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The Art of Not Making: The New Artist/Artisan Relationship a review by Kate Kretz

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The Art of Not Making: The New Artist/Artisan Relationship a review by Kate Kretz

Not so very long ago, saying that an artist “had a production line” in their studio was considered an insult: it meant that the work was not growing, and that the artist was methodically repeating something that had been successful in the past. Accusing someone of  “phoning it in”, another slam of old, is now a proud way of life for some artists: they are actually phoning art in…. to their fabricators.

Discussions among artists (the only ones who seem to care) regarding the meaning of authorship have come to the forefront in recent decades, due to the skyrocketing auction prices of contemporary artists such as Damien Hirst, Jeff Koons, and Takashi Murakami. These artists have redefined what it means to be an artist as millionaire art superstars, and, not incidentally, they each employ teams of workers to fabricate their designs.

The practice of making art has morphed in response to the art market. When your piece can sell for $23 million, why make only one if the market will buy more and you can have your fabricators make a limited edition of five? A recently released book, The Art of Not Making: The New Artist/Artisan Relationship, by Michael Petry, takes us inside the world of fabricators and the artists who employ them.

While there is nothing new about artists employing assistants, the modern evolution of an  artist employing artisans to solve problems and create their work from start to finish is new, and there is something revolutionary about this matter-of-fact book that names names and demystifies the process. This coffee table publication features over 300 color photos of pieces by well-known artists who have hired artisan fabricators to produce their work. Lengthy paragraphs describe the materials and processes used to create each work. The book contains a DuChamp-heavy background essay by author Michael Petry and is divided up into chapters focused on glass, metal, stone, textiles, and “other materials”, with a short introductory/background page for each medium. The book consists mainly of images, punctuated by quotes from artists explaining their philosophies regarding artistic creation, such as Jorge Pardo’s statement: “I don’t think that art gets made with your hands.”

For me, the most revelatory and thought-provoking part of the book was the section containing interviews with artists who use fabricators, and the fabricators themselves. (Many fabricators are also artists in their own right, and the book includes images of the craftspeople’s own artwork alongside their interviews.) Several interviewed artists refused to reveal who created their pieces, and most revealed that they do not credit fabricators in their exhibitions or sales. Some artists never touch any materials at all, while others make the bulk of their own work and only employ craftspeople when the scale gets too big, or when they think an artisan could do it better.

In one interview, Sam Adams, a London fabricator who works for Jeff Koons and Glenn Brown, was asked, “What would you do if an artist wants you to make something that you feel won’t work?” and he replied, “It hasn’t happened yet. People come to you for solutions – they can start with an outline or a sketch for an idea and we try to put flesh on it. That’s our role in their practice – to make solutions.” When asked a bit later if he would ever employ anyone to fabricate any of HIS works, Adams responds that, in theory, he would, but, “There is a strong link between the thinking and making processes in my work… when I make something… I think about it and maybe I just chop something off here or change something there. You can’t do that if you have someone making it for you.” And this is one of the essential questions one is left with after reading this book that presents fabrication as just another genre of work, with no implications whatsoever: what kind of art is going to be made when artists are no longer solving their own problems or immediately responding to their materials?

As someone whose brain works more like Sam Adam’s than Jeff Koon’s, I found this book fascinating, and read it in one sitting. The possibilities presented are inspiring to artists who might have never considered working beyond their own individual skill set. Despite a rather extensive section on Further Reading, the book could use essays by other contemporary critics and/or curators. I was longing to hear someone ask the questions that, to me, seem to arise naturally from this thought-provoking book and the increasing normalcy of this practice:

Should more art schools (some already have) move away from practical/technical skills? Are there essential qualities of artwork lost when the artist’s body is removed from all but the signature? Are new artists going to be marginalized by artists who have the money to buy better artists to make “their” work for them? The Art of Not Making is a solid landmark in the march towards real transparency and evaluation of previously taboo subjects, forwarded in recent times by gallerist Ed Winkleman’s blog, and Jerry Saltz in his New York Magazine column, and by discussions amongst art world members on Facebook pages. The most successful artists currently using fabricators are Jeff Koons  and Damien Hirst. Koons comes from a business background and Hirst hired a sideshow promoter to be his manager. Is the real “art” to be found in the marketing and branding? If so, how does this art differ from a Limited Edition Bugati automobile or a Louis Vuitton bag? Some relate artists who use fabricators to film directors, who should never be expected to produce a product single-handedly. But movie directors credit those who contributed to the creation of the work. Is it time to change standards in the art world and ensure that fabricators receive production credit?

Kate Kretz earned a certificate at The Sorbonne and a BFA at the State University of New York at Binghamton before receiving her MFA from University of Georgia. Her work in varied media focuses on human vulnerability as defiant act. Kretz was trained as painter, but her work has expanded to include a line of Psychological Clothing and intricate embroideries made with human hair. Kretz’s work has appeared repeatedly in The New York Times and has been featured in ArtPapers, Surface Design, Vanity Fair Italy, ELLE Japon, and PASAJES DISENO magazines. Her controversial painting “Blessed Art Thou” was reproduced in hundreds of international news sources, was recently included in the documentary, “The Second Tear: Kitsch” for NDR/arte German Public Television, and continues to be published in university textbooks worldwide. Exhibitions include the Museum of Arts & Design, Van Gijn Museum, Kunstraum Kreuzberg, Wignall Museum, Katonah Museum, Lyons Wier Ortt Gallery & 31Grand Gallery, Fort Collins MOCA, Telfair Museum, Fort Lauderdale Museum, and the Museo Medici in Tuscany. She has received the NC Arts Council Grant, The South Florida Cultural Consortium Fellowship, The Florida Visual Arts Fellowship, and a Millay Colony Residency. After working as an Associate Professor and BFA Director at Florida International University for ten years, she recently moved to the Washington, DC, area. Kretz continues to teach as a visiting artist at various universities and works alone in her studio on obsessive pieces that can take up to 12 months to complete. She has always believed that the personal life hours invested in her work are part of the gift given to the viewer. Kretz could never make the bent wood sculpture stand upright in her undergraduate 3D design class, but has always wanted to be a sculptor, and is therefore very intrigued by this fabrication idea. Her work can be seen at www.katekretz.com, on Flickr, and Facebook.

Images in this post all by Kate Kretz:

“Tempest”, 2011, tarnished silverpoint on found spoon, 1.5 x 5.5 x 1″

“Crying Man” (detail), 2005, acrylic & oil on masonite, 24 x 18”

“Special Angel”, 2010, etched mirror, graphite, paper, 20 x 16″ oval, from an ongoing series of guardian angels who don’t come through.

Black on Black: Rothko’s Re-Imagining of Color by Sarah Amos

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Black on Black: Rothko’s Re-Imagining of Color by Sarah Amos

Artists and physicists may argue whether or not black is a color, a shade or even the absolute absence of color itself. But the iconic artist Mark Rothko doesn’t see black as any of these single, narrow definitions.

Such is the theme of “In the Tower: Mark Rothko,” now showing at the National Gallery of Art. A small collection of works spanning his career are on display: Each prominently utilizes blackness, whether as merely an accent or as a vehicle to explore the vast potentiality of the anti-color.

Rothko, labeled an abstract expressionist, is probably best known for his great canvases comprised of stripes, or even simply squares, of pure color. Although initially experimenting with pictorial scenes and even surrealism, Rothko has distilled the notion of what art is, providing emotionalism through his skilled architecture of color and space. What the paintings lack in images, they make up for in meaning through his expert combinations of pure color.

Such familiarity with this usual idea of a color-centric Rothko is instantly defied upon entering this latest exhibit. It is best to enter “The Tower” of the National Gallery through the elevator to see his earlier works first before witnessing the grand finale, the “Rothko Cathedral.”

The small and intimate collection of nine of Rothko’s small to medium works begins with his expressive figures of the 1930s, moves on to the surrealism of the mid-1940s, “multiforms” of the late 1940s and finally reaches his classic style of the 1950s. Overall, the paintings have thick oily brushstrokes layering grays, blacks and other neutrals, with an occasional bright color thrown in.

In an untitled picture, known as “Man with Green Face,” the subject’s deep green flesh forces the eye to explore the true color of the man’s seemingly plain black jacket. The repeated brushstrokes slick on layer after layer of darkness. Rusty shading gives depth and definition to the black mass, revealing the man’s folded arms.

In another untitled piece, known as “Reclining Nude,” the artist is still in his early figure stage, but his exactitude when using color is further explored. A black bed that the woman lies upon takes over the page, covering almost all of it. But the intensity of the black — more brownish with a blue underlay — makes the pale, fleshy nude stand out. The contrasting darkness makes her appear more rounded, dimensional, as if her misshapen body and askew legs were about to emerge from the canvas.

The blue tones of the black pop against the mustard-colored floor and red nightstand. In spite of the dull coloring, the feeling of this painting isn’t melancholic. The figure appears blithe and content, gesturing her arm out as if she’s blowing a kiss. The exhibit proves that the dark colors do not have to equate to despair, although that was often suggested by critics due to Rothko’s moods, which culminated in his 1970 suicide.

Rothko advances in his style during his mid-‘40s “multiform” period, a bridge between his surrealism and later chromatic purism. Multiform “No. 10” has a dusty peach background with black blocks throughout the canvas, softened with a veil of gray brushstrokes. These dark forms float around the many blocks of color, seeping into one another in a calculated randomness. There is a dull pulsation to the picture as the black is not what it seems, with purple shadows as a backlight to the looming forms. Acid green and yellow light up the neutral, shadowy canvas.

These early paintings provide an intimate look into Rothko’s stylistic formation leading up to drama and darkness of “Rothko’s Chapel.” Collectors Dominique and John de Menil asked him to decorate a Catholic chapel (now non-denominational) they built in Houston, Texas. He surprised them with bold, gargantuan canvases done in his classic style, but missing his signature colors. The blacks, however, layer and differ, engaging the viewer in reflection, and appropriate for a chapel, provide a meditation. Dominique recalled of the pieces, “I felt held up, embraced, and free. Nothing was stopping my gaze, There was a beyond.”

The “Tower” exhibit, a trapezoidal room with white walls, houses seven black rectangles on the walls. On first glance, they seem to be only black squares. But standing in front of them for a while, the differences in the shades appear. Each canvas is composed of two blacks. The center blocks of black are subtly shinier, whereas, the flat, suede, alternate black lies beneath.

The monochromatic subtleties make themselves known: jet black, carbon, espresso, ink, eggplant, ebony. Suddenly you realize what your mother meant when she said that your black belt didn’t match your black shoes.

And yet, each individual color seems perfectly black, but only when adjacent to an alternate black does it seem rather off-black. This intersection of simplicity and complexity will definitely turn off the casual viewer. The massive black squares can have the same effect as a wall of paint chips at The Home Depot.

It may be hard to “get,” or even like, but it is interesting to stare at. Rothko didn’t just place manufactured colors next to each other, the color was laboriously achieved (although by the time of the Chapel pieces, he was in such poor health he had to oversee the paintings produced by assistants, taking over three years). Coat after coat of oil paint, the smoky edges of the contrasting blocks bleed into one another giving it an organic feel.

The austere drama of these simple black forms was designed not to be intimidating, but intimate. The de Menil’s chapel incorporated a subliminal echo of tradition with th assemblage of squares resembling an altar’s triptych. The meditative effect of the surroundings is enhanced with an instrumental piece made by his close friend Morton Feldman under Dominique de Menil’s instruction. Rothko was an avid reader of Friedrich Nietzsche, and The Birth of Tragedy Out of the Spirit of Music inspired the artist.

From that work, Rothko believed that a complete harmony required a full spectrum of emotions and media. The swirling strings, at times ambient, other times terror-filled, permeate the open space with a hypnotic poignancy, as the dark figures surround the Tower’s expanse.

Sarah Amos is in her second year at Georgetown studying Culture and Politics. When she’s not in the the office of The Hoya as editor of their A&E magazine, The Guide, you can find her studying Arabic, playing intramural soccer, or eating raw cookie dough with her roommate. Her interest in art began at an early age, with her mother, an art teacher, who taught her about Monet and van Gogh before her times tables. (Math was never Sarah’s strong suit.) She hopes to pursue a career in journalism — and is currently accepting job offers, so she doesn’t have to nanny again this summer.

Black on Black: Rothko by Sarah Amos is one of the five finalists in the 2011 DC Student Arts Journalism Challenge.

Images in this piece are: Mark Rothko, Untitled, 1964, Gift of The Mark Rothko Foundation, Inc. Copyright © 1997 Christopher Rothko and Kate Rothko Prizel from the National Gallery of Art website, Untitled (Reclining Nude) 1937/1938 oil on canvas, National Gallery of Art, Washington, Gift of The Mark Rothko Foundation, Inc, and Mark Rothko, Vision at End of Day, 1946, oil on canvas, National Gallery of Art, Washington, Gift of The Mark Rothko Foundation, Inc. from the exhibit website.

I Too Would Be a Stone by Gregory Luce

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I Too Would Be a Stone by Gregory Luce

“The stone sinks, slow, unperturbed
To the river bottom
Where the fishes come to knock on it
And listen.”
– Charles Simic

I too
would be a stone
if only I could
harden myself
enough I would
fit myself to
the palm of a boy
with bottles to break
or be kicked along
the curb by a sad
teenaged girl.
I would delight
in being skimmed
across the surface
of a pond happy
to then sink
silent past astonished
fishes if only
I could lose these
edges and take on
the weight.

Gregory Luce is the author of the chapbooks Signs of Small Grace (Pudding House Publications) and Drinking Weather (Finishing Line Press). His poems have appeared in numerous print and online journals, including Kansas Quarterly, Cimarron Review, Innisfree Poetry Review, If, Northern Virginia Review, Juke Jar, Praxilla, Buffalo Creek Review, and in the anthology Living in Storms (Eastern Washington University Press). He lives in Washington, D.C. where he works as Production Specialist for the National Geographic Society.

I Too Would be a Stone by Gregory Luce (c) Copyright Gregory Luce; printed by permission of the author.

[2011 Competition Winner] Arcade Fire, The Suburbs: Review by Caroline Klibanoff

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[2011 Competition Winner] Arcade Fire, The Suburbs: Review by Caroline Klibanoff

The literary accompaniment to The Suburbs is found almost too perfectly in William Faulkner’s 1950 Nobel Prize acceptance speech, in which he declared the state of youth in the union: “There are no longer problems of the spirit. There is only one question: when will I be blown up?”

The Montreal-based septuplet similarly poses the difficult questions of the age on their latest release, sometimes ironically and sometimes earnestly. Thematically organized around the threat of suburban sprawl and the replacement of one culture with another, the band manages to avoid the inevitable downer-type sensibility associated with suburban sprawl and instead replace it with total searching exuberance. Like Faulkner, they simply “decline to accept the end of man,” a challenge made immediately clear from Win Butler’s first declaration on the album amid friendly, pleasant piano plinks: “The suburbs are a lonely drive / and you told me we’d never survive / grab your mother’s keys, we’re leaving.”

 

This is the album Arcade Fire have been waiting their whole career to make. People are going to go under this album and not come out until they’re old and grey. If folks got excited about Funeral and Neon Bible, both of which teetered around 46 minutes of orchestral art-rock, then they should probably sit down for this one, because there’s far more being said here. Where Funeral built tunnels and made connections, The Suburbs shirks any peacemaking or coming-to-terms; instead, it shouts desperately for any sign of real life, of hearts beating real blood, echoing Springsteen’s query: “Is there anybody alive out there?”

 

The weird thing is, The Suburbs exhibits no huge sonic departure from AF’s previous work, but the smallest choices make the biggest difference. Like how the last high-pitched note on “Month of May” sustains gorgeously into the rockabilly opening of “Wasted Hours,” which is for all intents and purposes the ideal end-credits-to-a-film song. Or how the final track “The Suburbs (Continued)” reprises the opener of the same name, or how the guitars glitter on the soothing “Rococo,” or how the end of “Suburban War” crashes most bellicosely, almost visually. Continuity is the name of the game here, aided by a few sets of two-part songs, like the melodramatic, appropriately flat “Sprawl (Flatlands)” and the peaking, soaring “Sprawl II (Mountains Beyond Mountains).” The first “Sprawl,” the only lull on the album really, forms a platform for the second, which is a jam and a calling– specifically, “Come and find your kind.”

Perhaps the most impressive feat here is that in addition to cultivating an album that overwhelms musically, Arcade Fire has essentially made a concept album, one that pleases your ears as it eases your mind. Let us remember that North American suburbs popped up around the same time as Faulkner’s speech, creating enclaves of homogeneity and much-needed post-war stability under the watchful eyes of Truman and Eisenhower, which more or less resulted in an eventual cultural backlash (Howl, anyone?) And I mean, in every line and arching note on The Suburbs, I hear echoes of John Clellon Holmes’ 1952 essay, “This is the Beat Generation,” in which he describes a generation for which “the valueless abyss of modern life is unbearable,” one that “exhibits on every side, and in a bewildering number of facets, a perfect craving to believe.” Arcade Fire sees these same suburbs aged 60 years, and reacts with a satisfying dissatisfaction to this “valueless abyss of modern life,” which evidently (and disturbingly) has only gotten worse. That’s why the album’s escape-at-any-cost-and-take-who-you-can-with-you nature is so appealing. Win Butler practically declares a call to action in the hard-rocking “Month of May”: “I know it’s heavy, I know it ain’t light / But how you gonna lift it with your arms folded tight?”

 

It is with this simultaneous care and rebelliousness that the album makes its biggest statement; the music itself is equal parts moody/thoughtful and wild/free, which suits the material. From the first notes of “City With No Children,” the listener is greeted with wall-to-wall jubilation, like the pivotal sounds of rock ‘n’ roll in big bold blocky print font, an energy that is sustained for the full 60 minutes.

 

Keenly, even in their exuberance, the band does not lose sight of keeping their message gravely serious, even when Butler’s darling falsetto threatens to win fans simply for aesthetic appeal. It’s both droll and concerned, like Bowie’s “Heroes,” which seems to be echoed most obviously on synth-bopper “Modern Man” and “Ready to Start.” Bowie’s Major Tom was an amusing character that evinced real pain, a strange literary device that Arcade Fire grasps with ease in “Ready to Start”: “All the kids have always known / that the emperor wears no clothes / but they bow down to him anyway / because it’s better than being alone.”

 

“Half Light II (No Celebration),” is an instant stunner, a gently-sung track that boasts rapid heartbeat drums and a songwriter’s firm structure. It opens with a resignation (“Now that San Francisco’s gone, I guess I’ll just pack it in.”) and follows with deep-seated fear (“Pray that I don’t live to see the death of everything that’s wild.”) But beneath it all rumbles a vague hopefulness (aided by a joyful “Woo!”), a story of barreling back and forth from coast to coast, taking what is left in these desolate suburban outposts and finding the heart that must beat there because humanity is eternally, hopelessly alive. Or, as Faulkner puts it:

“It is easy enough to say that man is immortal because he will endure; that when the last ding-dong of doom has clanged and faded from the last worthless rock hanging tideless in the last red and dying evening, that even then there will still be one more sound: that of his puny inexhaustible voice, still talking. I refuse to accept this. I believe that man will not merely endure; he will prevail.”

Or, for The Suburbs: you can take the heart and soul out of the man’s land, but you cannot take the heart and soul out of the man. And Butler comes back with a vengeance and a promise on “We Used to Wait,” which chronicles nostalgically the olden days of long-distance pen-and-paper communication over clean 60’s keyboard riffs before building to an arresting climax: “Now we’ll scream and sing the chorus again!”

 

By the time the final track comes around, the old-school cinematic “The Suburbs (Continued),” all that’s left is a question, the only way to end an album like this. The opening track is reprised beneath an orchestra and some haunted, ethereal vocals that aren’t quite sad or backwards-looking as much as they are eerie and intriguing, and the whole elusive nature of it redirects the listener to consider the driving force behind all of The Suburbs: Where are we? Who are we? Where are we going? And what will await us when we get there?

 

Faulkner provides an answer to that, too. “The last sound on the worthless earth,” he once said, “will be two human beings trying to launch a homemade spaceship and already quarreling about where they are going next.”

Originally from Atlanta, Georgia, Caroline Klibanoff is a junior at Georgetown University, majoring in American Studies and minoring in Film & Media studies, with a special interest in the uncertain future of the American press. She currently serves as General Manager of WGTB Georgetown Radio, where she also hosts a weekly show and writes features and reviews for The Rotation, WGTB’s online publication. She has previously written for Paste Magazine, The Georgetown Voice, and the Georgetown Hoya, where she continues a biweekly column. Caroline is also a musician and enjoys recording, and hopes to further develop her creativity and production skills through new ventures in filmmaking. Her current projects include creating a documentary on music in sacred spaces and cultivating a spring music festival for WGTB.

“Arcade Fire, The Suburbs” is one of the five finalists in the 2011 DC Student Arts Journalism Challenge.

 

Klibanoff’s review was first published August 4, 2010 on WGTB’s The Rotation, the online publication of Georgetown Radio. You can see it as it was first posted here.

 

Making the Moonlit Traveler by Helga Thomson

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Making the Moonlit Traveler by Helga Thomson

Moonlit Traveler is from a series of prints titled “Chronicles and The Garden of Earthly Delights.” After all, only in the freedom and adventurousness of a moonlit evening would anyone dare to ride on a naked fish with a doggie’s face.  I have made many prints and works on paper during a career that took me through three continents and I try to invite my viewers to join me on an exciting adventure.

This piece is the almost serendipitous product of circumstances. At the time, I was doing a lot of drawing from the model. One day, I decided that my model should wear some animal paper masks; a series of nudes with animal masks was born. I did drawings, monotypes, and etchings based on these. The whole series was called “ Chronicles” and “ Garden of Earthly Delights Revisited” in honor of Hieronymous Bosch and his amazing fantastic creatures who inhabit a world where good and evil is interchangeable.

I trained with printmakers in my native Argentina as well as The Hague, Paris and the U.S. and use both the wide range of traditional printmaking techniques, from etching to lithograph, collagraph and chine colle, to experimental digital and video work. I believe that my Argentine and European background permeates my work; I aim to combine a sensuous line with bold and symbolic imagery, bringing the light and dark side of life together.

As with many of my prints, I used a combination of techniques to make Moonlit Traveler, in this case, etching and aquatint. In etching, a drawing is made with a sharp etching needle on a metal plate that has been previously covered with an acid-resistant coating. The plate is then submerged in acid, which bites through the drawn image but leaves the remainder of the treated surface untouched. After it is washed, the plate is ready to be inked and printed. Aquatint is a method that allows for larger surfaces of the plate to be “bitten” by exposing the plate to acid through layers of resin particles. (These explanations may begin to suggest to you why printmakers are so often seduced by technique.)

When the plate is ready, I applied the colors in stages. I used black etching ink for the line drawing and the aquatinted areas. I wiped the ink away in all but the lines and areas I wanted to be black. Then with a roller previously coated with blue and yellow etching ink I carefully rolled over the whole plate. I then placed a damp sheet of paper on top of the plate and ran it through the press, transferring the image onto the paper, and voilá, a print is born!

Thank you to the artist for making this print available to Bourgeon contributors. To acquire the work, click here.

Helga Thomson was born in Buenos Aires, Argentina, and studied there with German artist W. Dohme and printmakers Pompeyo and Eduardo Audivert. In Europe, she continued printmaking for brief periods in The Hague (Royal School of Art) and Paris (Atelier E. Caporaso and Jean Lodge). In the United States, Helga attended Ann Zahn’s Printmaking Workshop in Bethesda, Maryland, as well as Montgomery College, Maryland (with Z. Sikora), and the Corcoran School of Art, Washington, DC (with Gene Frederick and W. Christenberry, and digital art with Marise Riddell and Marte Newcomb). Helga has exhibited in international juried, group and solo shows. Her works are included in private and public collections (such as the Library of Congress) in the United States, Argentina, Europe and Central Asia. Helga has received national and regional awards in the United States. Helga is a member of the Maryland Printmakers, American Print Alliance, The Print Center of Philadelphia, Washington Project for the Arts/Corcoran, Arlington Arts Center, Pyramid Atlantic and the Central Asia Cultural Exchange. To see more, visit the artist’s website.

Edited by Ellyn Weiss

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