The Art of Felix Gonzalez-Torres—The Now and Not Yet

When the concept that art can be subversive is first acknowledged images of overtly political or propagandistic art might form in the mind. The feminist politics of an artist like Barbara Kruger are fully apparent when viewing her work. Even her heavy handed use of stark images, limited to black, white, and red, betrays her political agenda. This overt stance is certainly the model at times, yet some artists wield the tools of contemporary art in much more subtle, if not equally effective, ways.

The late Felix Gonzalez-Torres was a master of subtle symbolism. His art is brazenly political though his complex vocabulary requires a certain degree of deciphering if one wishes to receive the messages he sought to convey. His Leftist politics exemplified the stated decline of American culture that the Religious Right vigorously battled during the height of the culture wars in the 1990s. Still, Gonzalez-Torres proved that one might have an agenda akin to something like Robert Mapplethorpe’s without visually assaulting the sensibilities of the general population (*which is not to say that ALL of Mapplethorpe’s work did this, nor to state that his photographs are not technically superb).

Though not a founding member of Group Material, Gonzalez-Torres was asked by Tim Rollins and others in the Group to join their collaborative projects in the 1980s. Their collaborative-conceptualist works were both political in content and process. The individual political ideals of the Group aligned with Gonzalez-Torres’s own and the democratic nature that defined the group process guaranteed that a more liberal agenda would be set forth. However, he continued simultaneously creating individual works because his unique perspectives were somewhat muted in the collaborative process.

Where many derided artists, casualties of the culture wars, found their opponents on the Right as nearly sub-human, Gonzalez-Torres respected their tactics. Raised Roman Catholic, strict religious systems were not foreign to him. Some residual elements of his Catholicism even influenced his work. Upon reading that the director of the Christian Coalition promoted a form of guerrilla warfare that would only be apparent to those with a liberal political agenda on election night, the artist embraced the subversive tactic. He claimed that he also wanted to be a spy—a Trojan Horse his opponents could not initially detect.

Indeed, preliminary examinations of Gonzalez-Torres’s work seem to only reveal a spare conceptualism. Rooted in minimalist forms, incorporating everyday objects as the preferred media, there is nothing on the surface to expose the artist’s larger mission. As an openly gay artist during the height of the early AIDS epidemic, it was not unusual that Gonzalez-Torres would create art that brought related topics into focus. In fact, the artist eventually succumbed to the disease, following the death of his partner, also from AIDS related complications.

If Gonzalez-Torres’s art was not explicitly about sexuality and desire (though he might have stated it was), it was certainly about relational dynamics. These relationships were both private and corporate and their blurred boundaries were a main thrust of the thematic totality. The artist questioned boundaries. Cuban born, but living mostly in the U.S., physical boundaries were only one possible reading for Gonzalez-Torres.

Works like the "stacks"—unlimited posters printed by a commercial printer and stacked in a minimalist column within the gallery—often questioned the boundaries between private freedoms and government policy or intervention. Not only were the messages printed on the posters political (i.e. concerns about federal gun control policies and the rate of deaths by gun violence), the nature of the works’ structure was a political statement in terms of art world commodification.

The stacks consist of an endless supply of identical images. Viewers are encouraged to take one. Thus, each stack is slowly diminished throughout every exhibition day. The gallery or museum staff replenishes each stack as the prints dwindle in quantity. The swelling and receding stacks mock the valuation of art. The unlimited supply, from which viewers take and do not purchase individual portions, is an affront to the gallery system and the presupposition that art is only for a wealthy, elite minority. This art is free to all.

Similar to the stacks are the "spills." Placed in corners of the gallery or in minimalist influenced rectangular "blankets" on the gallery floor, the spills are composed of individually wrapped hard candies. The Untitled (Placebo) of 1993 relates directly to the AIDS virus. As Gonzalez-Torres helplessly watched his partner slowly die from the effects of AIDS, he was acutely aware that the prescribed treatments were little more than a delusion in the face of an incurable disease.

For Gonzalez-Torres the spills represented the gradual loss of one who is dying. Little pieces of his partner were lost daily, just as viewers take pieces and literally eat away at the installation. This odd mixture of life and death, a dead body consumed by the living, has often been linked to the Eucharistic symbols of the artist’s Catholic heritage. These works are nearly alive, breathing organisms. Yet they are always diminishing, dying.

The stacks and spills mimic our relational lives. In our personal interactions we constantly take little pieces of others away with us. When those people are eventually dead and gone we still hold on to the memories, the pieces. They are not the whole of the person, but a portion. Gonzalez-Torres realized this and even defined the parameters of works by assigning them ideal weights (such as the combined weight of the artist and his partner).

This ideal is also found in Platonic philosophy. Plato’s famed "cave" relates our experiences in this physical world to shadows viewed in the recesses of a dimly lit cave. We only catch glimpses of what is real, what is ideal, in this, our current state. These installations reflect an ideal and perfect state for the artist, but they can never assume that ideal state. Even when candies are installed at this weight the piece is incomplete until viewers partake of it physically. And when they do, the fluctuation, the ebb and flow of the component parts, competes with the ideal.

This process can be likened to another concept in Christianity—the Kingdom of God as the Now and Not Yet. Jesus explained to his disciples that the Kingdom of God was here. He claimed he had fulfilled the Law of Moses so that humanity could once again dwell with God. But heaven was not yet here on earth. It was still to come at the end of time. The perfection of things that Felix Gonzalez-Torres sought through politically infused art was always just out of reach. The fullness of relationships could never be attained since we are all dying a little each day.

At the heart of these works and others is a sense of desire. This may be a desire for the other, but it is also that desire for perfection, completion. It is that desire for the "not yet." Another signature work that reflects this longing is the artist’s Untitled (Clocks). Two simple, unadorned wall clocks are placed adjacent to each other on the wall. Their sideways figure eight recalls the symbol for infinity. The clocks are set in perfect time, down to the second. They are like two people, a couple that is perfectly in sync.

But there is soon trouble in this perceived paradise. The clocks eventually fall out of rhythm. The infinite love of this united pair can fall out of step. Inevitably one clock will stop ticking. One heart will stop beating. No matter how perfect the relationship, this "now" is temporal and mortal. So we continue to seek that immortal perfection of the not yet.

The deceptively simple artwork of Felix Gonzalez-Torres continues to hold a powerful influence in the contemporary art world for more than its political power and status. For some it holds a certain importance for its message of sexual equality. For others the attention brought to certain social issues is paramount. Still, the primary reason Gonzalez-Torres’s work continues to be exhibited is that it touches on key elements of our human existence, as all great art must.

To End at the Beginning

I have worn a variety of hats in my professional life: teacher, administrator, curator, art critic, and more. No matter what my official title is at any given time, there is one title that always remains—artist. It is something that is integral to my personality and the artist’s mind and mode of seeing cannot really be turned off at will. That means that new and in-process works are always rambling through my head, often when I least expect them.

There are certain times when I am actively seeking ideas and inspiration. When I visit flea markets and antique shops I have a couple goals. I tend to have a mental list of items I’m seeking. Odd objects that will become relics within larger altarpieces are often located on these excursions. No matter how the idea for an altarpiece originates—from an object I have already found or an idea that came from something I read or heard—I tend to envision additional objects as I sketch the design. A rooster (really just a chicken), a lamb, a doll’s head, a platter, a honey dipper/dripper. All of these have been on my list and were found on one of these trips (Of course that elusive chameleon is still on my list! I think it is just blending into its surroundings).

I now stick by the rule that if I find an item, even when I’m not searching for it, I better get it. When I lived in Massachusetts there was a great flea market I sometimes attended on Sunday mornings before church. My friend George and I would get up at 5 AM in order to paw through the assorted trash and treasures before heading out to mass. I will be incorporating my finds from the Todd Farm flea market for decades to come. My other reliable haunt was the antique shops in a small town in New Hampshire. That is where I learned the lesson to buy it right when you find it.

On what I would guess was my second trip to these antique shops, I happened upon one of those life-sized Christ child statues/dolls that churches often display in a manger around Christmas. Mind you, I was not in the market for one and I also had no idea what I would do with the thing if I bought it. I do recall that it was priced higher than what I was really willing to pay. I was drawn to the worn quality of the object. It was missing fingers and had scars and abrasions over its surface. So, I gathered the objects I planned to buy, made my purchases and went home without baby Jesus.

The Christ child would not leave my mind, however, as Jesus is often want to do. I tend to be enchanted by objects no one else would, so I returned later that week expecting little Jesus to be there waiting for me. I was wrong. I still didn’t know what I would have done with it, but I was greatly disappointed that I didn’t obtain it when I had the chance.

Several months later I returned to the New Hampshire antique shops with my friends Barry and Kathy. We had spent the previous day in meetings and part of my thank you to them was this trek to our immediate north. Barry is known for his assemblage work and I knew he would be delighted with the shops. He ended up filling his suitcases for the return flight to California and I even had to mail an additional box of items to him later.

I picked up some old cameras, a bunch of skeleton keys, and some old iron claw feet from a bathtub. I figured I would find a few items but I didn’t expect to be fascinated with an object I was not actually seeking. Inside a glass display case I spotted an antique German doll. It wasn’t exactly that missing baby Jesus, but it elicited a similar response. This doll was made from pressed metal. The head and legs were detached from the torso and the parts were piled in a wooden cigar box. It was also placed in a price range I was reluctant to enter.

The siren call of the dismantled infant eventually proved irresistible and I purchased it, having no idea what I would do with a dismembered doll. The doll lounged in its cigar box daybed for several months. I passed it daily and contemplated its meaning. Since it had reminded me of that baby Jesus I had passed by, I kept mentally interrogating its purpose within my studio.

One day, while working through the sketches for a crucifixion piece I was developing, the meaning of the doll struck me clearly. This small object was the complete history of Christ. It was the miraculous birth of the incarnate God, yet it was also the foreshadowing image of the adult Christ. Here, the infant of the Christmas story was also revealed as the object of ultimate sacrifice and salvation for all humanity.

As the relevance of this relic for an unknown altarpiece construction revealed itself the other elements of the work quickly fell into place. I learned a good lesson with the doll. Trust your instincts. I see many objects at antique shops and flea markets that spark an interest, but few have captivated me to this degree. I now understand that when they do I need to bite the bullet, spend the cash, and wait for the next artwork to reveal itself. These unconscious symbols surround us. It is the role of the artist to connect the dots and uncover their hidden meanings.

Tim Rollins—A New World Evangelist

On a warm fall evening I made my way along 23rd St. in New York’s Chelsea district. After a day full of business meetings I was looking forward to the possibility of a relaxing chat with an artist friend. We had already missed each other earlier in the day because he had an interview somewhere uptown. No definite plans were confirmed for that evening, but I had a hunch I knew where to find him.

Down a few steps, through the door, and to the left. Sure enough. Dressed in his requisite black attire, with the signature black hat, Tim Rollins was already holding court at his favorite bar. The first time he brought me there he described it as a type of Cheers. True, everybody there knows Tim’s name and that evening they sat rapt, encircling the bar, as he offered up tale after tale.

After a few minutes of catching up, and into Tim’s second Beefeater martini, another artist acquaintance of Tim’s walked in. We were introduced and soon the artist began to explain his current project. It was an interesting proposal for which he sought models from a great variety of ethnic backgrounds. He mentioned that he needed several more African Americans. Without hesitation Tim invited him to church that Sunday. Tim attends a black church in Harlem. His is regularly one of the scant white faces in the crowd—swaying, shouting, and singing as energetically as anyone else. Tim could certainly round up a dozen or more willing models. This conversation and the invitation to church are typical of Tim’s generous interactions—his modus operandi.

Rollins first gained attention for his work with Group Material, a politically motivated art collective formed from students nearing graduation from the School of Visual Arts. They produced a body of work in the 1980s. The individuals met in conceptual artist Joseph Kosuth’s seminar class at SVA and, from the first, their joint efforts took on a similar conceptualist flavor.

Julie Ault, another founding member of the Group, has explained that the democratic process of their work needed a bit of harnessing. Though the members had their own private art practices and interests, they worked within a different dynamic when collaborating. Tim Rollins became an agent of much needed focus for their collective ideas. His natural charisma and experience working with young students in the New York City burroughs thrust him into some leadership responsibilities.

Rollins possesses a talent for bringing out the best—the untapped creativity—within others. He also has a boundless enthusiasm that is contagious. These qualities caused him to relentlessly question the bureaucratic roadblocks placed in his way when teaching in the Learning to Read Through the Arts program within the New York City public school system. He refused to place a low bar before his students simply because they came from less than promising circumstances. Inspired by the hope and optimism that empowered the Civil Rights work of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., Tim refused to consign the minds of these young people to the trash heap.

About this time (1981) Rollins began an after school program called the Art and Knowledge Workshop; the art he and those students produced in collaboration eventually was to be known as the work of Tim Rollins and K.O.S. (Kids of Survival—what the young people dubbed themselves). From the first, these collaborative works were marked by Tim’s insistence on the creative and intellectual potential within the Kids. The work, to this day, is typically characterized by the use of painting and drawing media upon single book pages or multiple pages adhered to stretched canvases.

The literary works mined for both artistic and transformative potential include Ralph Ellison’s The Invisible Man, Gustave Flaubert’s The Temptation of St. Anthony, and The Creation oratorio by Haydn. These works could provide a challenge for the average junior high school student, yet Tim dove into the texts along with his young artists. Together, they searched for the relevant elements of human struggle and potential in each work.

As with the work of Group Material, Tim’s work with K.O.S was often a political endeavor. He may have chosen the texts for the group to read and discuss, but the students were responsible for shaping the artwork. They could find the injustices relayed through a work of fiction. They could also recognize these injustices in their own lives—in their neighborhoods. Again, a somewhat democratic process allowed for the vetting of ideas and concepts. As in Group Material, Tim functioned as a facilitator in this process.

Reviews of the work have often been mixed. It has stood the test of time for over twenty-five years. The work has also earned a coveted place within the pantheon of contemporary art. For those who might offer complaints about the style of the work—stating that its form has not progressed beyond the paintings on book pages—a reminder that consistency in style is a necessity for nearly any other contemporary artist is in order.

Criticism has also been leveled against Rollins as an exploiter. The claim is that he has used these young people as his means to art world success and fame. The story of collaboration with underprivileged youth would then be little more than a way to tug at the heart (and purse) strings of over privileged collectors. This could be the case if one disregarded the actual person of Tim Rollins.

Rollins’ personality indicates that his journey through the art world could have been none other than what it is. He is an evangelist—a high octane backwoods preacher. I propose a variety of meanings with this analogy. As stated above, Tim might readily invite any casual acquaintance to church with him on any given Sunday. He fully believes in the experience that he and others share in that zealous setting.

Tim is also an evangelist for justice. He views Dr. King as a hero. Much of his drive comes from a desire to unmask the disparities and inequities present within our culture. He works with the forgotten and the disenfranchised. Working with children that society may write off, he guides them to revelations of their true worth. Providing them with this kernel of truth is essential if any are to truly become Kids of Survival, reaching past their meek circumstances.

Not only does Tim’s zeal positively impact the outlook of the K.O.S. artists, it impacts a larger culture. Tim uses art and literature to open the eyes of the children. He then turns around and opens the eyes of the culture to their personal complicity in a system that weighs these children down in the first place. That makes him an advocate and not an exploiter. And for this reason the larger project of Tim and K.O.S. can be nothing short of political. Yet it can also be viewed as spiritual. Tim’s fervor and zeal comes from a New Testament faith. A faith that impacts how he interacts with all people. The teachings of Jesus saturate his personal interactions. A love for others is at the center of it all.

Though the art is provocative in its own right, the backstory is equally compelling. The forceful visual language of Modernism thoroughly engages the viewer. But the work is not merely some abstract wallpaper. Just as the process of creating the work is transformative for the artists, it can be transformative for the viewer. Rollins and K.O.S charge viewers with the responsibility of entering the art, completing a cycle of communication and action. The work is a testament to the adage that anything worth our time in this world is also worth our sweat and toil.

The Pilgrimage: Unforeseen Journeys

As I prepared for a one month teaching stint in Italy in 2006, I had a list of artworks, altarpieces, and locations with and at which I planned to spend some quality time. I had been in Italy for a little more than a week in 1991, but that was before I had ever taken an art history class. In the intervening years I had taught art history to hundreds of college students and the altarpiece had become a significant form within my own work.

I was lucky enough to have a friend from Boston who was living in Florence at the time. So I spent a few days with him and planned my schedule so that I could see as many works as possible. This, however, did not include entering Florence’s domed cathedral (the Duomo) or visiting the Academia to see Michelangelo’s David and Slaves. I had already seen these works and, though they are worthy of multiple extended visits, I knew there were some less widely known works I had not previously seen that would prove to be better stops during this pilgrimage.

I spent the better part of one day in the Uffizi Museum. One morning was devoted to the convent of San Marco with the frescoed cells of Beato (Fra) Angelico. The final morning found me crossing the Ponte Vecchio bridge to see Pontormo’s masterful Deposition and the Brancacci Chapel at Santa Maria del Carmine.

At both the Uffizi and the museum at the San Marco convent I did the type of sketching I had anticipated. The frames on various altarpieces and smaller devotional works were intricately carved and gilded. Reproductions in books never do these details justice since they are flattened. Some books even leave the frames off completely. Though I don’t try to make the constructed portions of my own altarpieces quite like their renaissance era predecessors, I do gain valuable information from studying them closely.

What I had not expected was the impact reliquaries and medieval wooden statuary would have on me. I came across these beautiful and curious objects in unexpected places. In Florence, I did not shun Michelangelo completely; I visited his Medici tombs in San Lorenzo. Like many of the churches in the city it also has an adjacent museum. The gilded bones and odd possessions of long departed saints were encased in complexly designed, jewel encrusted structures.

Back in Orvieto, where I was spending most of my days, I visited the museum of the city’s cathedral. It had an exhibit of work by Simone Martini. His international gothic style Annunciation has always been inspiring as an altarpiece form. Some of the other works on display, but not in that exhibit, were what really drew my attention. Several worm eaten wooden sculptures of saints simultaneously possessed a sense of decay and a tender, life-like presence. I took detailed notes concerning their condition. Later, on several visits to the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York, I studied similar medieval statuary. While they intrigued me, I wasn’t sure how these sculptural works related to what I was presently pursuing in the altarpieces.

When I found a broken wooden hand mannequin—the kind artists use when sketching out hand gestures—I began to see it as a reliquary object. It was on clearance at an art supply store so I picked it up for future use. It is becoming a hybrid form, and is still in process. The wooden sculptures I had been studying are typically painted (polychromed) in life-like colors. Reliquary objects are often coated in gold. This hand resides somewhere between these two forms. It is both worm eaten, weathered wood and a mystical golden relic. It connects to an ancient past but is also of this contemporary moment.

What the hand means within the larger context of a specific altarpiece will be up to the viewer to conceive. I have my concept for this relic, but I don’t want to reveal too much about the work before it is finished. Keep reading future posts for further details.

Playing a Serious Game—The Art of Amy Day

Just how is it that art "works" on us? There may be a commonly held belief that art should possess aspects of beauty. Even a narrow definition that excludes aesthetic sensibilities like the sublime recognizes that art possesses something more than merely technical skill—mimesis of nature’s beauty. There is something transcendent in art that takes us out of ourselves and causes us to look at the world through a different lens.

Sometimes it takes the unsettling to make us take a new look at an old concept. Performance art has had an unsettling quality from its genesis. It wasn’t visual art in the traditional sense and it wasn’t even theatre. This hybrid nature caused questions to naturally arise in viewers and this has often been used to the advantage of artists who employ performance as a medium.

Amy Day utilizes her body in her performance works. Her body is her primary medium. The actions of her body, combined with other symbolically laden objects, reference attitudes and beliefs common in society. Day, however, turns viewer assumptions on their heads. By re-presenting beliefs and assumptions in a new context, Day causes the viewer to consider the cultural qualifiers that may color basic beliefs.

Day’s series of videos entitled Bible Bath (all hyperlinked titles can be viewed on YouTube) consists of various "episodes" in which she plays the hostess of a video story-time. Amid floating bunches of plastic grapes, she relays various biblical tales that are both loosely self interpreted and drawn from versions found in children’s coloring books . Her Eucharistic fantasy is enlivened with occasional sips from the wine glass constantly cradled in her hand, no doubt adding to some non-traditional interpretations of Noah and the Ark, and David and Goliath. All the while she lounges, self-baptized in a water filled bathtub.

Part of the artist’s intention for this work was to relay what her faith would resemble at the age of thirty if it had never changed from the condition it was in when she was a child. In the gospels Jesus admonishes Christians to possess a childlike faith, but that doesn’t mean a childish faith. Day presents a problem to fundamentalist and evangelical Christians. Are they more concerned with the conversion of the unsaved masses than in the maturation of those same newly converted "baby" Christians? Is American Christianity based disproportionately in the Just As I Am altar call of a Billy Graham Crusade? If this is true then the recent predictions of blogger Michael Spencer, concerning the imminent demise of evangelicalism, may be true.

Bible Bath appears as both amusing and disconcerting. It is imbued with an honesty that makes it unnerving, while still fostering an appeal to both those in Christian circles and in the art world. The use of the artist’s body in other works is more immediate, dramatic, and potentially offensive. Day does not shrink away from the traditional symbolism connected to the physical bodies of female performance artists. The woman’s body is the battleground for feminist concerns and ideologies. By stripping down their bodies, Day and other female performance artists regain the control taken from women by a patriarchal society.

This is most evident in Eve. Once, again, connecting to religious tales, Day presents herself as a sinless figure of the mother of humanity. Her naked body is covered in flour to reveal its Edenic purity. As in much of Day’s work, the performance is then inhabited by the accoutrements of childhood. This time it is in the form of the childhood game of bobbing for apples. One by one, Day grasps these blood red, candy coated apples with her mouth, drops them down her torso, and into her lap. Images of sin, death, loss of innocence, and sexuality merge into one powerful scene.

Eve is far from subtle. It tackles Christian beliefs head on, but it communicates in the language of contemporary art. Physical vocabulary is important to Day. Even when she is not using her own physical body the works enlist a materiality that calls attention to the truth of the circumstances presented. A comparison between Ritual Obstacle Course and Closer to the Light is a case in point.

In Ritual Obstacle Course Day navigates the mythic tasks of some self-imposed bodily challenge. She interacts with structures she has previously built in the natural world. The rituals begin with the gathering of pottery from the puddles of a muddy plot of land. Dressed in garments of white, like her figure in Eve, she performs various tasks with the vessels at the appointed stations. until her white, mime-like mask is washed clean from her face in the "rain machine," completing the ordeal.

Closer to the Light is the alter ego of Ritual Obstacle Course. It is the child’s version—the title coming from a book of the same name that addresses near death experiences of children. It is a stop-action, puppet animation that finds the central character—a doll that seems a cross between Snow White and Alice in Wonderland—performing identical tasks in a world of toys. This is the child-like Bible Bath version of the actual biblical tale. Day wants the viewer to understand that we sometimes require a re-telling, a re-imagining of our archetypes, in order to better dissect their content. Our familiarity with the stories and practices of our youth may cause us to neglect the high seriousness of their full implications.

Performance and even video art are like a foreign language to many people. They do not often possess the intrinsic beauties that many assume are the hallmarks of good art. Amy Day’s work is fun and humorous, but also serious. She uses the first two elements to elicit questions in the minds of her viewers so that the latter is palatable. It is these vivid reinterpretations that work on our imaginations over time.

Subterranean Homesick Blues

Even though I construct altarpiece-like box constructions, as an artist, I hate to be confined to a box. I find that the art world may be even worse than other areas of the culture in confining people to specific categories. One look at the job postings section of the College Art Association’s website is enough to convince people that there are more rarified and miniscule areas of study and expertise in the history of art than can be imagined. Labels make life easier, but they limit our human—or humane—interactions.

I found this to be the case with my former position with CIVA but also because of any associations with Christian institutions (i.e. colleges) I have had. It was far easier to write me off as an ignorant Bible-thumper than to engage in meaningful interaction. Time and again I encountered artists, curators, scholars—you name it—who were ready to terminate a conversation as soon as one of these labels found its way into our discourse. I could usually turn things around when the individual found that I was more than conversant in and knowledgeable about multiple aspects of the contemporary art world.

I must confess. I have been guilty of the same kind of crime. On one occasion I met James Cooper, the editor of the American Arts Quarterly, for lunch while on a visit to New York City. His work with the Newington-Cropsey Foundation, along with his well-considered editorials for the journal, left me with the presupposition that he was interested in only a fairly narrow segment of the art world. On the contrary, we had such an enlivened discussion on all facets of art that I was internally embarrassed I had ever harbored such a notion. We concluded our visit with a trip through the Edvard Munch exhibition then on display at the Museum of Modern Art. I think we both left with a new vision and comprehension of the Norwegian Expressionist’s work.

This brings me back to the American Arts Quarterly. In the Winter 2009 issue I was pleased to find a review of the recent George Tooker retrospective exhibition at the National Academy Museum in New York City. Written by the eminent art historian Donald Kuspit, this wide-reaching review gave more insight than many I read these days. Kuspit made a not entirely original analogy of Tooker’s 1950 painting Subway (above) as a Hell for the Modern world. The claustrophobic painting teems with bewildered Manhattanites lost within the labyrinth of the city’s subway system. It stands as a metaphor for the disillusioned fate of Modern humanity.

Granted, Kuspit is not the first to point this out. Yet as I pondered the relevance of the subterranean metaphor it agitated my sensibilities in a distinct way that previous interpretations of the painting had not. I imagine that this time around my more recent familiarity with the subways of both Boston and New York internalized the interpretation. In the sweltering heat of a Northeastern summer, these subway systems certainly can give Dante and Virgil a run for their money.

My acquaintance with the subway as a type of Hell launched my mind into the configuration of a new altarpiece with a Boston "T" car as the vehicle of Hell. Living just outside of Boston, I regularly used mass transit to enter the city, arriving at North Station underneath the parquet court of the Celtics. From there, the Green Line was my typical starting point, often bringing me to the Park Street Station—the oldest subway station in the U.S. What better place than Park Street to re-imagine a New England Puritanical Hell?

I miss Boston—even the hellish quality of the Green Line on an afternoon when Fenway Park is hosting a World Series game. Still, the "T" as Hell was only a premise on which to build a more complex work. Sure, the subway car could play host to Charon. I guess the Charles River would be his route instead of the Styx. Probably some would say that the great Satan of liberalism lies across the Charles in ivy covered Cambridge. But that would require taking the Red Line and my intuition was not necessarily leading there, clever as the concept might be.

Typical of postmodernist appropriationism, I felt that some kind of Last Judgment image was more in keeping with my theme. Many people are aware of Michelangelo’s Last Judgment. Its location in the Sistine Chapel along with its controversial nudity has perhaps made it more famous as a type than a recognizable image. I rather enjoy Luca Signorelli’s Last Judgment, as well. Michelangelo visited the cathedral in Orvieto to view it when preparing his own version. My month in Orvieto allowed me plenty of opportunity to study this work. In the end, however, my favorite Last Judgment is Rogier van der Weyden’s. Those poor, naked, doomed souls being chased into Hell are on my top ten list of northern renaissance images.

Lest I give my elaborate concept away in full, I will conclude. The totality of this work will be based in some specific personal experiences. This will not configure a typical Last Judgment. And this brings me back to my original annoyance. I expect that many might place my work in the category of "religious art." I agree that there are some pieces (woodcuts and cathedral etchings) that fall more comfortably into that designation. The altarpieces, however, do not. They do appropriate religious imagery and trappings, but they are far more complex than that simply reading. My hope is that when the next wave of altarpieces is completed they will receive a broader audience that more accurately reflects their complexity.

Engraving and the Art of Stanley William Hayter: Taking the Hard Line

I can’t see that there is a very accurate measure for fame. In fact, I’m not sure we would really want to attempt creating such a system. Fame is not an indicator of what kind of influence or importance a person actually holds within his or her immediate circle or within the larger culture. It is more of a popularity contest based on some least common denominator.

For this reason, most people do not know the name Stanley William Hayter. Most artists don’t even recognize his name. That does not diminish his importance. As a printmaker, Hayter initiated some of the most significant media-specific changes of the twentieth century. But it was his inventive spirit that ultimately impacted hundreds and thousands of artists who would not necessarily classify themselves, primarily, as printmakers.

I admit that I knew next to nothing about printmaking until I was about halfway through my graduate program in painting. I knew the minimum about techniques. I also knew a bit about Durer and Rembrandt, which came from general art history survey courses. And I had some interest in the work of Leonard Baskin, but that had much more to do with style than technique. When I came into the presence of a color intaglio work by Hayter (Saddle, above) my interest in printmaking skyrocketed.

I think my earlier lack of enthusiasm for printmaking and printmakers was largely due to my preconceptions about the medium, I figured that it was merely a medium by which paintings and other artworks could be inexpensively duplicated for the masses, only in black and white. This was exactly the kind of thinking that Hayter worked against for most of his life. He wanted to transform printmaking into a highly original and creative medium in its own right.

Hayter’s first prints were in black and white, but they were works unto themselves and not derivative or reproductions of other prototype works. (A side point is that printmaking has continued to suffer from the belief that prints are mere reproductions. There is a major and distinct difference between what many call "prints" and true original print media.) Hayter’s primary process was intaglio—which encompasses a wide variety of techniques that incise or abrade a metal plate. Nearly every intaglio work by Hayter incorporated engraving. He referred to himself as an engraver and that technique was at the heart of his method.

Although Hayter is often linked to the Surrealists, he transcended the movements of the twentieth century. Hayter worked with several Surrealist artists, but his imagery was not intrinsically linked to their styles or concepts. His engraving favored freely flowing virtuosic lines that mocked the unforgiving nature of the metal surfaces he utilized. Themes for the engravings often came from literature. A master work, Death by Water (above), takes its title from a movement in T.S Eliot’s The Waste Land. It was not unusual for the works to take on such existential themes, particularly during this early black and white period.

The passage from the poem reads as follows:
Phlebus the Phoenician, a fortnight dead,
Forgot the cry of gulls, and the deep seas swell
And the profit and loss.
A current under sea
Picked his bones in whispers. As he rose and fell
He passed the stages of his age and youth
Entering the whirlpool.
Gentile or Jew
O you who turn the wheel and look to windward,
Consider Phlebas, who was once handsome and tall as you.

While Hayter generally took a much more abstract approach to his literary transpositions, this work retains a certain faithfulness to the text. One senses the whirling undercurrents of the seas as they assault the tragic figure of Phlebus. Yet delicate lines also seem to suggest the gentle picking clean of the Phoenician’s bones.

Rescuing printmaking from the realm of simple reproduction of previous imagery would have been a sufficient and noble goal. And Hayter’s engravings were able to accomplish this in the minds of many. His next endeavor was more far reaching. His belief in the medium as an avenue for unlimited creative expression empowered him to open a printmaking workshop—Atelier 17—where others could come to experiment with intaglio processes.

At first, Hayter did not visualize himself in the role of teacher. He championed an approach of freedom in the print studio, though, in the end, if one came to study at the workshop he had a somewhat regimented approach to the medium. This was, however, a structure within which a great deal of creativity could still be expressed. Atelier 17 opened in Paris before WWII and was a creative meeting ground for many renowned continental artists of the period. When the war threatened France Hayter uprooted the studio and transplanted it to New York for a time.

Many artists came to Hayter’s workshop with little experience in printmaking. Their clean slate status, mixed with the experimental nature of the workshop atmosphere, provided the impetus to challenge tradition. Hayter harnessed the questioning spirit of these artists, bringing their collective energies together so that the whole of the Atelier’s efforts became something much more than the disparate parts.

The next challenge that Hayter and his associates undertook was printing in color. Previous color intaglios were either printed in black and white and then hand colored, or printed with multiple plates. The multi-plate method was cumbersome and produced unreliable results. Hayter felt that if multiple colors could be printed from a single plate, on only one pass through the press, the results would be more consistent.

Cinq Personnages (above) is the watershed print that marked this transition. At times Hayter had created stencils through which he had rolled colored inks onto the plates before they were passed through the press. The colors were a bit diluted with this method (though he did create some incredible images with this process). For Cinq Personnages, the colors were applied to the plate with silk screens. This rendered vibrant colors. But, while the registration of colors was better, using all the silk screens was still somewhat laborious.

What one begins to sense in this transition is Hayter’s new way of conceiving imagery. The same lyrical line quality is apparent in the engraved portions, but color and shape are equally comprising the finished products. It is this presence of color and shape that connects the work more to painting than to drawing. Drawing and printmaking had traditionally been grouped into the category of graphic arts. Hayter, who was also a painter, wanted to transcend these media specific categories.

The last stage of the color printing transformation came when members of the Atelier (usually this discovery is attributed to Krishna Reddy) found that multiple colors could be applied to one plate by producing varying levels within the plate, then inking the plate with inks of different viscosities, using rollers of different hardnesses. Saddle, the first work I encountered, is a variation on this method: it only incorporates two inks with one rolled color. The intermixing of the various inks created a breadth of color combinations and sparked a revival of interest in printmaking.

The vibrancy of the colors used in these prints was like nothing seen in intaglio works during the previous centuries. By the 1960s and 70s Hayter’s style had taken a slightly different direction, in keeping with the new multi-color printing. Still stemming from his engraved line work, the jarring color shifts resulted in combinations of either analogous or complimentary colors. The results were somewhat similar to the Op Art works of the period, yet retained a distinctive quality of their own.

Mauricio Lasansky, an Argentinean-American, studied with Hayter while Atelier 17 was in New York. Lasansky’s color printing methods were much different from Hayter’s but, along with Hayter, his impact on printmaking in the U.S. was astounding. Lasanksy started one of the first MFA printmaking programs and his students went on to found the major university printmaking programs across the nation. Still, the renewal in printmaking—intaglio specifically—was initiated when Atelier 17 was briefly located within U.S. borders.

There was actually a confluence of multiple factors that caused this renaissance in printmaking. Much of it had to do with timing. Hayter was in the right place at the right time. The U.S. was perched on the edge of its first original, world-impacting art movement—Abstract Expressionism. The experimental qualities of Abstract Expressionism were similar to the innovations found in Hayter’s workshop format. Although Stanley Hayter is not the household name that Jackson Pollock is, his spirit infused the work of many mid- and late-century artists, even if they may not recognize it.

The Art of Self-Disclosure

It wasn’t really that long ago that the proper subject matter for great works of art was somewhat narrowly defined. Tales from religions, mythology, and history were the only subjects deemed worthy of our highest regard. Disruptions in this belief became evident with Realist artists like Gustave Courbet and Edouard Manet during the nineteenth century. Within one hundred years it seemed that the entire hierarchical structure had crumbled and that the politics of personal identity had displaced the previous themes.

This is a somewhat dramatic oversimplification, but there have been significant shifts. While there may only be a fraction of contemporary artists producing work that fits the traditionally held formats of history and religious painting, many artists continue to reference these same stories of humanity’s past. The purpose may be to scrutinize long-held beliefs the artist finds to be false, or to align the work with some sub-theme from the past. Likewise, not every contemporary artist utilizes his or her artwork to investigate questions concerning gender, race, or sexuality, or to exorcise some specific personal demon.

One thing that is certain, the realm of the personal and intimate has a prominent position among the various and valid themes in the contemporary discourse. From Tracey Emin’s rumpled bed sheets and womb-like tent installation listing every person she has ever slept with, to the sado-masochistic performances of the now deceased Bob Flanagan, who mixed elements of his cystic fibrosis with his art and sexual practices, the highly personal has become highly public. My question as an artist is where do we draw the line?

I am not saying that these particular artists, and others like them, have crossed some moral boundary that marks their work as something other than, or less than, art. All these categories and many others are certainly fair game for the creation of art. If the work takes us no further than the bathroom humor of a fifth grader then I question its artistic merit. If it has a more transcendent presence, even if the medium used to get us to that place is a difficult one, then it is valid as art. My question is more about my boundaries.

The creation of artwork is, by its very nature, personal. Andy Warhol may have worked to destroy some of that notion, but there were still aesthetic choices made in his "machine-like" works. The Duchampian emphasis on the choice of the artist finds contemporary artists inhabiting a different system than our forebears did. If multiple artists were given the same basic task and tools, the results would still differ in regard to style. Even when we try to hide the evidence of individual style it is bound to show through in some way.

Since text is a major component in much of my work I vacillate between the extremes of how much of it I should reveal. The books I read certainly tell viewers something about me. Is it better to spell out why some specific work has impacted me by making certain passages fully readable? Is it better to obscure the passages under paint so that they are still integral to the work but not a road sign pointing out a particular path?

It isn’t just the text—the physical objects and scenes depicted have personal meaning, too. These are often more highly symbolic for me, but that poses another problem. If I, like Joseph Cornell, am employing everyday objects to form a new personal, symbolic vocabulary, do I not risk being misinterpreted?
All of these possibilities are part of the fabric of contemporary art and its interpretation. It can often be a misinterpretation. While the role of the personal in art production has introduced the personal more fully into interpretation of the same works, the artist has to be somewhat comfortable with the misinterpretations that may result. The savvy artist uses the interpretations of others to assess how well his or her goals are being met and to recognize if there are apparent aspects of the work that he or she didn’t even consciously intend during its creation.

I have always employed a somewhat personalized and symbolic form of figurative imagery. Often, it retained a distinct connection to the historical and religious stories or themes mentioned earlier. As my imagery began to veer into directions that were increasingly personal I had a fear that the work would cease to find a connection with a broad audience. I soon learned that even highly personal themes retain enough of our common human truth to be approached as fully human, and therefore something to which any viewer can relate.

The probability of misunderstanding symbols and texts is great. I connect my pantheon of images and resources in my own specific ways. I associate them with things most viewers commonly would, but also with things almost nobody else would. In the end, my work is not meant as full and perfect communication. It is partial communication and partial self-discovery. I don’t mean this as some form of art therapy. It is more like a pathway, subconsciously directed, from one piece to the next.

Whatever Happened to Art Criticism?

The contemporary art world, like any subculture, is a symbiotic community. While talent, hard work, and timing are factors through which artists and artworks find a place into the canon of art history, there is also a good deal of nepotism. This “I’ll scratch your back, you scratch mine” state of affairs has resulted in a recent dearth of genuine art criticism—though this may have always been part of the system.

Writing on art still exists, but it often avoids stating strong opinions in black and white. An article in the February 2009 issue of Art in America touched on this in terms of market characteristics. The author lamented the loss of standards of quality which he claims has been one reason for such sharp increases in the valuation of art by living artists. A major point was that a pluralist view in the art world, along with a refusal to state that there could feasibly be some system of quality standards, has resulted in a lack of experts who can truly assess this.

I do not expect that the reviews written in major art periodicals and newspapers are going to be scathing censures of particular exhibitions or artworks. I have first hand experience with the inherent dilemmas of writing art criticism. When I was writing art reviews for a newspaper in Boise, Idaho I routinely wrote about exhibits and artists that interested me—ones I felt had merit. One gallery owner complained to my editor that his gallery’s shows were never covered. My assignment, with my editor’s full understanding that I would likely be less generous with my compliments, was to review their next show. The gallery owner didn’t complain again.

The art community in any region or municipality is small. Even New York and London have quite manageable art communities. You can accurately surmise that Boise’s is a rather small one. Even when my reviews were mostly positive I would sometimes point out problematic display issues or inconsistencies in the selected works. Once, after mentioning that the enormous frame on a particular landscape painting dwarfed the better features of the piece, the artist took me task. While attending opening receptions during the following Boise First Thursday festivities I was harassed and followed by the artist from one gallery to another. I eventually left earlier than I had planned and decided that large opening receptions were likely not the best setting to view works anyway.

I think this might be one reason for the lack of true critical writing. In the smallness of the art world it is far too easy to anger not only an artist, gallery director, or curator, but the associates of those same people. Unless the critic has a stable position with a particular publication she may be walking on very thin ice when negative criticisms are relayed.

However, all publications are complicit in this lack of true criticism. In an effort to publish what sells best, journalistic integrity is compromised. What we are offered, instead, are synoptic reviews that provide a written facsimile of the exhibition inventory and layout, while avoiding any meaty discussion of the works’ merit, or lack of it. Expert opinion may still just be opinion, but it has the backing of the author’s expertise which should carry the appropriate weight. It is always the similar opinions of many experts that create a consensus that work is of great value. The critical opinion of one bad review will not end a career.

This disappointment in a lack of real criticism was made manifest in an art review of an exhibition of work by Stanley William Hayter, printed in the March 2009 issue of Artnews (the exhibit was of Hayter’s work from 1940-50 at Francis M. Nauman Fine Art, written by Alfred MacAdam). I had been immensely disappointed that I was not able to view the exhibition. The artist’s work has made a significant impact on my own printmaking. I own the catalogue raisonne of his prints and have read most of the available literature on his life and work. I even own several of Hayter’s etchings.

I could have written a more accurate critical review without seeing the exhibit or even knowing which specific works were in it. This was merely a biographical snippet gleaned from either sources I had already read, or perhaps from the catalogue for this exhibit. I gained no new knowledge or insight on the artist, his work, or even this show. There wasn’t even a sense of what specific techniques comprised the works in the exhibit—how the works related both to one another and the decade in which they were created.

I don’t fault Mr. MacAdam for all this. He gave readers exactly what the magazine editors had requested. And the brief piece was helpful if only to provide an introduction of Hayter’s work to a much larger audience. At the same time, I wanted something more substantial from the review, and from many others that I read.

Instead of just accepting the way things are I take this as an opportunity to make what little difference I can. While this blog continues to be written with those who are somewhat estranged from the art world in mind, I now have more resolve to provide additional critical analysis than what may already be available. In fact, there will certainly be some attention paid to Stanley Hayter in the coming weeks. Assessing art and artists of our time is valuable for everyone and hopefully creates more interest in a field that remains insignificant to far too many.

All That Glitters Is Not Gold

I didn’t set out from graduate school with a plan to coat absurd and obscure objects found in junk shops with gold. I was a painter and it was only logical that my artwork would reside mostly within the arena of painting. Yet I am a strong proponent of trusting in whatever direction the artwork is leading. And this gilded path is eventually where it led.

Innocent choices inspire fateful results. My Altarpiece of St. Thomas Eliot was the first official work I produced in the altarpiece format. The original concept for these pieces involved weathered and rusted structures that indicated items far older than their production date. They were like Protestant altarpieces left in the wake of reformational iconoclasm. With this work there was both the rusty grate and the weather stained wood. But when the wood was cut to size it left edges of fresh, clean lumber.

I decided that since so many renaissance era altarpieces were coated in gold that this would be a suitable finish option for those edges. I went to Boise Blue Art Supply (one of my favorite places in Idaho) and purchased a little gold leafing kit. It was actually imitation gold leaf, which is really brass and considerably less expensive. It worked perfectly but it soon presented another finishing option.

There are chemical treatments (surface patinas) that can be applied to brass and other metals if one wishes to give them an aged appearance. Since that was really part of the whole concept I decided to try this with a couple of the next pieces—Altarpiece of St. Francis of L’Abri and Altarpiece of the Martyrdom of St. Bon. After that I have never used real gold leaf because the manipulation of the imitation gold was much more appropriate for my purposes.

What you will find is that the use of gold (or silver or copper) in the works vacillates from worn and degraded to bright and pristine. Aside from referencing age, the treatment of the metal leafing in the altarpieces is quite similar to the use of nude figures in the painted passages of these works.

The figures, referencing saints, take an elevated position in the works. Ordinary people are paid honor and reverence because of their extraordinary character or deeds, At the same time, their nudity places them on the same level or sphere in which you and I inhabit each day. The gold (or imitation gold) that covers the reliquary objects causes those objects to seem valuable, exceptional, and even holy. Yet it can tarnish. These are the common materials of this world that operates in transcendent ways.

By the act of plucking common and unusual objects out of their original contexts I am re-presenting them to the viewer. This allows for a new kind of thinking, a re-imagining of the purpose and power within the objects with which we so easily interact. It enables a reconsideration of the gracious quality that the material world possesses.