Collaborative Histories/Conceptual Seeds
Discover the collaborative processes of three different artists creating work that record the personal and collective experiences of absence, loss, memory, and change. Alighiero e Boetti works with Afghan craftswomen to map the world. David Dunlap creates hundreds of journals with students and friends and presents them and other works in a clubhouse structure built inside the gallery. And Su-Mei Tse and her partner Jean-Lu Majerus present several sculptures and sound installations inspired by music, art and tradition.
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Mappa, 1990. Embroidery on cotton. Barbara Gladstone Gallery.
Alighiero e Boetti: Mappa
Barbara Gladstone Gallery – 530 West 21st Street, Until January 23, 2010
David Dunlap: SUDDENLY a Walnut Farmer
CUE Art Foundation – 511 West 25th Street, Until January 9, 2010
Su Mei Tse: Words and Memories
Peter Blum Gallery – 526 West 29th Street, Until January 9, 2010
1.
Alighiero e Boetti: Mappa
The exhibition at Barbara Gladstone gallery presents over 20 woven maps from the artist Alighiero e Boetti; an Italian artist whose career began in the ‘60s. The maps are a collaborative creation conceived of and commissioned by the artist. Here’s a description of the artist’s process from the gallery’s press release:
“During his second voyage to Afghanistan in 1971, Boetti pondered the idea of the first Mappa: He commissioned Afghan craftswomen, who following the artist’s directives, hand-embroidered a map of the world in which the geopolitical boundaries were filled with each country’s flag. This first piece began a twenty-year collaboration that continued until the artist’s premature death in 1994. Viewed as an ongoing series, they bring to light the man-made divisions drawn over the continents and chart the political realities of the world from the early 1970s through the fall of the Berlin Wall and the collapse of the USSR.”
- What does a flag mean to you, your friends? How do others feel about this symbol?
These works are representative of the ideas and strategies that Boetti drew on to make art: Collaboration with other artists, using images that previously existed in the world, combining imagery from different sources, and reflecting a global perspective. He is also a major representative of an Italian art movement called Arte Povera, or ‘poor art’, a loose group of artists interested in making art from everyday life.
A statement from Boetti made in 1967 is illustrative:
“In 1948 I tore a large sheet of brown paper to get little rectangular pieces that I piled up, and with which I erected a rather unstable column. In 1954 I straightened out a piece of corrugated cardboard with a surface area of a square meter. Since 1957, without interruption, I have been smoothing out the silver paper from cigarette boxes…. Bending a piece of rubber between two fingers, rolling a sphere on a plane inclined by myself to this end, rolling up a soft wire inside a pencil, mixing different colored powders, these are the works carried out between March and April 1949. From 1946 onwards, I have continuously poked fires with the help of various materials.”
- How can these everyday actions be considered works of art? Do they require an audience?
Experience it…
Mappa (detail), 1990. Embroidery on cotton. Barbara Gladstone Gallery.
When you enter the gallery or looking at the work online you’ll notice the walls are lined with the woven maps. On the wall to the left of the desk is the original, handpainted classroom map called Planisfero Politico that the artist created in 1969.
As you look at the work, notice how each of the maps has its own color-scheme.
- How are the flags presented? How do the symbols on flags from different countries relate to each other?
- What allegiances are made evident through the symbols?
Though Boetti was very particular about the colors and threads chosen for these tapestries, over time he let his collaborators make some of the decisions - the ocean colors were chosen by the Afghan women he worked with.
- Which map is your favorite? Why are you drawn to that one — colors? size?
Talk about it…
Beyond the personal connection between the artist and the producers of his work, the maps make a connection to a larger global political consciousness. By noting all of the countries’ flags at the time of production, the viewer is confronted with the task of discovering changes in the political map of the world. The flag of the USSR, which covers much of the map, would now be broken up and replaced by that of the Russian Federation. Germany, once split in two, is now unified.
- What comments do these maps make on the world? What relationships are made? How is history presented?
More on Boetti:
Museum of Modern Art: Works in the collection
David Dunlap. CUE Art Foundation.
2.
David Dunlap: SUDDENLY a Walnut Farmer
“David Dunlap is a cultivator of relationships, a planter of conceptual seeds, a harvester of images, and a packager of the fruits of his obsessive creative labors in exhibitions that seem to accrete into place like a tantalizingly wonder-filled coral reef.” – Mark Paul Petrick
David Dunlap is the towering figure in this sweet, overwhelming, and insightful display of collaborative prowess. Obsessive in the creation, collection and display of notebooks, he is equally obsessive in sharing the artmaking experience with others. I was told that the work on view here is never really finished and that you can find work from 20 years ago next to work that was created this year.
This jam-packed exhibition is filled with small and large treasures. So many that is nearly impossible to know where to start – What are some common threads running through the works in the show? What do some of the images mean? Highlights? Here’s a primer:
Experience it…
David Dunlap’s exhibition at the CUE Art Foundation is called SUDDENLY a Walnut Farmer because he harvests walnuts and uses them to paint with (I guess they give him a nice brown color).
I walked into the exhibition and was totally overwhelmed—But taking a breath and spending a little time looking around, patterns began to emerge.
It seems that everything and every person he encounters finds its way into his art, and artwork from 20 years ago may be sitting next to work that was made just last year. The clubhouse in the center of the space is a good place to start. It is modeled on a building called the Moon Hotel in Kansas City, where the artist was born and raised. Images of this building appear again and again throughout the work. Around the outside of the structure you’ll see journals: lined notebooks that the artist has kept since 1974. These are arranged chronologically. It seems like he wants to record every moment in his life.
Looking around, I found other imagery that appears over and over:
Martin Luther King
Light Bulbs
A boat
Calendars
And, somewhat troubling, Swastikas and Burning Crosses
The bulbs are called “Devices for measuring the presence Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.’
They appear as drawings and sculptures, and look like light bulbs with black and white flags in the center, that, when placed in a window and heated up by the morning sun, begin to spin. They’ll spin all day as long as the sun is shining.
The swastikas and burning crosses, taken in this context seem like just another symbol – perhaps stand-ins for an emotional response. I’ve read that on a trip to Nepal the artist came across the swastika as an ancient motif, removed from it’s 20th century context. But, for me it’s really difficult to think of it outside of the context of the holocaust – and maybe that’s where the art in this exhibition really succeeds.
I began to evaluate how images affect me – the burning cross with Barak Obama written on it – what does that mean here? Why am I getting upset about it? Where does the power of that image come from. And suddenly, I wanted to talk to somebody about it, and make a drawing with them. To take the power of these images into my own hands and share the experience of it.
It seems that David Dunlap has taught me how to look at images all over again.
Talk about it…
Much of the imagery used in this is recognizable, but because it is packed in so tightly, it’s difficult to think about it as a whole. Choose just one section or one drawing to think about – like the cart at the beginning of the gallery. It is a shopping cart covered in a cardboard shroud with a flag or banner attached to it. What symbols do you notice? How do all of the images fit together?
Draw Something…
Take a moment to record some of the details of your day. Who did you meet and talk to? What new things did you learn? Share this with somebody else and ask them to add to it. Start a collaborative journal with somebody and draw in it everyday.
More on David Dunlap:
The artist’s statement for the show is as mysterious as it is compelling. The emotion you feel in the work itself is spelled out, if not completely explained:
T h e C o u r a g e t o M i s s p e l l In Truth and Reconciliation Reparations
That summer the first thing we did was to make a Device for Measuring the PRESENCE of Martin Luther King Jr. Then Gelsy and I began to draw. We sat across from one another and drew back and forth, and in this exchange we spoke of those things we do for keeps, love and war. We were mindful of the saying “all’s fair in love and war.” We also spoke of the memory we hold deep in our bodies, of being eaten. We marveled at how we had learned to become a herd and in this knowledge were no longer eaten (alive).
Drawing back and forth we spoke of love. We spoke of the love that Martin Luther King Jr. described in his dream, the love we experience when we are part of a whole. Then we spoke of love when it is just us. In either case we realized love enters as a song. We remembered Martin singing his dream, then, thinking of love when it is just us, we listened to Ray Charles sing “I don’t need no doctor.”
SUDDENLY the Device for Measuring the PRESENCE of Martin Luther King Jr. began to move and we both exclaimed, “Let’s write our artists statement about this!” Let’s make our artists statement about how to conduct our selves when playing for keeps.
FIRST thing: NO zombies, NO water boarding, NO extraordinary rendition. We began to tell one another our experience with Zombies (Gelsy was Haitian-Canadian, often used “zombies,” ” royalty” in her work). We realized that zombies were the opposite of Martin Luther King Jr. They seemed to be present, but were not. They cast no shadows. When they apologized they always cried. Then we reflected on the times we had been zombies.
Whenever we reflected we would read from our textbooks, children’s geography books from the time of Darwin. We would read the description of a lake: “A lake is a pool of still water.” Tears would well up in our eyes at this. Then in the same voice we would read “The black race is a degraded race.” It was then that we realized that broccoli was sentient, had a soul and that we were cannibals. We realized that evil is evil because you cannot always see it, because it does not always goose-step. Tears would well up in us at this.
Gelsy had an “I am a Man” project. She and those of us within her project would draw Martin Luther King Jr., as he would appear today. She, we took great liberties with his appearance (sometimes he looked like James Brown, sometimes he looked like Elizabeth Stanton). He was a living, breathing thing, not fixed. He was not what you expected (Gelsy sometimes called herself “The Unexpected Haitian”). I did not mean to, but I have a project, projects (”Ana Mendieta Foster Child of Iowa,” “Kangying Guo, Brave and Resourceful,” “The Swastika Drawing and Sewing Club,” “The Burning Cross of Barack Obama”). I do not know what any of these projects mean or why I am involved with them. I can only trust there is something for me to learn.
Out of the blue Gelsy died (age 39) leaving behind her daughter Clara (named after Gelsy’s mother). Now it is harder to pursue my projects. Now I have to say that recently I have been diagnosed with a rare form of Tourette’s syndrome in which I am compelled to draw swastikas and Barack Obama Burning Crosses.
Gelsy Verna, NO water boarding David Dunlap, NO extraordinary rendition
EVEN More on David Dunlap:
The Iowa Source: Article and photos
Cue Art Foundation: Essay
Many Spoken Words (detail), 2009. In collaboration with Jean-Lou Majerus. Cast iron, black ink, steel, pump, plastic, stone. 91 x 138 x 138 inches (231 x 350 x 350cm). Photo Credit: Jean-Lou Majerus
3.
Su-Mei Tse: Words and Memories
Tse, born in 1973 to a Chinese father and English mother, represented her native country of Luxembourg in the 2003 Venice Biennale, where she took the Golden Lion Award. Many of the works on view here were created in collaboration with her partner, Jean-Lou Majerus, who helped conceive of and build the works.
Experience it…
Take a moment to adjust your ears to the sounds in the gallery the moment you walk in. You’ll hear a scratching and popping record coming from the room on your right, and the plop and splash of a fountain from the center of the gallery.
- How do these sounds fit together?
- What do they have in common?
Many of the sculptures in this gallery offer themselves up to interpretation immediately. The fountain spews black ink, behind it on the wall, what appear to be music sheets are covered with drops of ink. One thinks of the connection of the sound of the fountain to music, and the ink to writing and suddenly you find yourself in a different world conjured right before your eyes.
Swing, 2007. Neon, motor, transformer. Edition 5/5. Photo Credit: Jean-Lou Majerus
As you walk around then, more specters become solid: a neon birdcage sits atop a gorgeous wooden table. You notice that the door to the cage is open and find yourself picturing what has escaped – or at least the sound of it.
- Does the sound of the fountain add to the absence of the bird? How?
On the other side of the gallery, a neon swing moves back and forth and a record player with white plastic balls spins silently.
- Do you now think the fountain is playing the sounds of a park in the summer? Or the pops and hisses of the record? What else comes to mind.
Su Mei Tse is an artist professionally trained as a cellist. Her musical background takes center stage in this installation. In an interview from Shift Magazine, the artist discusses the relationship of sound and music to her visual installations:
“In the beginning of my studies I was always somehow between music and art, but my attraction for the visual world made me decide to concentrate on my fine arts studies and playing the cello beside. A few years ago I started to use my musical interests and experiences as a language in my work. That’s how I got to feel the most satisfied in the way of expressing myself.”
The bonsai trees on metal stilts at the front of the gallery seem mysterious at first, and beautiful. Questions come up – why are they on stilst? Why are they all at the same height? You even notice that the height is marked on the wall in fluorescent tape and called ‘Standard Eye Level’. What is going on here?
standard eye level, 2006-2009. metal supports, plants, fabric, fluorescent lettering andline. #2 of 3 versions. Photo Credit: Jean-Lou Majerus
A little information helps. Dorothea and I spoke with the Director of the gallery and learned that the artist is referencing the ancient and horrific tradition of binding women’s feet in China. You notice that the bonsai trees are bound at the roots and you begin to think about the standardization of the trees that are meant to be unique. The work powerfully evokes the effect of this tradition.
The final stop on this tour brings you to a place of meditation – what a terrific way to end! Follow the sounds of the record pops into the room at the very front of the gallery. Take note of all that you see in the room – a video projection of a warped record still playing after the end of the music. What does it sound like? Do you notice a rhythm? What affect does this have on you?
Floating Memories, 2009. In collaboration with Jean-Lou Majerus. Silk rug, wooden platform with walnut veneer, resin,loudspeakers, and video projection. This work was produced by and exhibited at theIsabella Stewart Gardner Museum, Boston, July- October 2009
On the ground in front of you is what appears to be a patterned carpet. But look closely and you’ll see that there is a carpet, but it is off-center and framed in wood. The wood itself contains the pattern, which has been etched into its surface and filled with a beautiful green lacquer. The tile of the exhibition resounds here – Words and Memories. As you ponder the ideas of loss and reflection in this exhibition, think about how this piece brings you to a state of desire for what’s missing – the sound on the record, the pattern in the carpet.
- What else has been missing from this exhibition – the bird, a person on the swing, words in the ink splotches?
This piece was conceived for and shown at the Isabella Stewart Gardiner Museum in Boston, paintings from which were stolen, having been cut out of their frames. These paintings have never been found, but the frames have been left on view in the museum’s galleries. It’s a haunting display and is perfectly captured in this piece by Su Mei Tse.
More on Su-Mei Tse:
Shift Magazine: Interview and photos