms—plants, animals, planets, and human
beings. In these works, colors are always
LEFT: STEPHEN WHITE, © MARIA NEPOMUCENO, COURTESY THE ARTIST AND VICTORIA MIRO, LONDON / RIGHT: COURTESY THE ARTIST
undergoing a smooth passage from one to
the other. Pink becomes red, blue turns into
green, as in an eternal process of transfor-
mation. At the same time, I feel influenced
by the environment where I buy my materi-
als. Especially at the beginning, I used to
buy materials in the Saara, a large, open-
air market in the center of Rio, where they
sell materials for Carnival costumes. These
bright colors, characteristic of Carnival,
bring their special vibration to the work.
Carnival is also part of the poetic context
of the work, because it is a moment when
everyone can fulfill their fantasies of being
anything at all, from a worm to President
Obama. This freedom is really beautiful. I
want my work to absorb the freedom of
Carnival. My intention is to create free
organisms.
In my exhibition, “Tempo para Respirar,”
held at MAM Rio de Janeiro in 2013, there
were references to Surrealism in various
works. Daily objects displaced from their
functions create new uses, such as bricks
Sculpture September 2017
Left: Untitled, 2014. Bricks, cement, fiberglass, beads, and pastels, 280 x 180 x 76 cm. Above: Três vezes
ohm (3 times ohm), 2005. Blue rope, 300 x 300 x 70 cm.
or chairs, and there is also a game with scale, as in the huge basket that people can
enter. This is another aspect of the work—an attempt to find a balance between playful-
ness and the visceral.
RP: How would you describe your working process?
MN: First, I should mention the subjects that are always present in my work in one way
or another. These include the relationship between man and nature, the interpenetration
of urban space and nature, and the dizzying speed of time and the wish to slow it down.
My work also speaks about the exchange of vital energy and affection between object and
viewer, about seduction and desire, and about the eternal cycle of life in transformation.
While my work is rooted in well-defined concepts, I believe that intuition, imagination, and
the desire to always take a step further inside the work can never be left out of the creative
process.
My process is an open one. I rarely make drawings; and when I do, they are very simplified,
so that the process does not get imprisoned in previous planning. What I like to do most
as an exercise is to visualize the work mentally and set out from the mind directly into mat-
ter. Sometimes, I start a piece based on a color or a shape, and from there, I develop the
work, usually one step at a time. The work goes through various transformation processes
as it progresses and can be undone several times before reaching a final result.
I should probably confess that I love turning ready-made works into other works or
making use of already prepared parts in the studio to start something new—like a seed
that sprouts or a branch that re-roots, thus generating a new organism. I feel that in this
way, the work is always within the cycle of transformation.
RP: Would you say that your work really started to come together after 2007? Do you
recall a key moment behind what appears to be an acceleration?
MN: When I began to develop my sculptures, for example, with 3 times ohm (2005), I
used only rope and in some cases, beads. The shapes were much simpler, and there were
fewer colors, as in Untitled (2005), with the sisal ropes referring to reels or large ears,
all hand-sewn using circular movements that respect the nature of the material. To this
day, the process includes spiral constructions made by manual sewing, but little by little,
other materials have been brought to the sculptures, including pottery and braided
straw, which reflect a desire to approach indigenous and African cultures.
From 2009, the works really began to become more complex. The initial techniques
not only improved, but I also began to incorporate new techniques and to work in col-
laboration with groups of artisans. At the “Esfera Dalva” show at A Gentil Carioca in
2009, I had the opportunity to work with a group of straw braiders from the northeastern
part of Brazil.
49
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Above and detal: Untitled, 2016. Ropes, beads, wood, ceramic, and mixed media, 100 x 90 x 40 cm.

RP: Michael Asbury, in his essay for the Turner Contemporary exhibition catalogue, says:
“When asked to speak about her art, Maria Nepomuceno concisely states that it departs
from two fundamental elements: a line and a point.” How does that work?
MN: When I began my work in sculpture, I used beads and string. These materials,
besides being imbued with symbolism, refer to the foundation of geometry: the point
and the line. Through them, we can build any shape. The always-present spiral stitching
constructs an open geometric shape that sucks everything in. The work is like a black

ROBERT GLOWACKI, © MARIA NEPOMUCENO, COURTESY THE ARTIST AND VICTORIA MIRO, LONDON
hole, a large mouth that devours what is around it, and the symbolic, material, pictorial
food becomes part of a single pulsating organism.
RP: Earlier in your career, your work seems to have centered on venues in Brazil. When did
higher profile venues in other countries begin to offer exhibition opportunities for you?
MN: In 2006, the Brazilian gallery A Gentil Carioca began representing my work. That was
really the beginning of my career. Before that, I was making art, but it didn’t have a lot
of visibility. A Gentil Carioca always had the objective of participating in international fairs.
When they started to exhibit in the most important fairs and to publicize my work, interna-
tional exhibition opportunities began to open up. 2010 was another very important year
for me. I had my first solo show at Magasin III in Stockholm and my first solo show at the
Victoria Miro Gallery in London. That year, I felt that my work was becoming known to more
and more people.
RP: In Untitled (2014) and Untitled (2016), you use hollow clay bricks and organic forms
to imply a manmade element being taken over by vegetation. Do you look at organic
growth in urban environments?
MN: In Untitled (2014), I wanted to convey the idea of something being alive, vegetation
that comes from within the architecture and goes beyond the walls. I wanted to create

50 Sculpture 36.7
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Above: Magmatic, 2013. Mixed media, installation

view. Right: Pulso, 2012. Mixed media, installation
view.

something that represented the force of

nature underlying human constructions. It
NORBERT MIGULETZ, © MARIA NEPOMUCENO, COURTESY THE ARTIST AND SCHIRN KUNSTHALLE / BOTTOM: MARIO GRIZOLLI, © MARIA NEPOMUCENO, COURTESY THE ARTIST AND FUNDAÇÃO EVA KLABIN

gives you the idea that nature always wins

out. In this way, sterile space, such as a
white wall, becomes organic, and architec-
ture becomes part of the work. In Untitled
(2016), the “organisms” enter through a
pile of bricks on the ground and climb the
walls like vines. The main idea is that these
organisms can permeate anything, pene-
trate anything, and dominate any space.
I’m talking about time here as well. The
word “bead” in Portuguese is conta. This
means elements used for counting, just as
the beads of a Japa mala count the number
of mantras you will be repeating. Here, I am
accumulating both the huge amount of
time spent on the work and a huge number
of beads, so that viewers can feel their time
filled up by the work. I want to bring back over the space is a unique moment. I have to create perfect integration between work and
lost time, the time that spills out from the space. The work must dominate the architecture in a forceful and loving way. It should
walls and also climbs up them. I am pro- be comfortable without losing vigor—tension and relaxation at the same time.
posing an enlivened time. RP: Why did you use orange as the dominant color in Magmatic (2013), which was shown
RP: How do you know when a work is at the Schirn Kunsthalle in Frankfurt?
complete? MN: I wanted the installation to be monochromatic and the color to be very warm, since
MN: I have an easy time starting a piece and it would be winter in Germany. I chose orange because it is the color of magma, and the
a lot of trouble finishing. The work must work is full of volcanoes. The entire installation is like a huge eruption.
present a level of self-sufficiency, with all its RP: When did you start using paintbrushes as a material, and why?
elements becoming just one organism. An MN: Paintbrushes entered my work in 2013. I was longing to paint again but didn’t know
energetic current should be able to traverse where to start and had no particular subject in mind. Then I understood that my longing
the work as a whole. It is as if it has to be was really for painting materials, which is why I started to insert them into my work. They
irrigated with energy of its own. When it had been there in my studio all along without being used, and it was as though they were
is a larger work or an installation, like Pulso suddenly sucked into the works. The brushes, like all of the elements in the works, have
at Fundação Eva Klabin, the assemblage their own specific development. Gradually, they began to sprout branches and fork off like
process is very much alive, and the work living elements. For me, this is essential—everything is in transformation; everything
continually undergoes transformations. I like is alive in the work.
to leave the work open to change until
the end, because the moment when it takes Robert Preece is a Contributing Editor for Sculpture.

Sculpture September 2017 51

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Revisiting
Lin Tianmiao
BY ANN ALBRITTON

Protruding Patterns, 2014. Woolen

carpets, 150 sq. meters cm.
52-55_sclp_sept_2017.qxp_Layout 1 7/21/17 1:23 PM Page 54
Experimental artist Lin Tianmiao has been
dramatically expanding her work in recent
years, moving from her signature textiles,
ribbons, and threads into found objects
and sound. A recent visit to Lin’s studio
and home near Beijing offered an opportu-
nity to see current works, as she prepared
for upcoming exhibitions.
Spread along the floor, an extremely long
carpet composed of dozens of smaller woven
carpets looked much like a tapestry, with
purple and red yarn emerging in strong tufts.
The surface illustrates the title, Protruding
Patterns (2014), forming a relief of bulging
Chinese characters and several English
words, including “Duchess” and “Cherry.”
Other works involved wrapping. For instance,
a jumble of pink, undefined rods and curving
shapes included everyday objects and inter-
secting gadgets swathed in yards of pink silk-
satin ribbon; closer examination revealed
54
how the objects were trapped by their beau-
tiful, girly wrappings. A similar work, bound
in yellow satin ribbon, reinforced those
ideas, which seem to comment on the place
of women in patriarchal society.
Earlier works throughout Lin’s home and
studio were familiar, but she has not rested
there. What appeared to be a metal sculp-
ture shaped somewhat like gynecological/
obstetric stirrups or the structure of the
pelvic bone was actually covered in bronze-
colored silk. Combining old forms with new
ideas, Lin says that the fiber spheres in her
works have evolved to reflect cancer cells.
(Her mother died of cancer a few years ago.)
Balls of thread filled large bowls around the
studio and could be seen in various two-
and three-dimensional works throughout
the house. Lin references women and their
precarious place in her own culture, as well
as in others.
In 2015, Lin’s solo exhibition “HOW” in
Wenzhou, China, featured several earlier
thread works, as well as sculptures made of
artificial bones and ordinary mechanical
tools—constructions that appeared more
stereotypically masculine, though the
bones were arranged according to size and
type, eliminating gender. Toy #1, which
appeared in the same show, took the form
of a playful, revolving installation of multi-
ple circular disks covered in abstract pat-
terns; progressively decreasing in size along
the length of a central support rod, they
resembled an endlessly turning transmitter.
For the Setouchi Triennale on Japan’s
Ogijima Island (2016), Lin installed Rotation-
Revolution throughout the rooms of an
empty house. In this multi-part kinetic work,
found, discarded objects doubled as sound
sculptures. Commenting on loaded words
like “respect,” “reconstruct,” “decontami-
nate,” “migrate,” and “forego,” she says:
“These words contain the regard, curiosity,
excitement, and respect that I have for the
island. Through this I am attempting to use
the old objects left over from daily life in
an intuitive and tangible manner, tasting the
traces of past lives. Further, in the name of
art, I am reconstructing an old culture using
new aesthetics, concepts, and taste to give
it the potential of organic symbiosis.”
Lin points out that in Rotation-Revolu-
tion, she was “attempting to endow objects
with a ‘new life,’ which also produces
an aesthetic concept of ‘surplus value.’
I look[ed] for a new way of interpretation…
to reactivate the objects that were left and
forgotten in the house, to make them move
again.” Rotation-Revolution explored con-
cepts from Japanese Shinto, making a con-
nection between contemporary Japan and
its past. The tree-like forms that appeared in
several of the installations brought viewers
up close, where they could examine the
unusual assortment of items contributing
to the moving whole. These objects ranged
from discarded clocks to kitchen utensils
and Lin’s ubiquitous fiber balls. In one
installation, which protruded from the wall,
yellow silk balls dangled and spilled
Toy #1, 2015. Polyurea, metal frame, engine, and
mixed media, 3.3 meters tall, 3-meter diameter
when rotating.
Sculpture 36.7
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Above: Rotation-Revolution #17B, 2016. Below left: Rotation-Revolution #5, 2016. Below right: Rotation-Revolution #9, 2016. Multi-part installation consisting
of polyurea, steel structure, acrylic paint, silk thread, and mixed media, dimensions variable.

around silver trays, while strings of thread
hung into the space below.
Lin’s studio and home reflect her complex
use of materials in life and art. From textiles
YASUSHI
create sound, there is endless opportunity bridges past and present, uncovering
to question and to examine. By recon- echoes and correspondences.
structing fast-disappearing traditions and
ways of life through discarded items—silks, Ann Albritton is a writer based in Sara-

and threads to found objects that turn and threads, and everyday objects—her work sota, Florida.

Sculpture September 2017 55

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Made in
TIMOTHY AMUNDSON

Kayla Mattes and Justin Seibert,

The Shape of Things, 2017. Detail
of installation at Front/Space.
56-61_sclp_sept_2017.qxp_Layout 1 7/21/17 1:38 PM Page 57

the Middle

Art and the Crossroads

of Kansas City
BY ANNIE RAAB
56-61_sclp_sept_2017.qxp_Layout 1 7/21/17 1:38 PM Page 58

The Crossroads District epitomizes the

tenacity of one group of artists determined
to pioneer a creative community. Now an
essential artery of the Kansas City creative
body, the Crossroads has gone through
major transformations over the years. The
gritty birthplace of Kansas City’s beloved
First Fridays was once virtually a ghost
town, an uninhabited limbo between Mid-
town and Downtown; now it is a destina-
tion for locals and visitors on the hunt
for contemporary art. Jim Leedy, veteran
ceramic artist and grandfather of the scene,
bought property in the destitute area in the
early 1980s. Long before the neighborhood
had a name, artists simply called it Leedy-
Above: Rebecca Gemeinhardt, installation view of “Hopscotch,” Leedy-Voulkos Art Center, 2017. Below: ville. Today, the Leedy-Voulkos Art Center
Shiyuan Xu, Untitled, 2016. Porcelain, paper, and clay, 7 x 9 x 11 in. is considered one of the best places to find
large-scale ceramics and sculpture in vari-
ous mediums. Longstanding institutions
share blocks with newer galleries, inter-
lacing classic with contemporary in a bor-
derless web of expanding commerce. Hip
boutiques, coffee-shop bakeries, and world-
class restaurants are some of the many
businesses that have sprung up beside or
connected to galleries and working studios.
Even when visitors believe they are leaving
the art district, another gallery comes into
sight in an unexpected part of town—
another empty space surprisingly filled
by an artist.
The Crossroads Art District has boomed
to include more than 90 galleries altogether.
Even compact spaces, like Cerbera Gallery,
make room for exceptional small sculpture,
and local artists like Emily Connell, who
casts Hungarian Bibles in fine porcelain, can
be inches away from Beth Cavener and Tara
Donovan. Venues that make a special place
for large sculpture include the beloved Blue
Gallery, which shows Graham Lane’s self-
TOP: ERIN WOODWORTH / BOTTOM: COURTESY CERBERA GALLERY

In many ways, the story of art in Kansas City is a familiar one—adventurous and untamed, reflective bronze and wood sculptures;
with a rogue determination that lingers as a holdover from the days of the Wild West. the diverse Paragraph, where fiber sculptor
Artists are trailblazers. They are the first to persist in cold winters and hot summers, Noël Morical’s Wiggle Room turned the
working in structures suitable for little more than warehouse storage. They are the first space into another world, and the impres-
to see potential studio space in an irreparable building. They are the first to put creativity sive Weinberger Fine Arts, which represents
above profit, renting out or lending rooms to other artists for less money than conven- Misty Gamble’s decadent busts and Brett
tional landlords. They are the last to give up on underdeveloped districts and the last to Reif’s bulbous, tiled organisms. The open
yield to greedy commercialization. Artists in search of cheap housing and studio space— spaces in these galleries accommodate a
residential blank slates—plant the first seeds of growth in neglected neighborhoods, variety of sculpture, giving it plenty of room
turning them into vibrant communities. Artists in Kansas City don’t play by the rules, to breathe, and even hang from the ceiling.
because the rules are flexible in the open space between the coasts, where artists can While the established institutions of the
do their thing and be forgotten. Kansas City is for outlaws. Crossroads are worth visiting, the neigh-

58 Sculpture 36.7
56-61_sclp_sept_2017.qxp_Layout 1 7/21/17 1:38 PM Page 59

Left: Misty Gamble, Indulgence and Succulence, 2013. Ceramic, cardboard, steel, and plastic, 80 x 60 x 60 in. Right: Brett Reif, Billow, 2015. Tile, soffits, and
mixed media, 39 x 28 x 29 in.

borhood thrives on the innovation of ambitious young artists. True to the district’s humble Another gallery, emerging from the same
beginnings, student- and alumni-run spaces all over the city pump out diverse and class of Kansas City Art Institute graduates,
avant-garde work on a regular basis. Front/Space on 18th Street economizes its small lives half a mile east of Front/Space. Vulpes
area with a storefront/gallery/apartment for artists. Mixed-use spaces like this are Bastille lies just beyond an orange, fox-col-
becoming more common, responding to a younger generation that prioritizes function ored exterior wall, and a maze of studios
LEFT: E.G. SCHEMPF, COURTESY THE ARTIST / RIGHT: COURTESY THE ARTIST

and affordability over traditional gallery values. Front/Space’s widely varied, non- woven through the back host painters, pho-
commercial art events, readings, installations, musical performances, and collaborations tographers, and installation artists. Exhibi-
mean that it reinvents its aesthetic with each new show. Notable installations over the tions showcase work produced by studio
past year included Caitlin Horsmon’s room-size camera obscura—constructed to block residents and others. Shows at Vulpes
the light from the north-facing picture window and project the outside indoors on the Bastille are unique for their emphasis on
opposite wall—and Kayla Mattes and Justin Seibert’s personality quiz sculptures in The creative communication. No piece in the
Shape of Things. Horsmon’s time-based pinhole camera could be fully experienced only gallery ever feels stand-alone, and the bene-
at a certain time of sunset, engaging viewers in an of-the-moment light phenomenon. fit of artists working together in close quar-
Mattes and Seibert brought personality types to life with an algorithm that printed ters means art is treated like an ongoing
out unique shapes for every person who took the test. These shapes were folded and call and response. Artist Caranne Camarena
installed on the walls, resulting in an odd and colorful array of what essentially amounted procured the 6,300-square-foot property
to different people. Playful and unconventional, Front/Space has become a local favorite in 2012 and invited fellow graduates to
among those of us who seek something a little different. improve the space according to their unique

Sculpture September 2017 59

56-61_sclp_sept_2017.qxp_Layout 1 7/21/17 1:38 PM Page 60

visions. Group exhibitions are more like neb-

ulous conversations held by participating
artists, like the ongoing “RE/WORK” proj-
ect, a three-month experimental collabora-
tive exhibition between all the artists in
the studios. If nothing else, the overarching
goal of Vulpes Bastille is to dismantle the
myth of the solitary artist—a radical step
even for today’s creative community.
The spirit of community-building con-
tinues in Midtown, blocks away from
the Kansas City Art Institute, in an old Osco
drugstore that had been vacant for years.
Accurately named The Drugstore, the huge
space has been converted for communal stu-
dio use, with cubicle walls erected for roomy
10-by-10-foot studios. The open front room
houses exhibitions, live drawing events,
fundraisers, and raucous artist parties. (The
space is big enough for the sizable glittering
sculptures of Dylan Mortimer, whose work
examines health, Christianity, and the biol-
ogy of disease.) Every year or two, tenants
Above: Caitlin Horsmon, Practical Optics, 2016. View of installation at Front/Space. Below: Kayla Mattes rotate out or build more studios, so the work
and Justin Seibert, The Shape of Things, 2017. 2 views of installation at Front/Space. inside never stales. Each studio feels like

CENTER AND BOTTOM: TIMOTHY AMUNDSON

60 Sculpture 36.7
56-61_sclp_sept_2017.qxp_Layout 1 7/21/17 1:38 PM Page 61

a miniature gallery, but the inhabitants exchange so many ideas that common Above: El Anatsui, installation view of “Special Showing—Three
threads can be spotted during open-studio events. The area around The Drug- Pieces,” Belger Arts Center, 2009. Below: Jill McKeever, Tara Mille-
store is in a developed part of Midtown, but the neighborhood’s acceptance of ville in ruin, Littl' Otik, 2016. From a photo series shot at Wickerson
the collective that took over the old Osco represents one of the best things about Studios, featuring 1 of Michael Wickerson’s structures.
Kansas City: KC loves artists, because art symbolizes growth.
Kansas City is a unique home for contemporary art. Galleries and art busi-
nesses stick around, because the arts economy is estimated to be worth almost
$70 million. Businesses and benefactors extend their generosity by hiring artists
with some frequency. But even here, the cycle of artist-pioneered neighborhoods
often ends in rent hikes and commercial spaces. Many of the artists who
got their start in the Crossroads have moved to the outskirts, where there is less
pressure for them to sell. These eclectic spaces allow them to experiment, unre-
stricted by profitability. The Kiosk Gallery, which relocated to Columbus Park,
schedules shows based on original thought instead of demand. It allows space
for experimental projects like the Black House Collective, a residency founded by
composer Hunter Long that encourages the integration of sound, sculpture, and
performance. Considering the small size of the gallery, owners Eric and Erin Dod-
son have made a uniquely inclusive space for cross-medium experimentation.
In the East Crossroads, the Belger Crane Yard Studios provide studio and exhi-
bition space for artists working in clay, metal, and lithography. In a separate
building, the affiliated Belger Arts Center offers a less formal but continuously
charming gallery and workspace on the first floor and a vast exhibition space at
the top accessible via an old-school freight elevator. International artists, includ-
ing El Anatsui and Robert Stackhouse, have displayed critically regarded works
on this upper level, a raw-wood warehouse space with carefully arranged white
walls. Many of the ceramic works at Belger don’t require the “white cube” and
instead occupy pedestals and shelves in the unrefined interior. Belger Crane
Yard Studios and the Belger Arts Center may occupy two separate buildings, but
the residency offers two functional ceramic studios, gallery spaces, and more
in each location. A rotating cast of ceramic artists can be found in the lower-level
space, which remains raw enough to flaunt its warehouse beginnings. No matter where art begins in Kansas City, or where
Deep in the outskirts of Kansas City, in Wyandotte County, artist Michael Wick- it ends up, much of what is created eventually passes
erson has built a haven for sculptors who require more space. The 11-acre prop- through this celebrated neighborhood. What stands out
TOP: JAMES K. WALKER / BOTTOM: COURTESY THE ARTIST

erty has been completely transformed to suit iron pours, mold-making, perfor-
mance art, and even outdoor musical events. Wickerson Studios and Foundry pro-
vides tools that iron casters might find difficult to access outside the art college,
and Michael Wickerson emphasizes a hands-on, interactive experience. Inspired
by his two young boys, Wickerson pioneered a unique program for children to
attend a class and cast their first bronze sculpture as a direct way to encourage
art at an early stage. Similarly, Jacob Burmood builds and casts his large-scale
public sculptures on a 15-acre plot in a studio equipped for clay, bronze, and alu-
minum. Finished pieces are transported to be shown outside the Olathe court-
house, the University of Kansas, and the Leopold Gallery in the Crossroads.
is an overwhelming variety of mediums and a focus on
experimentation that swells with new waves of artists
each year. While the region might appear to offer less
visibility than a city on a coast, artists stick around for
the flexibility, an advantage for those beginning their
careers. Wide-open spaces, a history of community
building, and an outlaw spirit make Kansas City an
exceptional place to be an artist.
Annie Raab is a writer based in Kansas City.

Sculpture September 2017 61

Available from ISC Press

Artists Reclaim the Commons

New Works / New Territories / New Publics

Edited by Glenn Harper

and Twylene Moyer

Percent-for-art commissions may represent the official, professionalized Member Price°$24.95

face of public art, but beyond the plaza—in neighborhoods, back streets,
Non-Member Price°$29.95
and vacant lots; in suburban hinterlands, rural villages, and remote virtual
realms—another kind of art has been taking shape, one that questions the
=PZP[ZJ\SW[\YLVYNMVY
very nature and experience of the commons. Driven by artists, curators,
TVYLPUMVYTH[PVU
and nonprofit organizations, these independent projects treat public space
as more than an outdoor gallery. Whether temporary or permanent, guerrilla
or sanctioned, object or action, such works invite us to imagine alternative
ways of seeing and being while opening up new possibilities for individual
and collective consciousness. When we enter their domain, public space
becomes a site of resistance, a stage on which to enact experimental
scenarios, and a catalyst for action—a place of both art and life.
72-79_sclp_sept_2017.qxp_reviews 7/21/17 1:59 PM Page 72
reviews
N Y
Whitney Biennial 2017
Whitney Museum of American Art
Smaller and more diverse than in
years past, this year’s Whitney Bien-
nial featured the work of 63 artists
spread across two floors, the stair-
well, and lobby of the museum’s
new Renzo Piano building. With few
walls, high ceilings, and works
hung together in separate spaces as
if in mini gallery shows, the layout
encouraged viewers to wander
about almost as if they were at an
art fair.
The rather vague organizing con-
cept—the relationship of individual
self to the turbulent present—
seemed designed to be as inclusive
and fragmented as our current
political soap opera. Much of the
72
critical response centered on the
return of painting—mostly figurative
with a few nods to abstraction—and
the controversy over Dana Schutz’s
Open Casket, based on photographs
of Emmett Till in his coffin. Included
to “represent” the violence of our
times (another thematic concern),
the painting’s labored, decorative
execution and Schutz’s dubious
claims of empathy with black culture
and trauma betrayed questionable
decisions by the artist and the cura-
tors, Christopher Y. Lew and Mia
Locks. While Schutz’s work attracted
all the publicity (especially after
artist Hannah Black wrote a letter
calling for its removal and des-
truction), it proved no match for
Henry Taylor’s paintings, especially
his immersive, sympathetic render-
ing of the shooting of Philando Cas-
tile, The Times Thay Aint a Changing,
Fast Enough!, which, together
with Deana Lawson’s photographs,
offered an engaging, alternative
view of everyday African American
experience.
Many of the selected artists shared
this sense of art’s responsibility to
community. Maya Stovall’s videos of
dancers performing and interacting
with locals in front of Detroit liquor
stores questioned opportunities
gained and lost, while John Divola’s
photographs explored neglect, aban-
donment, and loss by simply instal-
ling student paintings in deserted
buildings in Riverside, California.
Others turned to social practice,
their work or activity intent on build-
ing bonds, promoting exchange,
and stimulating interaction and
discussion. Rafa Esparza, using mate-
rials from his Los Angeles neighbor-
hood, constructed an adobe brick
room in a small gallery near the
museum entrance that served as
an exhibition and performance space
for other Mexican-American artists
not included in the show. As part of
the ongoing “Handler” series, John
Riepenhoff literally embodied sup-
port, with papier-mâché casts of
his lower body dressed in his own
clothing doubling as stands for art-
works by fellow Milwaukee artists.
Occupy Museum’s installation,
Debtfair, displaying the work of 30
artists, called attention to student
debt. Bundled together to resemble
risky collateral and discredited bank-
ing practices and hung within the
exposed studs of the walls alongside
charts and didactic explanatory texts,
the installation too closely mimicked
the aesthetics of its surroundings
to work as either agitprop or institu-
tional critique.
Every so often, the fluid layout was
disrupted by a contrary cube or
box-like structure. Postcommodity,
a collective based in New Mexico,
encapsulated the immigrant experi-
ence, viscerally surrounding viewers
with a video installation, A Very
Long Line. Shot from a moving car
driving along the U.S./ Mexico
border and projected on four walls,
the video offered a dizzying, discon-
certing panorama view of alienation
and dislocation, with viewers never
COURTESY THE ARTIST AND BRIDGET DONAHUE, NY
sure where they stood in relation to
the moving metal-and-steel screen
barrier.
Pope.L also had a room of his own,
a tall cube painted in Pepto-Bismol
Jessi Reaves, Idol of the Hares, 2014.
Oak, polyurethane foam, silk, cotton,
aluminum, and ink, 38 x 28 x 48 in.
Sculpture 36.7
72-79_sclp_sept_2017.qxp_reviews 7/21/17 1:59 PM Page 73
TOP: MATTHEW CARASELLA, COURTESY THE ARTIST AND MITCHELL-INNES & NASH, NY / BOTTOM: MATTHEW CARASELLA, COURTESY THE ARTIST AND COMPANY GALLERY, NY
pink and covered with a grid of cir-
cular bologna slices, the excessive
fat staining and oozing down
the walls. Each slice included a small
photograph of a face that, as stated
by a framed text inside the box,
supposedly represented one percent
of the Jewish population of New
York. Mixing references to Minimal-
ism, Holocaust memorials, statis-
tics, memory, and even “fake news,”
Pope.L purposefully turned desire—
for recognition, nourishment, under-
standing—into a repellant contrary
experience that asked us to question
what we really know.
While Pope.L disrupted the pris-
tine order of the cube, Larry Bell
celebrated the pleasure of percep-
tion with Pacific Red II, an installa-
Sculpture September 2017
tion of 24 glass panels in pink and
orange that formed a row of boxes
within boxes. Placed on the terrace
where it could interact with the
ever-changing light, Bell’s installa-
tion celebrated the sensorial sensa-
tions of the everyday.
Jessi Reaves’s functional sculp-
tures also commemorated the prac-
tical and experiential. Upending
modern furniture design through
repurposing and expressive decon-
struction, her couches, chairs, lamps,
tables, and racks appeared through-
out the exhibition, providing a witty
critique of high art practice as well
as comfortable, useful places to sit
and look.
For a number of artists, the
Whitney building became a vehicle
for framing and interrogating con-
temporary concerns or projecting
future visions. Samara Golden’s The
Meat Grinder’s Iron Clothes, installed
within the western glass wall, offered
a disarming, voyeuristic glimpse into
the social and spatial strata of our
present-day economic divide. Min-
iature environments fashioned
almost entirely from foam core and
stacked one atop another were placed
above mirrored panels to create dis-
orienting inversions of penthouse,
art studio, gym, and hospital ward
interiors. These re-creations of
life, labor, and leisure collided and
collapsed into a dystopian house
of mirrors.
Raúl de Nieves also took advantage
of the glass walls, transforming an
Left: Pope.L, Claim (Whitney Version),
2017. Acrylic paint, graphite pencil,
pushpins, wood, framed document,
fortified wine, and bologna with pho-
tocopy portraits, 15 x 16.75 x 16.75 ft.
Below left: Raúl De Nieves, beginning
& the end neither & the otherwise
betwixt & between the end is the
beginning & the end, 2016. Paper,
wood, glue, acetate, tape, and
beads, 495.3 x 1159 cm.
eastern-facing expanse into a faux
stained-glass window, whose 18
panels portrayed scenes of waste
and excess. Strutting through
the ambient, multi-hued light cast
by the acetate panes, life-size figures,
each wearing a colorful costume
fashioned from glass beads, cloth,
and trim, formed a lively parade,
merging the sacred and profane,
artifice and spirituality.
The museum’s open stairwell
provided Ajay Kurian with a rather
dramatic and evocative setting for
his hybrid sculptures. Constructed
of body, doll, animal, and machine
parts, these life-size puppets, hanging
on ropes from the ceiling, seemed
trapped in a surreal, post-apocalyptic
game of survival and transcendence.
This hybrid state of in-between
seemed an apt metaphor for the
Whitney Biennial as a whole—
insistent, active, participatory, but
also anxious and guarded, wondering
what might be next.
—Sue Canning
W, DC
Christian Benefiel
Flashpoint Gallery
In Christian Benefiel’s recent exhibi-
tion, three large sculptures filled a
small, elongated space. Each work,
created of interwoven pieces of
wood, was held together through
the strength of the intricate con-
nections linking its individual parts.
Benefiel sees his constructions as
a physical means of addressing the
interactions of singular elements
in complex systems, whether social
73
72-79_sclp_sept_2017.qxp_reviews 7/21/17 1:59 PM Page 74
systems (societies and governments)
or biological ones (organisms both
simple and complex).
On the outside, looking in, to a
hole greeted visitors as they walked
into the gallery. Made from found
scraps of wood—primarily picture
frames and easels—the sculpture
looked like an enormous bird nest
set on its side, with a hole cutting
all the way through. Factions of
People Certain of what they Believe
to be Oppression also resembled a
Above: Christian Benefiel, A way
through or around (detail), 2017. Pine
and paint, approx. 14 ft. long. Below:
Christian Benefiel, Factions of People
Certain of what they Believe to be
Oppression, 2017. Pine, approx. 3 x 4
x 4 ft.
74
giant nest—perhaps a blown-up
wasp nest seen at close range.
Although Benefiel didn’t specify the
type of scrap wood used in Factions,
it was perfectly suited to the penta-
gonal geometry of the latticework
pattern. The seemingly burnt edges
of the wood contributed to the sense
of order in chaos, as well as to the
dramatic interplay of shadows in the
interior.
Peeking inside the tunnels of
Benefiel’s sculptures seemed the
best way to appreciate them. Both
Factions and the third (and largest)
work, A way through or around,
presented ample opportunities to
crouch down and look inside and
through the forms. In A way
through—which resembled an over-
size, hairy caterpillar more than a
nest—scrap wood painted blue,
purple, and pink was organized
so that one color seamlessly flowed
into the next, creating a dramatic
enticement to investigate the bowels
of the work.
Obviously inspired by the natural
world, Benefiel’s works are both
aesthetically interesting and philo-
sophical. The complex systems
that he references are carefully con-
structed yet precarious, the sculp-
tures standing on thin wooden legs
that look like they could snap at
any moment. Strength and delicacy
co-exist in these works, just as they
do in nature. The metaphor for the
fragility of societies is clear; we
are so interconnected that, should
one piece crack under pressure,
the whole thing could come down.
—Elena Goukassian
M, I
“SHIFT: Jongil Ma, Christopher
Smith, Corban Walker”
David Owsley Museum of Art,
Ball State University
The three artists featured in this
show come from different places—
Jongil Ma from Korea (now living
in New York), Christopher Smith
from the U.S., and Corban Walker
from Ireland—but they all share
an interest in glass and Plexiglas.
Curator Lisa Banner, a professor at
Pratt Institute in Brooklyn, exploited
this commonality in two ways: first,
as a means to remember the univer-
sity’s ties to the Ball family glass-
manufacturing business and, second,
as a tool to explore subtle changes
in material, as well as shifts in vision
and viewpoint.
Ma constructs painting-like panels
from wooden strips or inkjet prints
covered with Plexiglas; Smith works
with videos projected onto Plexiglas;
and Walker stacks sheets of glass
and Plexiglas to establish hard-edged
geometric forms. Their reworkings
of shape, and color in Smith’s case,
revise perceptions about how con-
temporary art can shift from one
context to the next through the use
of different media, and how these
media demand shifts in attention.
Ma’s wooden strip pieces look a
lot like abstract paintings. Floating
in Blue Space (2014) consists of 50
pieces of re-cut colored wood, mainly
in hues of blue and green. The strips
are placed horizontally on top of
each other, and the final effect is
reminiscent of a seascape. In The
Shifting: Once, You, The Loved One
(2017), a pale-green Plexiglas
sheet, covered with thin strips of
wood arranged into a gridded
pattern, overlies an inkjet sheet with
an abstract drawing on it.
Smith’s work is highly colorful.
Cutting In (2011) consists of brightly
colored vertical strands, the image
produced by a video projected
onto Plexiglas. In Pink Panther (2017),
multiple layers of red, blue, yellow,
TONY HITCHCOCK PHOTOGRAPHY, COURTESY CULTURALDC
and pink latex paint are worked
onto Plexiglas and a rubberized tray.
The two parts of the work, one on
the wall and one on the floor,
create a dialogue that animates the
space between them. The video
50940 (2012), projected onto Plexiglas,
shows splashes of water, accompa-
nied by the sound of liquid flowing
onto glass. Different colors enter
Sculpture 36.7
72-79_sclp_sept_2017.qxp_reviews 7/21/17 1:59 PM Page 75
into the projection as bubbles appear
on the surface, altering the viewer’s
experience. This is a motion-filled
work, shifting, as the show’s title
asserts, from one visual to the other.
Walker, who represented Ireland
in the 2011 Venice Biennale,
makes works aligned with his four-
foot height. Untitled (Center Glue
Maquette) (2009) consists of two
13-centimeter-high stacks of clear
float glass, one inserted at an angle
inside the other. Half of the sculpture
leans into empty space, establishing
RIGHT: JUNE BOIVIN
a shifting degree of penetration in
relation to the second, upright stack.
Walker uses acrylic in the large-
scale Observation (2012), a line of
Sculpture September 2017
orange vertical rods held together by
two rows of horizontal rods. Like
much of his work, Observation origi-
nates in Minimalism.
Ma, Smith, and Walker all demon-
strate a sensitivity to subtle
changes in materials and dimen-
sions, as well as abstract patterning.
They also communicate a distinctive
understanding of how shapes and
colors can transform—on their own
and with the assistance of changing
viewpoint. Each of these artists
recognizes that even minute differ-
ences in form can initiate visual
changes that extend beyond imme-
diate perception.
—Jonathan Goodman
Left: Christopher Smith, Pink Panther, of the Rings, was striking. Akimbo
2017. Paint on Plexiglas and rubber and Unconformity were carved from
basin, installation view. Below left: trees more than 150 years old.
Corban Walker, Observation, 2012. Moerlein refers to these as “Scholars’
Acrylic and screw posts, 183 x 183 Stones,” and indeed, they bear
x 183 cm. Both from “SHIFT.” Below: some resemblance to the stones
Andy Moerlein, Akimbo, 2016. Red in the Chinese Garden of the Met-
oak and plywood, 118 x 36 x 36 in. ropolitan Museum of Art. He
carves with a chainsaw and hand
B chisels, then exquisitely finishes by
Andy Moerlein and Donna hand. His interjections act on the
Dodson wood, like water works on stone,
Boston Sculptors Gallery to create almost impossible-to-
Donna Dodson and Andy Moerlein imagine contours that flow in an
recently transformed Boston organic fashion.
Sculptors Gallery into a new kind of The sculptures are stunning in
Wonderland with their related shows, their gargantuan size and grace. Not
“Zodiac” and “Geology.” Dodson’s quite like anything even vaguely
anthropomorphic deities, arranged familiar, they are unique evocations
in two circles, reference both of an ancient art of collecting
Chinese and Western zodiac sym- stones that dates back to the Han
bols. The archetypal figures
emanate an extraordinary calm. Each
takes a similar stolid stance yet
clearly expresses her individuality.
Careful carving of maple, elm,
walnut, mulberry, and cherry allows
the natural grain and color to
flow through smoothly sanded and
polished surfaces. Dodson’s figures
often have painted features, bringing
to mind the makeup used by some
women.
There is an intimacy of scale as well
as of demeanor, with each goddess
standing just over two feet tall. Like
miniature regents, they gaze out
yet retain a secretive inner focus.
Monkey Mother, carved in spalted
maple, sits Buddha-like with her
tail curved playfully over one of her
haunches. In Gemini (Pea Hen Sisters),
two tall, slender figures stand
in a “face-off” stance, each leaning
slightly back, black beaks pointing
at each other. Leo (Golden Lioness),
regally composed, wears white gloves
and stares mysteriously through black
slits for eyes.
The passage from the space occu-
pied by these personalities into
the second room, where Moerlein’s
sculptures rose from floor to ceiling
like fantastic forms out of The Lord
75
72-79_sclp_sept_2017.qxp_reviews 7/21/17 1:59 PM Page 76
Dynasty. In China, such found stones
were often honored as spirit stones.
Akimbo, 9.5 feet tall, carved from
tough red oak, is a forceful, upright
piece with multiple openings and
unexpected twists. Moerlein adeptly
exploits the natural flow of the grain,
which, from some angles, almost
suggests an anthropomorphic figure.
There is clearly a sense of life within
the wood. The deep hollows in
Unconformity, which sits on a formal
Chinese-style base, seem to invite
investigation into the inner life of
the wood. These pieces are comple-
mented by a series of smaller, more
traditionally sized scholars’ stones
in wood and ceramic.
The combination of works by this
artist couple was both sensitive and
powerful. Both Dodson and Moerlein
bring a potent sense of the present
to the ageless art of woodcarving.
Each sculptor extends the reach of
the medium and expands the
imaginative scope of what is possible
when a contemporary aesthetic
meets an ancient art form.
—B. Amore
N Y
Heinz Mack
Sperone Westwater
In Heinz Mack’s recent, three-floor
exhibition, carefully selected mono-
chromatic paintings, wall reliefs, ink
drawings, and stelae were placed
76
together to read like a narrative.
The quest for narrative in abstract
terms is beginning to appear inte-
gral to Mack’s work. Rather than
emphasizing mediumistic aspects,
he clearly went for the impact of
earthly and celestial light on physical
form, a position related in some ways
to the Romantic poet, playwright,
natural philosopher, painter, and
color theorist, Johann Wolfgang von
Goethe (1749–1832), a figure with
whom Mack has been compared.
Mack moves between glittering,
absorbent monochrome reliefs
and upright, standing sculptures in
the same way that Goethe moved
between poetry and painting. In
both cases, a certain force or advo-
cacy is present in the work. Mack’s
open-endedness allows him
to weave between mediums while
remaining consistent, even if one
project may appear to oppose
another. Rather than opposition,
one might formulate an ambiguity
between “unity” and “separation”—
an aesthetic distinction also made
by Goethe.
Mack’s sculptures and paintings
suggest a revival of alien forms—
some in pigment, mixed with sand
Left: Donna Dodson, installation view
of “Zodiac,” 2016. Below: Heinz
Mack, installation view of “Heinz
Mack,” 2017.
and grit, and others, metal protu-
berances assembled in the Tunisian
desert for Sahara Project and later
used as sculptural elements in the
film Tele-Mack (1968). In addition
to the three-dimensional works that
occupied a small first-floor gallery,
the exhibition invited viewers to
compare two ensembles of stelae:
the actual works from the past
two years and the earlier forms that
appear in Tele-Mack.
This juxtaposition raised the ques-
tion of the difference between
experiencing art in three-dimensional
space and merely seeing it on a
screen. While Mack’s formal consis-
tency is undoubtedly present in
the two bodies of work, the tactile
perception of material in real space
disappears in the film. Still, one
could grasp his rigorous propensity
in making permutations of his
earlier forms. Redeveloping forms
from the past may, in fact, revitalize
them. Some continue to vibrate even
when seen under manufactured
light, which is physically distinct
TOP: PAULA OGIER / BOTTOM: COURTESY THE ARTIST AND SPERONE WESTWATER, NY
Sculpture 36.7
72-79_sclp_sept_2017.qxp_reviews 7/21/17 1:59 PM Page 77
from the more penetrating light of
the desert.
The ink drawings on handmade
paper, which also featured in
Mack’s 2016 exhibition at the Sakip
Sabanci Museum in Istanbul, simi-
larly reveal his observations of light
and darkness, applying their alter-
nation to repetitive patterns; curator/
writer Sir Norman Rosenthal has
compared these works to Persian
designs. The complex dimensionality
of these primarily black and white
drawings demonstrates Mack’s
economy of means in his choice of
medium. As Rosenthal observes,
these drawings “imply that infinite
sense of ornamental variety com-
mon to Islamic art—dynamic range,
density, and geometric invention of
fabulous and beautiful complexity.”
Mack’s Sahara Project, a series of
interventions in the Tunisian desert
conceptualized in 1958 but not fully
realized until a decade later, antici-
pated the subsequent developments
of Land art and heralded his grow-
ing interest in architectural scale and
paradoxical effects instilled through
the equivocation of motion balanced
with stasis. For this exhibition, Tele-
Mack was screened in a large freight
elevator. Somehow watching the
film became a kind of “sculptural
event.” The metal spires, lit by the
intense sunlight of the Sahara, gave
the impression of being in another
world, on another planet, neither
in the past nor the future. One
TOP: COURTESY THE ARTIST AND SPERONE WESTWATER, NY
was simply there at the moment,
watching Mack engage in various
escapades—such as throwing mate-
rial into the wind—which under-
scored the sense of ephemerality
or ethereality: nothing absolute
goes beyond time, nor is anything
certain.
—Robert C. Morgan
Sculpture September 2017
Takamori portrays a number of
variants on the public act of contri-
tion. A man in a drawing apologizes
by bending his body from the waist
at a 90-degree angle. The Japanese
S  twisted, barely maintaining grace language of gesture is clearly pre-
Akio Takamori under pressure. sented, but the man doesn’t seem
James Harris Gallery The most intricate and largest comfortable with it. One can sense
The works in Akio Takamori’s recent sculpture portrays former German his struggle as he must publicly
show revealed a strangely somber Chancellor Willy Brandt, remem- humble himself in the truest sense.
and perplexing side to this usually bered for his act of contrition in This is a formal gesture used by top
exuberant ceramic artist, examining Poland, kneeling down in apology business executives in Japan. Here,
the rituals of male public behavior. for Nazi atrocities. Takamori depicts Takamori uses flowing and dripping
These were the last works that he him in a quiet moment, almost black ink to accentuate the form.
produced before succumbing to a like a praying priest overwhelmed by Another large drawing depicts
long bout with cancer last year. Idio- the weight of human tragedy. Here, the face of man, who could be a
syncratic and characterized by Takamori demonstrates his ability Japanese executive or maybe Taka-
masterful technique, Takamori’s to materialize a piece of history in mori himself, who embodies quiet
work is also known for a perilous perfect shape and harmony: the face remorse, a private expression. In
awkwardness, which often doubles is brushed with light touches of Apology (2016), a small, full-length
as self-examination. The array of pale orange glaze, and the body is statue of a man in a suit and tie,
inspiration is free-ranging, his sub- covered by a coat with a dark flowing the figure sits on the floor in the
jects all filtered through wide-open pattern. The Brandt figure stood on traditional Japanese manner with
eyes. In this show, however, there a pedestal tall enough for viewers to a humble, calm expression. The
were no exquisite copies of Goya or look up to him as a dignified figure. body language signifies both apology
Velázquez, no Japanese villagers
created out of old photos, memories,
and imagination.
Takamori took the title of the show,
“Apology/Remorse,” from his obser-
vations on recent American politics.
The installation appeared gray and
monochrome, each figure broken
or fragmented. Soon a clearly recog-
nizable reference point emerged—
the Venus de Milo. Each armless
female torso is glazed in a single
color—white, black, yellow, appar-
ently in reference to race—and
topped by a male head. The realisti-
cally rendered faces, taken from
public photos, together give a col-
lective image of public man.
In White Man, a roughly molded
female torso carries the head of
an elder male statesman, his mouth
Above: Heinz Mack, installation view
of “Heinz Mack,” 2017. Right: Akio
Takamori, Remorse, 2016. Stoneware
with underglazes, 23 x 6 x 6 in. Far
right: Akio Takamori, Willy B, 2016.
Glazed stoneware with under- and
overglazes, 35.5 x 16 x 23.5 in.
77
72-79_sclp_sept_2017.qxp_reviews 7/21/17 2:00 PM Page 78
Above: Norbert Prangenberg, Figur,
1994. Glazed terra cotta, 110 x 200
cm. Above right: Norbert Prangen-
berg, Figur, 1998. Glazed terra cotta,
200 x 100 cm. diameter.
and appreciation, which is highly
praised and considered necessary
for survival in Japan’s highly
structured society. In this work,
Takamori seems to be addressing
everyone he has encountered in his
life, offering a farewell and a per-
sonal “thank you.” Takamori was
only 66 when he died. One cannot
help but wonder how he might have
developed the show, and what
he might have accomplished in the
future. We can only be thankful for
what he left.
—Kazuko Nakane
C, G
Norbert Prangenberg
Galerie Karsten Greve
Nearly every top-heavy Figur sculpted
by Norbert Prangenberg (1949–
2012) is reminiscent of an ancient
amphora or pithos, although without
the lid or twin handles. The rest of
his symmetrical Figuren approximate
modern barrels. We eventually
realize that neither of his container
types can hold liquid or grain,
because they remain fundamentally
un-reconstituted ropes of clay.
78
The concentric coils were crudely
kneaded into lengths up to 2.5
inches thick before being barely
smoothed and vertically stacked.
Prangenberg’s favored ellipsoid
is the three-dimensional manifesta-
tion of an ellipse, but the volume’s
rounded ends are snipped off, like
the tips of a giant, bulging cigar.
The cropped, or never attached,
tips provide the top and bottom
orifices of his standing Figuren
while also functioning as stable
bases.
Eerily, both variations of his signa-
ture form are sufficiently voluminous
to inter a human body or two. The
use of the flexible German word Figur
as the title for Prangenberg’s leaky
vessels suggests that he wishes to
challenge our utilitarian assumptions
about terra cotta or to invoke the
narrative and anthropological impli-
cations of human-size containers.
The ambiguity lets us imagine that
we have stumbled upon unearthed
artifacts from an alternative antiq-
uity. Within the spare ambience of
Galerie Karsten Greve, the exuberant
surface handling and naked cons-
truction methods of Prangenberg’s
succulently colored forms triggered
visceral delight.
Once built and embellished, fired
and glazed, each container may
be placed upright or on its side, as if
toppled. Glazes range from translu-
cent to virtually opaque, from
chromatically subdued to highly
saturated, and from erratically
splashed to evenly dispersed across
the surface. Riven with gaps, these
objects eventually inspire the viewer
to gaze, often with discomfort, into
their unevenly darkened interiors, to
which the eyes must adjust.
One motley Figur (1998) looks
like a coral-encrusted urn discovered
in an ancient Mediterranean ship-
wreck and rescued from the sea
bottom. Another, from 1996, might
as well be a long-unexploded aerial
bomb from an unnamed conflict.
Prangenberg’s work does not overtly
reference any particular historic
event; instead, it subsumes the
pithos form within a larger historical
continuum by knotting up shifting
assertions of scale with inferences
of disparate functions. Critical com-
mentary about Prangenberg’s work
has breezily celebrated his expres-
sive handling of materials—clay as
well as paint (his modestly sized
geometric paintings defy geometry
with their ironically flattening
gooeyness). His approach to both
mediums, and to materials in gen-
eral, may be characterized as rough-
hewn but masterful, gestural, and
always proudly handmade.
—Mark S. Price
D ISPATCH
S. P  , R 
Art Prospect
Last year, Art Prospect, St. Petersburg’s
first and only public art festival,
marked its fifth year. Since its incep-
tion, its artistic vision has been
shaped by Susan Katz, an American
who has lived in St. Petersburg since
1998, and Kendal Henry, a New
Yorker involved with public art. In
2016, the festival focused on social
practice and community engage-
ment, with projects by 33 different
artists and artist teams, 22 from
Russia and the remainder hailing
from the U.S., Switzerland, Norway,
Finland, and Poland.
Two of the more impressive works
were performances. On each day
of the four-day festival, Norwegian
Karianne Stensland engaged in
Great Emotions, setting herself the
task of unifying slabs of Norwegian
marble with slabs of Russian marble.
In the first chapter of the perfor-
mance, Stensland conversed with
a commissioned gestalt therapist in
Russian to help ground her mentally
before she manipulated the marble
with hand and power tools. She
began by inscribing the surface of
one slab with the phrase (in Russian),
“I cannot speak Russian.” She pain-
stakingly split another piece of mar-
ble into small bits. At the end of the
hour, she said quietly, in Russian,
“I do not feel like an artist anymore,”
then put her tools down, exhausted.
To witness the performance was
to witness self-imposed labor and
struggle. Stensland continued the
next day, and the next, and the next.
The St. Petersburg-based group
known as Collective Body of Inter-
hearing performed Production of
Space in a magnificent ballroom with
neutral plaster walls and a concrete
floor empty of furnishings. An ornate
chandelier formed the focal point
of the room, which was occupied by
MARK S. PRICE
about 50 people, until a few mem-
bers of Collective Body began moving
and posing in unusual ways—
Sculpture 36.7
72-79_sclp_sept_2017.qxp_reviews 7/21/17 2:00 PM Page 79
crawling like four-legged animals,
hopping like insects, rolling like logs,
and standing, backs pressed to the
wall, for several minutes. Others soon
became improvisational dancers.
Collective Body integrates dance with
daily activities; audience members
participate without being conscious
of their participation—floor, side-
walk, and street all become the stage.
A last-minute site change for six
of the largest and most complicated
sculptural projects mitigated their
conceptual impact. The works were
intended for a park known as New
Holland, Russia’s first naval port,
which dates to the early 18th century
and is now owned by Moscow-based
financier and former politician,
Roman Abramovich. In the end, his
staff backed out of the offer to use
New Holland as an Art Prospect
venue. Katz was sent scrambling to
find new sites. The Akhmatova
Museum garden hosted Code Flags
for St. Petersburg, in which Minne-
apolis-based Peter Haakon Thompson
developed a series of pseudo-nautical
flags. He installed two flag poles;
a person standing at the base of one
pole could communicate with some-
one standing at the other by raising
a specific flag and then waiting for a
response in the form of another flag.
The poles were mounted about 50
feet from one another across a grassy
area of the garden. It felt somewhat
ridiculous to be communicating via
such a painstakingly slow device in
such a controlled context—the piece
might have held more resonance
had it been installed with one pole
on the island of New Holland and the
other on the streets of St. Petersburg.
Other works in the garden were
less site-dependent. In Alexandr
Morozov’s The Watchtower, a plat-
form constructed with standard
lumber hovered about 20 feet off
the ground. From there, Morozov
documented the activity of every
bird that flew overhead with a
pencil stroke or two on paper and
a notation of the time. His constant
Sculpture September 2017
Right: Karianne Stensland, Great
Emotions, 2016. Stone and perfor-
mance. Center: Collective Body of
Interhearing, Production of Space,
2016. Interactive perfomance. Bot-
tom: Alexandr Morozov, The Watch-
tower, 2016. Installation and
perfomance. All from Art Prospect.
presence, earnestness, and com-
mitment were endearing. From
this panopticon suspended above
human activity, one could see the
other works in the garden from
an altitude connected to the trees
and the life they support. It pro-
vided a privileged perspective up,
down, and around.
Broadening the focus from New
Holland to a variety of sites had
the advantage of encouraging Art
Prospect visitors to walk St. Peters-
burg’s streets. Once home to the
Romanov dynasty, the city is filled
with palaces, many of them now
museums. Yet outside these grand,
touristed areas, many neighbor-
hoods are zones of transition, hon-
oring the past while struggling
toward the future. Many people feel
disenfranchised by the Russian gov-
ernment. Against such uncertainty
and doubt, Art Prospect’s focus on
social practice offered an effective
way to serve local residents, con-
necting them with each other and,
ultimately, inspiring possible collec-
tive social and political action.
Katz explained that the 2016 theme
was “dialogue…in response to
the fact that local residents do not
know their neighbors—[due to]
growing nationalism and intoler-
ance, and intergenerational gaps.”
Art Prospect achieved its goal to
intervene in unexpected locations
to impact the dynamic in the city.
It also contributed to the global
conversation about public art by
creating a platform for Russian
artists to exhibit and work side-by-
side with artists from Europe and
the U.S.
—Kate Bonansinga
79
isc P EOP LE , PL ACES, AND E V E NT S

because of her creative exuberance. She has

1 2
3 4
1 Lynda Benglis and Tony Cragg. 2 Kiki Smith, Lynda Benglis, Tony Cragg, and Ursula von Rydingsvard.
3 Johannah Hutchison presenting Lynda Benglis with her award. 4 Tony Cragg receiving his Lifetime
Achievement Award.
2 0 1 7 L I FET IM E AC H I E V E M E N T AWA R D GAL A
The International Sculpture Center pre-
sented Lynda Benglis and Tony Cragg with
the 26th Annual Lifetime Achievement in
Contemporary Sculpture Award on April
26, 2017 at Tribeca Rooftop in New York
City. Friends, family, and members of the
arts community came together to celebrate
the lives and exemplary careers of two
extraordinary sculptors at this gala event.
The International Sculpture Center was
honored to welcome Richard Armstrong
and Jonathan Wood as speakers, who pro-
vided guests with both art historical and
personal perspectives on the guests of
honor. Armstrong, Director of the Solomon
R. Guggenheim Museum and Foundation,
shared personal anecdotes about his friend-
ship with Lynda Benglis, and about her
expansive career. Wood, Research Curator
at the Henry Moore Institute, spoke of Tony
Cragg’s extraordinary achievements
throughout his career as a sculptor, writer,
and teacher. Armstrong stated in his
remarks, “In the art world, Lynda Benglis
is and has always been a happy outlier.
Benglis was outside the norm, first I would
say, for being a woman sculptor, and
always given herself great freedom to
explore, to expand, to invent, and to rein-
vent.” Discussing Cragg’s work, Wood
stated, “Tony Cragg has enabled viewers
and makers to think afresh about how
sculpture can give new and inquisitive
shape and value to our understanding of the
world.” He also praised Cragg’s generosity
of spirit and his incredible contribution to
art education, describing him not only as
a sculptor but as a teacher.
Lynda Benglis and Tony Cragg were met
with standing ovations from family, friends,
and admirers upon accepting their Lifetime
Achievement in Contemporary Sculpture
Awards. Attendees ranged from established
artists and past Lifetime Achievement
Award recipients to emerging artists, gal-
lerists, and patrons. The evening included
a cocktail reception overlooking the Hudson
River and downtown New York City, seated
dinner, and awards ceremony. The program
closed with guests gathered around the
artists to offer personal congratulations.
Thank you to everyone who attended the
event and showed their support for these
most deserving artists.
The International Sculpture Center’s 2017
Lifetime Achievement Award Gala honoring
Lynda Benglis and Tony Cragg was spon-
sored and supported by Cheim & Read
Gallery, The Seward Johnson Atelier, Karen
& Robert Duncan, Agnes Gund, The Helis
Foundation, Ree & Jun Kaneko, Kathy &
Marc LeBaron—Lincoln Industries, Lisson
Gallery, Marian Goodman Gallery, The
Ronald & Jo Carole Lauder Foundation, and
Nadine Witkin, Estate of Isaac Witkin. We
would also like to give a special thank you
to the Atlantic Foundation, Digital Atelier,
Mana Contemporary, and Seward Johnson
for their continued support.

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80 Sculpture 36.7