Category: Exhibitions

Save the Date

February 5, 2025 0 Comment

Fiber art is having a moment. It’s “the new painting” according to Art in America and a trend that Artsy says will “take hold across the contemporary art world in 2025.”  Exhibitions of art textiles are on view across the US and Europe, including Woven Histories: Textiles and Modern Abstraction which will open at the Museum of Modern Art in New York in April. 

Wlodzimierz Cygan
20wc Totems, Wlodzimierz Cygan, linen, sisal, fiber optic, 37″ x 37″ x 7″, 2022. Photo by Tom Grotta

In Field Notes: an art survey (May 3rd -11th), browngrotta arts will provide a high-level view of the fiber medium, informed by the gallery’s 30+ years specializing in the promotion of art textiles and fiber sculpture. 

Sung Rim Park
1-2srp Beyond 220723, 180623, Sung Rim Park, Hanji, 46″ x 36″ x 4″; 36″ x 36″ x 4″, 2023. Photo by Tom Grotta

In art and science, field notes generally consist of a descriptive element, in which the observer creates a word picture of what they are seeing — the setting, actions, and conversations; combined with a reflective portion, in which one records thoughts, ideas, and concerns based on their observations. In Field Notes, viewers will be able to observe a varied group of art works, reflect on the creators’ thoughts about their art practice, and generate their own questions and conclusions.

More than two dozen accomplished international artists will share what’s on their minds, what’s on their looms, and what’s inspiring their art process, just as the art form’s popularity crests, including Sung Rim Park, and a few other artists whose work we have not shown before. Works by fiber art pioneers, Kay Sekimachi (US), Sheila Hicks (US), and Mariette Rousseau-Vermette (CA), will also be part of the exhibition, providing insights about the medium’s evolution.

Mariette Rousseau-Vermette
171mr Reflets de Montréal, Mariette Rousseau-Vermette, wool, 42″ x 82″ x 2.5″, 1968. Photo by Tom Grotta

“Textile art is strong in Norway today,” says Åse Ljones. “It has gained a higher status, and is often purchased for public decoration.” In her work, she is “looking for the shine, the light and the stillness in the movement that occurs in the composition of my pictures,” she says. “I embroider by hand on linen fabric.” The viscose thread she uses adds glow and shine in the composition. “With different light sources,” she says, “the image changes all the time. As a viewer, one must be in motion to see and experience the changes.” 

Aby Mackie, who works in Spain, combines existing materials with the tactile intimacy of textile techniques. “By blending these elements,” she says, “my work challenges perceptions of craft and sustainability, offering new ways to perceive the familiar and celebrating the beauty of reinvention.” Mackie agrees with Ljones about the evolving role of fiber. “The field of fiber art is currently experiencing a profound shift,” says Mackie, “gaining recognition as a respected medium within contemporary art.” 

Fiber ia “a powerful medium for storytelling and innovation in the current art world,” Mackie concludes. Join us in May as we highlight those stories and celebrate fiber art’s resurgence!

Sheila Hicks
40sh.1 Family Evolution, Sheila Hicks, 9” x 25” x 9”, 1997. Photo by Tom Grotta

Exhibition Details:
Visit Field Notes: an art survey at browngrotta arts, 276 Ridgefield Road, Wilton, CT 06897 from May 3 – May 11, 2025. 

Gallery Dates/Hours:
276 Ridgefield Road Wilton, CT 06897

Opening & Artist Reception
Saturday, May 3rd: 11am to 6pm
Sunday, May 4th: 11am to 6pm
(40 visitors/ hour)
Monday, May 5th – Saturday, May 10th: 10am to 5pm
(40 visitors/ hour)
Sunday, May 11th: 11am to 6pm
[Final Day] (40 visitors/ hour)

Safety Protocols: 
• No narrow heels please (barn floors)

Art Out and About, Winter 2025

January 22, 2025 0 Comment

We are deep in winter doldrums in the US — devastating fires in the West; plunging temperatures in the East. Art can be a balm and a bright spot. Here we round up some exhibitions of note and share some art news to remind you of the power of creativity.

We’ve already told you about the Sheila Hicks’ exhibition in Germany, Olga D’Amaral’s in France and Japandí Revisited: shared aesthetics and influences, in Wayne, Pennsylvania, which closes this weekend on January 25th at 4 pm after a lecture and reception. Below some notes from the US and abroad:

California
Cut from the Same Cloth: Textiles and Technology
Palo Alto Art Center 
through April 6, 2025
250 Hamilton Avenue
Palo Alto, CA 94301

Works by Lia Cook
On view in Cut from the Same Cloth: Textile & Technology. Left to Right: Little Happy Accident, Lia Cook (2019) and Intense and Questioning, Lia Cook (2018) Photo curtesy of the artist.

As the Cultural Center observes, “textiles have not only fueled the creative inspiration of artists throughout history, they also have provided the catalyst for technological innovation. Joseph Marie Jacquard, a French merchant, invented the ‘jacquard machine’ in 1801, which simplified the manufacture of textiles and later became the inspiration for IBM’s first computer introduced in the 1940s and 1950s. This exhibition,” which includes Lia Cook, “investigates the many unexplored relationships between craft and technology and demonstrates, through the work of a group of artists, how contemporary art practice has seamlessly embraced both.”

9 x 9: Contemporary Quilts & Containers
Palo Verdes Art Center 
January 25 – April 12, 2025
Opening Reception: February 1, 2025, 6 – 9 pm
5504 Crestridge Road 
Rancho Palos Verdes, CA 90275

works by Karyl Sisson
Karyl Sisson, Piece Work VII, Vintage paper drinking straws and polymer, 20.5″ x 20.25″, 2022, Photo by Susan Einstein; Speaking Out, vintage cotton/rayon ribbon, thread, mini-spring operated clothespins, 9″ x 14″ x 14″. Photo by Heather Cleary.

Beginning on the 25th, the Palo Verdes Art Center will showcase artworks by 18 distinguished artists from California’s established fiber art community. The artists, who include Karyl Sisson, Kay Sekimachi, and Carol Shaw-Sutton, will present innovative interpretations of traditional craft forms. “These dynamic quilted, woven, plaited, and twined works investigate the purposes and potential of cross-cultural narratives and techniques through diverse media,” says the Center, “expanding our understanding of visual culture. Material-based, conceptually engaged, and skillfully executed, these artists transform conventional quilting and container-making practices into sophisticated contemporary expressions.”

Denmark
Artapestry7, International Triennial
Kunst Centret Silkeborg Bad 
January 25 to  April 21, 2025
Gjessøvej 40
8600 Silkeborg, Denmark

Irina Kolesnikova textile
Detail: The Cage, 2022, Irina Kolesnikova, silk, flax, polyester; hand weaving, 138 x 98 cm. Photo courtesy of the artist.

This is the seventh time that the organization European Tapestry Forum has sent a juried exhibition of woven tapestries on tour in Europe, and the fourth time that the triennial has been exhibited in Silkeborg. The triennial, which includes work by Gudrun Pagter, Irina Kolesnikova, and Lija Rage, gives the audience a good insight into the current trends among weaving artists. The jury has selected the 37 most beautiful, skillfully executed and most creative tapestries from more than 100 submissions.

Washington, DC
We Gather at the Edge: Contemporary Quilts by Black Women Artists
Renwick Gallery of the Smithsonian American Art Museum
February 21, 2025 – June 22, 2025
1661 Pennsylvania Ave., NW
Washington, DC

work by Myrah Brown Green
Myrah Brown Green, In My Akwabaa Form, 2000, cotton fabric and cotton batt, 95 × 86 in. (241.3 × 218.4 cm), Smithsonian American Art Museum, Gift of Fleur S. Bresler, 2023.40.19, © 2000, Myrah Brown Green.

In 1981, the Smithsonian acquired 35 qulits collected by Dr. Carolyn Mazloomi, who holds a doctorate in aerospace engineering, is a prolific artist, curator, and scholar.  Dr. Mazloomi founded the African American Quilt Guild of Los Angeles, and then, in 1985, she founded the Women of Color Quilters Network, fulfilling the desire of isolated makers to connect and continue Black textile traditions. The quilts in this exhibition are remarkable in scope and groundbreaking in their representation of Black history and culture as told with needle and thread. “Sometimes the weight of living on this planet as a woman, we have to be reminded of who we are,” Dr. Mazloomi has said. “Quilts help to serve that purpose of reminding women about their power.”

New York
Anne Wilson: The MAD Drawing Room and Errant Behaviors
through May 11, 2025
Museum of Arts and Design
Jerome and Simona Chazen Building
2 Columbus Circle,
New York, New York 10019

Anne Wilson MAD Drawing Room
MAD Drawing Room at the Museum of Arts and Design, NY, NY. Photo courtesy Anne Wilson

Chicago artist, Anne Wilson has created the MAD Drawing Room, where visitors can engage in the beauty and complexity of the artist’s personal archives of lace and openwork textiles through close looking, drawing, or writing. The Drawing Room is inspired by the Davis Street Drawing Room, Wilson’s experimental and participatory art project in Evanston, Ilinois. Within the space, visitors are invited to explore Wilson’s library of art and fiber texts, listen to the playlist of sound sources for her video installation, and draw or write using the materials provided. Wilson’s sound-and-video installation, Errant Behaviors, newly acquired by MAD, plays in the gallery. Its source material of lace and openwork fragments are also on view in The MAD Drawing Room. You can see multiple images and learn more about the MAD Drawing Room on Wilson’s website.

Canada
Dawn MacNutt: Timeless Forms
through April 18, 2025
Mount St. Vincent’s University Gallery 
Mount Saint Vincent University
166 Bedford Highway
Halifax, NS
B3M 2J6

Feature image: Dawn MacNutt, Robin 2008. Patinated bronze, cast from twined willow, acrylic paint. Collection of the Nova Scotia Art Bank.

This comprehensive retrospective exhibition celebrates Nova Scotia artist Dawn MacNutt. Co-curated by Melanie Colosimo and Emily Falvey, this exhibition showcases MacNutt’s unique approach to weaving, which she transforms into large-scale figurative sculptures that explore themes of human fragility. Accompanying the exhibition is a catalogue featuring essays by the artist herself. Spanning four decades, the exhibition moves from delicate miniatures crafted in silver and copper wire to monumental bronze sculptures cast from woven, local willow branches. Together, these works link traditional craft practices to modern and conceptual sculpture and enrich contemporary perspectives on care and the handmade. Accompanying the exhibition is a book, Timeless Forms, that features essays by the artist herself.

work by Yeonsoon Chang
Yeonsoon Chang, Craft Trend Fair in Seoul, December 2024, teflon mesh, pure gold leaf, and eco-resin. Photo courtesy of the artist

Korea
In the art news department: The Korean Craft and Design Foundation selected Yeonsoon Chang as the winner of its 2024 Creation Division Prize. The artwork in the photo was showcased at this year’s Craft Trend Fair in Seoul in December 2024. It is made of Teflon mesh, pure gold leaf, and eco-resin. “The artist Yeonsoon Chang continues to create works that visualize a unique aesthetic through a Korean sense of beauty, transcending the boundaries of tradition and modernity, time and space, using the properties and structure of textiles,” the Foundation wrote. “Her ongoing dedication has set an example in the craft community and garnered international recognition for the excellence of Korean craftsmanship.”

Receiving the prize has energized and inspired Chang. “For the past nine and a half years since my retirement, I have immersed myself in the study of Eastern classics and the creation of my work,” she wrote on Instagram. “Through this journey, the once-abstract concepts of 空 (Emptiness) and 虛 (Void) have taken on a tangible and experiential reality. I believe the endurance of Korean craft over thousands of years is not solely due to its techniques but to the profound spirit that lies beyond them, deeply woven into its essence. Just days ago, I envisioned slowing the pace of my life to delve deeper into this path, yet now I find myself aboard a high-speed train, unable to control its momentum. Looking ahead, I see my calling as bringing to life the spirit of Korean craft, allowing it to breathe and resonate through my work.”

Japandí Revisited – Just 10 More Days

January 15, 2025 0 Comment
Japan Revisited installation
Japandi Revisted installation. Photo by Tom Grotta

We’ve been excited by the reaction to our Japandí Revisited partnership with the Wayne Art Center in Pennsylvania. Attendance has been good to date. Tours of viewers have been scheduled including the Japan America Society of Greater Philadelphia and the American Swedish Historical Museum. There are 10 more days to see the exhibition and the two of us (Tom Grotta and Rhonda Brown) will be at Wayne on January 25, 2025 for the closing reception from 1 pm to 4 pm. 

Japan Revisited installation
Works by Naoko Serino, Helena Hernmarck, Keiji Nio, Kari Lønning. Photo by Tom Grotta

The Ethel Sergeant Clark Smith Gallery, where Japandí Revisited is installed, is airy and full of indirect light. In the exhibition we’ve had the opportunity to place Japanese and Scandinavian works side by side, so viewers can see the affinities for themselves. Flowers by Keiji Nio (JP) is hung next to Kari Lønning’s (NO) work Horn. In an imaginative merger of technology and tradition, Nio takes photographs, silkscreens the images on ribbons that he braids using Japanese technique kumihimo. In Horn, Lønning works with akebia, a vine found in the Northeast US. Horn is the largest work that Lønning has created from akebia.

Japan Revisited installation
Japandi Revisted installation. Photo by Tom Grotta

Agneta Hobin’s Clair de Lune (FI) fans made of steel and mica are displayed next to Oh! Precious by Hirohito Sato-Pijanowski (JP/US)i. Pijanowski’s work is made of glued paper cord. Both works use unusual materials — mica and paper cord — to create shine. Both reflect the exquisite craftsmanship that is another element of Japandí design.

Gudrun Pagter, Masakazu Kobayashi, Merja Winqvist. Photo by Tom Grotta

On another wall is Gudrun Pagter’s (DK) abstract, Framed, of wool, hangs beside Masakazu Kobayashi’s (JP) Bow White of layered silk and aluminum bows, each illustrating a preference for neutrals and primary colors, clean lines, and minimal ornamentation that are a third element of Japandí style.

Japan Revisited installation
Works by Eva Vargö, Masako Yoshida, Kogetsu Kosuge. Photo by Tom Grotta

Eva Vargo’s (SE) Book of Changes and Toshio Sekiji’s (JP) Counterpoint 8 appear on the same wall. In another spot in the gallery, appears Helena Hernmarck’s (SE/US), Shredded Memories series, in which strips of letters by her mother are incorporated into weavings.  Each of these works transforms used paper into art. Each repurposes materials and, central to these cultures’ approaches, each reflects respect for old and cherished items.

Japan Revisited installation
Works by Markku Kosonen, Ulla Maija Vikman, Jiro Yonezawa, Kay Sekimachi. Photo by Tom Grotta

Appreciation for natural materials is the fifth element attributed to Japandí style. The exhibition combines baskets of multiple materials made by artists from several countries. Bamboo, jasmine, walnut and cedar baskets by Hisako Sekijima join ramie works by Noriko Takamiya, and works of jute by Naoko Serino of Japan. Works of handmade paper and twigs by Jane Balsgaard of Denmark are shown as are works of willow with catkins still attached and crowberry root by Markku Kosonen of Finland.

Japan Revisited installation
Works by Mia Olsson, Hideho Tanaka, Jin-Sook So, Hisako Sekijima, Naomi Kobayashi. Photo by Tom Grotta

Hope you get a chance to visit Japandí.

Details through January 25th:
Japandí Revisited: shared aesthetics and influences
Wayne Art Center 
413 Maplewood Avenue
Wayne, PA 19087

Dates: 
Through January 25, 2025

Events:
Curator’s Talk: 
Saturday, January 25, 1:00 – 2:00 pm

Closing Reception:
Saturday, January 25 | 2:00 pm – 4:00 pm

Gallery Hours:
January 2025 (free admission)
Monday 9:00 am – 5:00 pm
Tuesday 9:00 am – 5:00 pm
Wednesday 9:00 am – 5:00 pm
Thursday 9:00 am – 5:00 pm
Friday 9:00 am – 5:00 pm
Saturday 9:00 am – 4:00 pm
Sunday Closed

Also on exhibit at the Wayne Art Center is Craftforms, an international juried exhibition of contemporary fine craft.

Women Get the Nod – in Art at Least

November 20, 2024 0 Comment

We may not have seen the first female president in the US this year, but women are getting a well-deserved attention in the art world in 2024. We’ve previously written about women-centric exhibitions worth seeing: Subversive, Skilled, Sublime: Fiber Art by Women which includes Lia Cook, Kay Sekimachi, Adela Akers, Katherine Westphal and may others, at the Smithsonian in Washington, D.C, Sheila Hicks at the Josef Albers Museum Quadrat Bottrop and the Kunsthalle Düsseldorf museums in Germany and Sublime Light: Tapestry Art of DY Begay, at the National Museum of the American Indian. All of these run through the winter into at least January 2025. 

Olga de Amaral installation
Olga de Amaral installation at the Fondation Cartier in Paris. Photo courtesy of Fondation Cartier.

But there are even more, exhibitions that highlight women as artists and art collectors and curators. Not to be missed are Olga de Amaral at the Fondation Cartier in Paris, Composing Color, the Paintings of Alma Thomas at the Denver Art Museum in Colorado, Georgia O’Keefe and Henry Moore, at the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, Massachusetts, and Lillie P. Bliss and the Birth of the Modern at the Museum of Modern of Art in New York. 

The Fondation Cartier Pour l’Art Contemporain is presenting the first major retrospective in Europe of Olga de Amaral, a key figure of the Colombian art scene and of Fiber Art. The exhibition brings together nearly 80 works made between the 1960s and now, many of which have never been shown before outside of Colombia. As the Museum explains, de Amaral’s unclassifiable work draws equally from the Modernist principles that she discovered studying at the Cranbrook Academy of Art in the United States, and the vernacular traditions of her country, as well as pre-Columbian art. The exhibition shines a light on the different periods that have characterized her artistic career: from her formal explorations (use of the grid, colors) to her experimentations (with materials and scale), as well as the influences that have nurtured her work (constructivist art, Latin-American handicrafts, the pre-Columbian era). The installation is breathtaking, with works hung in space amidst stones and sunlight. 

Alma Thomas, Elysian Fields
Alma Thomas, Elysian Fields, 1973, acrylic on canvas, 30.125″ x 42.25″, Smithsonian American Art Museum, Bequest of the artist, 1980.36.8

Composing Color explores the life of the groundbreaking American artist and educator, Alma Thomas, drawing on the extensive holdings of her paintings at the Smithsonian American Art Museum (SAAM). Thomas’s abstract style is distinct, where color is symbolic and multisensory, evoking sound, motion, temperature, and even scent. The exhibition is organized around the artist’s favorite themes of space, earth, and music.

Thomas was born in 1891 in Columbus, Georgia, She moved to Washington, DC, with her family when she was a teenager. She became Howard University’s first student to earn a degree in fine art in 1924 and went on to teach art in DC public schools for more than 30 years, as well as serving as vice-president of the Barnett Aden Gallery, one of the nation’s first racially integrated and Black-owned art galleries. In 1972, at the age of 80, Thomas presented solo exhibitions at both the Corcoran Gallery of Art in Washington, DC, and the Whitney Museum of American Art in New York, earning her unprecedented recognition for a Black woman artist.

Henri Moore and Georgia O'Keefe
Henry Moore, Working Model for Locking Piece; Georgia O’Keefe, Jack in the Pulpit installation. Photo courtesy of the Museum of Fine Art, Boston.

As one of the most innovative artists of the 20th century, Georgia O’Keeffe left an indelible mark on modernism—and American culture at large. In the exhibition Georgia O’Keefe and Henry Moore reveals how nature in its many forms—most notably flowers and desert landscapes—influenced O’Keefe’s art. The way she approached her work carried through to how she approached life in general, from the way she dressed to how she decorated her home. Featuring more than 150 works, Georgia O’Keeffe and Henry Moore includes paintings, sculptures, and works on paper, as well as faithful recreations of each artist’s studio containing their tools and found objects. The studio installations illuminate the heart of their artistic practice—something rarely made visible in museum spaces—and create richer portraits of O’Keeffe and Moore by encouraging visitors to imagine how they worked and lived. This major exhibition is the first to bring these two artists into conversation, using compelling visual juxtapositions to explore their common ways of seeing. 

Lillie P. Bliss and the Birth of the Modern, at MoMA focuses on the collection and legacy of Lillie P. Bliss, one of the Museum’s three founders and an early advocate for modern art in the United States. On view from through March 29, 2025, the exhibition marks the 90th anniversary of Bliss’s bequest coming to MoMA and includes iconic works such as Paul Cézanne’s The Bather (c. 1885) and Amedeo Modigliani’s Anna Zborowska (1917). 

Lillie P. Bliss installation at the MOMA
Installation view of Lillie P. Bliss and the Birth of the Modern, on view at The Museum of Modern Art, New York from November 17, 2024, through March 29, 2025. Photo: Emile Askey, courtesy MoMA.

Lilie P. Bliss accompanies the publication of MoMA’s book, Inventing the Modern: Untold Stories of the Women Who Shaped The Museum of Modern Art, a revelatory account of the Museum’s earliest years told through newly commissioned profiles of 14 women who had a decisive impact on the formation and development of the institution. Inventing the Modern comprises illuminating new essays on the women who, as founders, curators, patrons, and directors of various departments, made enduring contributions to MoMA during its early decades (especially between 1929 and 1945), creating new models for how to envision, establish, and operate a museum in an era when the field of modern art was uncharted territory. Bliss was an example of the women who shaped the Museum’s vision for modern art. When Bliss died, she left approximately 120 works to the Museum in her will. In an effort to ensure the Museum’s future success, Bliss stipulated that MoMA would receive her collection only if it could prove that it was on firm financial footing within three years of her death. In 1934 the Museum was able to secure the bequest, which became the core of MoMA’s collection. This included key works by Cézanne, Georges-Pierre Seurat, Paul Gauguin, Vincent van Gogh, Pablo Picasso, Modigliani, Odilon Redon, Marie Laurencin, and Henri Matisse. Bliss’s bequest wisely allowed for the sale of her works to fund new acquisitions, facilitating the purchase of many important artworks, including Van Gogh’s The Starry Night, which is featured in Lillie P. Bliss exhibition.

Hope you can get to see one or more of these exceptional exhibitions!

Exhibitions/Locations/Dates
Olga de Amaral 
Fondation Cartier,  Paris, France
through March 16, 2025

Composing Color: the paintings of Alma Thomas
Denver Art Museum, Colorado
through January 12, 2025

Georgia O’Keefe and Henry Moore
Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, Massachusetts
through January 20, 2025

Lillie P. Bliss and the Birth of the Modern
Museum of Modern Art, New York, New York
through March 29, 2025

Subversive, Skilled, Sublime: Fiber Art by Women
Renwick Gallery, Smithsonian American Art Museum, Washington, DC
through January 5, 2025

Sheila Hicks
Kunsthalle and Josef Albers Museum Quadrat Bottrop, Dusseldorf, Germany
through February 23, 2025

Sublime Light: Tapestry Art of DY Begay
National Museum of the American Indian
through July 13, 2025

Save the Date: Japandí Revisited in Wayne, PA, December 7, 2024 to January 25, 2025

October 23, 2024 0 Comment
Willow basket by Mark Kosonen, Indigo banner by Hiroyuki Shindo
54mk Willow Cat Basket, Markku Kosonen sibirica, satix phylicifalia, 7″ x 11.5″ x 11″, 1990
4hsh.1 Wall Hanging, Hiroyuki Shindo, linen, handspun and handwoven, indigo dye, 69″ x 17″ , 1995. Photo by Tom Grotta

It turned out so nice, we decided to do it twice. Three years ago we curated an exhibition at browngrotta arts exploring the inspirations shared by artists in Japan and the Scandinavian countries, Sweden, Finland, Norway, and Denmark. We uncovered so many interesting stories and artistic references among the artists we work with we’ve decided to revisit this topic again this winter at the Wayne Art Center in Wayne, Pennsylvania. Japandí Revisited: shared aesthetics and influences will open on December 7, 2024 and run through January 25, 2025. 

Basket Strings by Birgit Birkkjaer
102bb Woven Art Basket Strings, Birgit Birkkjaer, linen, paper, horsehair, hemp yarn, silk-steel, yarn, glue, 61″ x 35″ x 4″, 2024. Photo by Tom Grotta

The Ethel Sergeant Clark Smith Gallery at the Wayne Art Center is spacious and bright and an inviting space. Vistors to Wayne will see some familiar works alongside new ones, from Birgit Birkkjaer, Hiroyuki Shindo, and Naoko Serino. Japandí Revisited will also feature artists new to our Japandí assemblage, including Shoko Fukuda, Toshiko Takaezu, Aya Kajiwara, Kogetsu Kosuge, and Hiroko Sato-Pijanowski.

Åse Ljones and Naoko Serino
Åse Ljones, 16al Dobbel Domino, hand embroidery on linen, stretched on frame, 56.675″ x 57″ x 2.5″, 2015
Naoko Serino, Generating 9, jute, 30″ x 30″ x 7″, 2014. Photos by Tom Grotta

Japandí in design is a fusion style that references shared aspects of Scandinavian and Japanese aesthetics.  “It is the East-meets-West design movement. It blends Japanese artistic elements and wabi-sabi philosophy with Scandinavian comfort and warmth or hygge,” Shanty Wijaya, an interior designer and owner of AllPrace told Architectural Digest in 2023. “Both Japanese and Scandinavian design aesthetics are focused on simplicity, natural elements, comfort, and sustainability. It teaches us to find beauty in imperfection, form deep connections to the earth and nature, and enjoy the simple pleasures of life.”   

paper boat sculpture by Jane Balsgaard
38jb Relief, Jane Balsgaard, iron, bamboo, willow, fishing line and handmade plantpaper, 74″ x 18″ x 12″, 2014. Photo by Tom Grotta

There are four elements highlighted in Japandí Revisted — natural materials and sustainability, minimalism, exquisite craftsmanship and, as Wijaya notes, similarities between the Japanese concept of wabi-sabi and the Scandinavian concept of hygge. A respect for materials is found in both cultures. Danish artist Jane Balsgaard spent time in Japan in 1993 and 1998, preparing for exhibits there. Works of paper and twigs were the result. In her work, white paper often contrasts the dark color of the willow twigs.  “Another element in [Balsgaard’s] works that has connection to Japan,” writes Mirjam Golfer-Jørgensen, “is the skeleton, that partly frames the paper, partly combines with the hollows in the constuction, and gives another character to the paper that with a lightness that creates a contrast towards to the hollows.” (Influences from Japan in Danish Art and Design 1870 – 2010, Mirjam Golfer-Jørgensen, Danish Architectural Press, 2013.)

Gudren Pagter and Keiji Nio
5gp Framed, Gudrun Pagter, linen, sisal and flax, 65” x 60”, 2018
14kn Large Interlacing – R, Keiji Nio, nylon fiber, 54″ x 54″ x 15.5″, 2004. Photo by Tom Grotta

These cultures share is an affinity for purity, minimalism, and simplicity. Danish artist Grethe Wittrock’s work includes expanses of twisted paper strands in single colors — minimal and simple yet powerful expressions of what Finnish Designer Alvar Aalto called “the language of materials.” Wittrock observed the similar appreciation for minimalism firsthand when she traveled to Japan and studied with Japanese paper makers and renowned indigo dyer, Shihoko Fukomoto. “I started to uncover what Nordic sensibilities are by living abroad,” Wittrock says. “I lived in Kyoto, and saw an aesthetic in Japanese design similar to the Nordic tradition. You could say that there is an agreement that less is more. As they say in the Nordic countries ‘even less is even more.’” Gudrun Pagter is another Danish artist whose abstract works in primary colors reflect the modernism for which Scandinavia is known. “From the exotic and foreign land we find an aesthetically common understanding of a minimalist idiom,” Pagter says, “an understanding of the core of a composition — that is, cutting off everything ‘unnecessary.’”

Grethe Wittrock and Jiro Yonezawa
Grethe Wittrock , 2gr The Second Cousin, white paperyarn knotted on steelplate, 67” x 78.75”, 2006
Jiro Yonezawa, 100jy Red Fossil 20−4, bamboo, urushi laquer, 22.5” x 21.25” x 21”, 2020. Photo by Tom Grotta

Meticulous craftsmanship is another element heralded in Japandí. Stainless steel fibers are masterfully incorporated into the work of three of the artists in this exhibition. Agneta Hobin of Finland weaves the fine threads into mesh, incorporating mica and folding the material into shapes — fans, strips, and bridges. Jin-Sook So’s work is informed by time spent in Korea, Sweden, and Japan. She uses transparent stainless steel mesh cloth, folded, stitched, painted and electroplated to create shimmering objects for the wall or tabletop. The past and present are referenced in So’s work in ways that are strikingly modern and original.  She has used steel mesh to create contemporary Korean pojagi and to re-envision common objects — chairs, boxes and bowls. Kyoko Kumai of Japan spins the fibers into ethereal, silver landscapes.

Toshio Sekiji and Eva Vargö
Toshio Sekiji, 34ts Counterpoint 8, Korean newspapers; black urushi lacquer, 28″ x 25″ x 4″, 2009
Eva Vargö, 6ev No. 55 (Book of Changes), linen, thread, paper strings, gold leaves, 31.75” x 29.375” x 1.5,” 2019. Photo by Tom Grotta

Several artists in the Japandí exhibition evidence an appreciation for repurposing materials as wabi-sabi envisions. Toshio Sekiji’s works are made of newspapers from Japan, India and the US and even maps from Jerusalem. Paper is a material that creates an atmosphere as well as art. Eva Vargö, a Swedish artist who has spent many years in Japan, describes how washi paper, when produced in the traditional way, has a special quality — light filters through paper from lamps and shoji screen doors creates a warm and special feeling, in keeping with the appreciation of the imperfect embodied in wabi-sabi and wellness and contentment in hygge.

A sneak peek — here’s the Wayne exhibition in 2-D. Photo by Tom Grotta.

We hope you can make it to Pennsylvania this winter!

Art Out and About: Fall 2024

October 16, 2024 0 Comment

It’s Fall, which means a new crop of exhibitions in the US and abroad. We took a day off after Ways of Seeing, our recent exhibition, closed, and visited two exhibitions in our neighborhood, but there are others to see — from Washington, DC to Greencastle, Indiana to Dussedorf, Germany.

Tara Donovan
Aggregations by Tara Donovan at The Bruce Museum. Photo by Tom Grotta

Tara Donovan: Aggregations
Through March 9, 2025
The Bruce Museum
1 Museum Drive
Greenwich, CT 06830

“Known for her experimentation with materials and her rigorous, labor-intensive process, Tara Donovan is something of an alchemist. She transforms the mundane and familiar into the strange and otherworldly, even as her works approximate things found in the natural world. At the the Bruce, the artist explores the additive effects of “accumulating identical objects,” or aggregations, in which she layers and combines materials together to complicate visual distinctions between part and whole. The final monumental work inhabits the gallery with an almost animate presence, calling to mind a mineral or petrified plant.

Kumi Yamashita
Portraits by Kumi Yamashita at The Flinn Gallery. Photo by Tom Grotta

The Elusive Art of Kumi Yamashita
Through November 6, 2024
Flinn Gallery
Greenwich Library
101 West Putnam Avenue, Second Floor
Greenwich, CT 06830

Kumi Yamashita uses a series of techniques and simple materials to creating intriguing works of art. Discussing her shadow art series, Yamashita explains, “I sculpt using both light and shadow. I construct single or multiple objects and place them in relation to a single light source. The complete artwork is therefore comprised of both the material (the solid objects) and the immaterial (the light or shadow).” The exhibition also features provocative portraits crafted by meticulously winding a single, unbroken sewing thread around thousands of small galvanized nails and portraits on sheets created by stamping with vibram shoe soles.

Sheila Hicks
Sheila Hicks, Labyrinthe du paradis, 2024, Photo: Claire Dorn, © VG Bild-Kunst, Bonn 2024

Sheila Hicks
Through February 23, 2025
Kunsthalle Düsseldorf  (Opening Friday, October 11 at 6pm)
Josef Albers Museum Quadrat Bottrop (Opening Saturday, October 12 at 2pm)
Dusseldorf and Bottrop, Germany

Opening this Fall, the Josef Albers Museum Quadrat Bottrop and the  Kunsthalle Düsseldorf will present the first major solo exhibition of Sheila Hicks (b. 1934) across two cities. Comprising a total of 140 works from all creative periods, the collaborative presentation provides a comprehensive overview of the the artist’s multifaceted oeuvre for the first time in Germany.Sheila Hicks’ unique practice unfolds in the interplay between material, color, and space: in large and small-format wall works, tapestries, reliefs, sculptures, and installations, the seemingly infinite possibilities of these three dimensions unfurl. “What can you do with thread?” is the question that the artist has tirelessly explored since studying with Josef Albers at the Yale School of Art in the 1950s. 

DY Begay
DY Begay and her work. Photos by Helena Hernmarck

Sublime Light: Tapestry Art of DY Begay
Through July 13, 2025 
National Museum of the American Indian
National Mall
Fourth Street & Independence Avenue
Washington, DC 20560

Sublime Light: Tapestry Art of DY Begay celebrates more than three decades of innovation by fiber artist DY Begay (Diné [Navajo], b. 1953). As the materials from National Museum of the American Indian explain, “Begay’s tapestry art is at once fundamentally modern and essentially Diné, each work an exploration of the artist’s passion for experiencing and interpreting her world. The primary world that Begay explores is Tsélaní, her birthplace and homeland on the Navajo Nation reservation. From this firm foundation, her innate and lifelong curiosity has motivated her to investigate the expressive power of color and design in developing her distinctive aesthetic. Begay creates unique artworks that bridge her traditional Diné upbringing and experimental fiber art practice. Through her embrace of color, passion for design, and innovative handling of fiber, Begay creates art that expresses a non-Western way of being to a contemporary audience.” Sublime Light is the first retrospective of Begay’s career, showcasing 48 of her most remarkable tapestries.

Gudrun Pagter
Two vertical and two horizontal greens tapestry. Photo by Gudrun Pagter

ACROSS
Through November 10, 2025
Kalundborg Art Association
BispegaardenKalundborg, Denmark

Anne Bjørn, Gudrun Pagter, Gurli Elbaegaard and Lisbeth Voight Durand are featured in a group exhibition at the Kalundborg Art Association, entitled ACROSS.

Jiro Yonezawa
Spiraling, Twisting, Unraveling installation. Photo courtesy of ASU

Spiraling, Twisting, Unraveling: Explorations in Pattern and Form
Through June 29, 2025
ASU Art Museum
51 East 10th Street
Tempe, AZ  85281

Culled entirely from the Arizona State University’s Art Museum’s collection, Spiraling, Twisting, Unraveling: Explorations in Pattern and Form explores the dynamic landscape and languages found through contemporary craft today. The exhibition features twenty-five artists, including Christine Joy, Kay Sekimachi, Mary Giles, John Garrett, Polly Adams Sutton, and Jiro Yonezawa who examine dimensions of decoration, pattern and form through their varied practices to engage with some of the most pressing issues of our time.

Patterns of Abstraction
Installation: Patterns in Abstraction. Photo by by Mike Jensen

Patterns in Abstraction: Black Quilts from the High’s Collection
Through January 5, 2025
High Museum of Art
1280 Peachtree St, NE
Atlanta, GA 30309

According to the High Musuem, for more than a century, the potential kinship between quilts and abstract painting has sparked lively debate. “Although the color-rich geometric patchwork of quilts is visually resonant with examples of abstract painting often credited as pinnacles of artistic innovation, many have argued that such comparisons fail to honor the integrity of quilts within their distinct conditions of production. Quilts made by Black women have too often been left out of the conversation altogether.” The High has collected Black quilts since the 1980s and recently has quintupled its holdings to ensure that Black quilts have a continually rotating presence in the museum’s collection galleries. Patterns in Abstraction: Black Quilts from the High’s Collection aims to answer a larger question: “How can quilts made by Black women change the way we tell the history of abstract art?”

Lia Cook
Installation: Beyond: Tapestry Expanded. Photo by Stuart Snoddy

Beyond: Tapestry Expanded
Through Dec 8, 2024
American Tapestry Alliance
Richard E. Peeler Art Center
DePauw University 
10 West Hanna Street
Greencastle, IN 46135

Beyond: Tapestry Expanded is a curated and juried exhibition that features work from artists, including Lia Cook, exploring the expansive properties of tapestry. Using the definition of tapestry as a nonfunctional, handwoven pictorial structure, artists combine both hand and digital processes, using non-traditional materials, creating three-dimensional forms, or incorporating multi-media components, including sound and video. 

Enjoy!

Ways of Seeing: On Assembling

September 25, 2024 0 Comment

Ways of Seeing, our Fall art event, is mid-exhibition today. It’s a celebration of collecting and the myriad ways that people acquire and arrange art. We’ve put together some groupings within the show and thought of others. We’ll share some of them below for those of you who can’t attend in person. For example, collecting by material, even one as ubiquitous as paper, can result in a varied collection. We put together a wall of works on paper: a print using xerography by Katherine Westphal, a painting on paper by Claude Vermette, collages by Norma Minkowitz and Hideho Tanaka, an intricately folded paper work by Dail Behennah, a composition of twisted commercial paper by Wendy Wahl, and an assemblage of colored sandpaper by Marian Bijlenga.

Gallery Wall of paper works
left to right, top to bottom:
Katherine Westphal, 10w Amphora and Fern, 1993; Wendy Wahl, 2ww 7 by 7 and 22, 1999; Marian Bijlenga, 37mb Luitzen, 2019; Hideho Tanaka, 31ht Emerging 008, 2016; Norma Minkowitz, 114nm The Seeker, 2014; Claude Vermette, 126c Untitled, 1980; Dail Behennah, 56db Two Golds, 2019; Toshio Sekiji, 26ts Lacquered and Torn, 1998. Photo by Tom Grotta

A more unusual material choice — assembling items made of materials from the sea, will also result in a wildly diverse group of works. We’re showing baskets of seaweed, wall work of fish skin and fish scales, and works that incorporate sea sand and sea stones. 

Artwork with sea materials
12jle Bivalve, Jeannet Leendertse, 2023; 5ab Threading Fish, Annette Bellamy, 2023; 40mb Scale Flowers, Marian Bijlenga, 2019; 32kn Sazanami(Ripples), Keiji Nio , 2022; 35sl Coast, East Riding of Yorkshire 1-3, Sue Lawty, 2024. Photos by Tom Grotta

Collecting by artist can yield a broad mix of results. Choosing a category, like Polish, LQBTQ+ or self-taught artists, can result in considerable variation. Even a single artist, if it is one who experiments relentlessly like Jiro Yonezawa, can ground a surprising collection.

Bamboo works by Jiro Yonezawa
Jiro Yonezawa 109jy Yellow Lady Bug, 2021; 95jy Ecdysis , 2019; 64jy Ascension, 2006 92jy Orbit, 2019. Phots by Tom Grotta

There are four very different works by this artist in Ways of Seeing, and they don’t even include the wide bamboo spheres which he has created more recently. 

Works by Hisako Sekijima
Hisako Sekijima
650hs Suspended Decision, 2021; 620hs From 2 to 3 Dimensions V; 643-655hs A Line of Willow, 2020; 639-651hs Bound to Continue VII; 625hs Structural Discussion VI, 2016

Basketmaker Hisako Sekijima, who has worked in everything from cherry bark to kudzu is another example of someone who can be collected in multiples. Lia Cook is another — her practice has moved in several different and exciting ways through out her career.

Works by Lia Cook
Lia Cook 55lc Between Clouds , 1978; 4lc Crazy Quilt: Royal Remnants, 1988; 16lc Presence/Absence: Gather, 1998; 28lc Su Brain Tracts Renew, 2014. Photos by Tom Grotta

Then there are them groupings — we are showing art related to water, but even a color, like Picasso’s blue period, can be an energizing organizing principle. We’ve gathered weavings and objects that meet that criteria: 

Blue Textiles
12lt Cross, Laura Thomas, 2023; 25gs Blue Color Gradation, Grethe Sørensen, 2005; 14jle Blue Levels, Jeannet Leenderste, 2019. Photos by Tom Grotta

There are a few days to see our compilations in person. Or you can order the catalog: https://store.browngrotta.com/c-54-ways-of-seeing/

Happy Hunting!

Ways of Seeing: how individuals envision and curate their art collections

Through September 29, 2024
browngrotta arts
276 Ridgefield Road
Wilton, CT 06897
https://browngrotta.com/exhibitions

Gallery Dates/Hours:
Monday, September 23rd through Saturday, September 28th: 10am to 5pm (40 visitors/ hour) Sunday, September 29th: 11am to 6pm [Final Day] (40 visitors/ hour)

Safety protocols: 
Reservations strongly encouraged; No narrow heels please (barn floors)

Ways of Seeing, Part Three: Right-Sized

September 11, 2024 0 Comment
Ways of Seeing Right Sized installation
Gali Cnaani, 8gs Red Dress, 2006; Jennifer Falck Linssen, 14jl Insight, 2016; Mia Olsson, 4mo Traces 4 Relief, 2006; Lewis Knauss, 38lk Spiked Horizon 2018; Paul Furneaux, 8pf Soft Sea Lewis II, 2024; Mary Merkel-Hess, 61mm Sun Series Orange, 2013; Sue Lawty, 35sl Coast East Riding of Yorkshire 1-3, 2024. Photo by Tom Grotta

“Right-sized” refers to adjusting something to an appropriate or optimal size. In Right-Sized, the third exhibition within Ways of Seeing, we explore collections through this lens. We’ve drawn inspiration from collectors who focus on intention and specificity—such as historic textiles, woven portraits, and Japanese baskets.

Laura Thomas
9lt Focus, Blue IV, Laura Thomas, glass, cotton, linen, silk, 16.75″ x 16.75″ x 1″, 2023. Photo by Tom Grotta

Herb and Dorothy Vogel, for example, a postal worker and a librarian, built a world-class collection of Minimalist and Conceptual art in their New York apartment, mindful of both affordability and space constraints. One artist noted that they would only purchase works they could transport home via subway or taxi. Similarly, Lloyd Cotsen, known for his diverse collections, including Chinese bronze mirrors, children’s books, and Noah’s arks, considered size in his creation of The Box Project, now housed at The Textile Museum at The George Washington University Museum For this project, Cotsen requested 36 artists to create three-dimensional works that fit within boxes measuring either 14 x 14 x 2 .5 inches or 23 x 14 x 2.5 inches. The goal was to observe how contemporary fiber artists navigated challenges related to physical restrictions and dimensions. In Right-Sized, we have selected works that adhere to specific parameters of small size, much like Cotsen’s project, while also considering affordability, akin to the Vogels’ approach.

noriko takamiya
34nt Revolving Cross, Noriko Takamiya, paper, 5.5″ x 7.75″ x 4.5″, 2024. Photo by Tom Grotta

Right-Sized is characterized by its diversity in materials, techniques, and approaches. The exhibition includes a variety of framed paper works—pleated, painted, printed, and collaged—alongside a salon wall of eclectic pieces, including sculptural works made from sisal, paper, linen, and hemp, a “weaving” of copper, “drawings” in stone, and a Japanese watercolor woodblock print (mokuhanga). We have assembled a grouping of cubes and spheres of everything from bark to jute to stainless steel and another of baskets of natural materials, each at least 12 inches high. Elsewhere In Right-Sized, viewers will find exquisite embroidery by Diane Itter, wood vessels by Markku Kosonen, willow sculpture by Lizzie Farey, and threads embedded in perspex by Laura Thomas.

Diane Itter
Detail: 1di Ribbon Rain, Diane Itter, knotted thread on linen, 23.25″ x 14.75″, 1984. Photo by Tom Grotta

With its eclectic assortment of more than 70 works, Right-Sized seeks to engage viewers’ impulses to classify, organize, and collect.

See what we have assembled, in person, or in the Ways of Seeing catalog: 

Exhibition Details:
Ways of Seeing
exploring ways individuals envision and curate art collections
browngrotta arts
276 Ridgefield Road
Wilton, CT 06897

Gallery Dates/Hours:
Saturday, September 21st: 11am to 6pm [Opening & Artist Reception]
Sunday, September 22nd: 11am to 6pm (40 visitors/ hour)
Monday, September 23rd through Saturday,September 28th: 10am to 5pm (40 visitors/ hour)
Sunday, September 29th: 11am to 6pm [Final Day] (40 visitors/ hour)

browngrotta.com

Schedule your visit at POSH. 
Safety protocols: Reservations strongly encouraged; No narrow heels please (barn floors)

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Ways of Seeing Part One: The Art Aquatic

August 21, 2024 0 Comment

Ways of Seeing, browngrotta arts’ Fall 2024 exhibition (September 20 – 29) explores various ways that individuals envision and organize art collections. One of the three types of collections we will exhibit in Ways of Seeing is an arrangement based on a specific theme. Having a fondness for water and a location between the Norwalk River and Long Island Sound, we chose water-related art, specifically, The Art Aquatic, as our sample organizing principle.

Karyl Sisson Octopus
Flight III, Karyl Sisson, deconstructed vintage zippers, thread, 5″ x 32″ x 22″, 2013. Photo by Tom Grotta

The changeable, fluid nature of water has often been an inspiration for artists. Artists use water to convey a variety of meanings. Some are moved by water as a natural force, for others there is a more spiritual connection, and still others are interested in how humans are impacting our oceans and rivers — in each case the results are thought provoking and intriguing. 

Marian Bijlenga Fish Scales
40mb Scale Flowers, Marian Bijlenga, dyed Nile Perch fish scales, 22.375″ x 18.875″ x 2.5″, 2019

Artists in The Art Aquatic exhibition reflect that diversity of approaches. Some have made imaginative uses of water-related materials. There are patchworks of fish skins by Annette Bellamy, who spends part of each year fishing commercially and compositions of fish scales by Marian Bijlenga. Keiji Nio photographs sea scenes, uses the images in ribbons that he plaits and edges with beach sand. Jeannet Leenderste creates baskets of seaweed she forages in Maine and works with the Rockweed Coalition. “Seaweed not only creates a habitat for countless species, it sequesters carbon,” she says, “and protects our shoreline as our sea levels are rising.”

Ulla-Maija Vikman painted threads
Ulla-Maija Vikman, Biagga (Sea Wind), painted viscose and linen, 67 x 71 in, 2010. Photo by Tom Grotta

Other works in The Art Aquatic offer more abstract references to life in the deep, including Ulla-Maija Vikman’s “painting,” Biagga (Sea Wind), made of viscose threads in marine colors.  Mariette Rousseau-Vermette’s Blue Water II, made of woven tubes of beachy blue, grey, white, and yellow, evokes a sunny day at the water’s edge. Masakazu Kobayashi’s assemblage of silk-wrapped bows reflects an ocean horizon.

Ed Rossbach Fish basket
Fish Trap, Ed Rossbach, 14″ x 11″ x 11″, 1988. Photo by Tom Grotta

A third series of works offer watery imagery, like Judy Mulford’s Aging by the Sea which incorporates a conch shell and a tiny boat covered in knotless netting, Ed Rossbach’s Fish Trap Basket, with a whimsical fish motif, the mermaid in Norma Minkowitz’s sculpture, My Cup Runneth Over, and Karyl Sisson’s Flight III, a sea-creature-like sculpture of vintage zippers.

Floating paper boats by Jane Balsgaard and Merja Winqvist. Tubular textile by Mariette-Rousseau-Vermette
Paper boats by Jane Balsgaard and Merja Winqvist, Tubular textile by Mariette-Rousseau-Vermette. Photo by Tom Grotta

More literal still, there are the nautical object interpretations included in the exhibition, like Mercedes Vicente‘s shell of cotton canvas. Jane Balsgaard’s Relief floats alongside Merja Winqvist’s gridded boat – both are made of paper. Text from Moby Dick is etched on Call Me Ishmael, Lawrence LaBianca’s ivory-colored boat sculpture. La Bianca has created a body of work that engages aquatic environments. “The tools we apply to nature—to contain it, shape it, understand it and categorize it also have a profound impact upon it,” he says. LaBianca references the impetus to measure, understand, contain, and manipulate nature that animates his art – that impetus is one that can animate collectors of art as well.

Wax linen cover shell by Judy Mulford
Judy Mulford, Aging-By the Sea , shell, waxed linen, waxed linen, silver, beads, pearls, silver spoon, sand, plexiglas, 11″ x 11″ x 10″, 2004. Photo by Tom Grotta

Join us at Ways of Seeing and learn more.

Exhibition Details:
Ways of Seeing
exploring ways individuals envision and curate art collections
browngrotta arts
276 Ridgefield Road
Wilton, CT 06897

Gallery Dates/Hours:
Saturday, September 21st: 11am to 6pm [Opening & Artist Reception]
Sunday, September 22nd: 11am to 6pm (40 visitors/ hour)
Monday, September 23rd through Saturday,September 28th: 10am to 5pm (40 visitors/ hour)
Sunday, September 29th: 11am to 6pm [Final Day] (40 visitors/ hour)
browngrotta.com

Schedule your visit at POSH. 
Safety protocols: Reservations strongly encouraged; No narrow heels please (barn floors)

Save the Date: Ways of Seeing, browngrotta arts’ Fall Art in the Barn exhibition Opens September 21st 

July 17, 2024 0 Comment
622mr Blue Water II, Mariette Rousseau-Vermette, wool and aluminum tube tapestries, 3’ x 5’, 1998. Photo by Tom Grotta

This Fall, browngrotta arts at 276 Ridgefield Road, Wilton, Connecticut, will explore the many ways individuals envision and curate their contemporary art collections. From September 21st to the 29th the gallery’s Fall 2024 “Art in the Barn” exhibition, Ways of Seeing, will sample different types of art selection criteria — by theme, by artist, by size.

Marian Bijlenga Fish Scale Detail
40mb Scale Flowers, Marian Bijlenga, dyed Nile Perch fish scales, 22.375″ x 18.875″ x 2.5″, 2019. Photo by Tom Grotta

Each work in The Art Aquatic, a theme-related collection, exists at the intersection of the artist’s fascination with a variety of nautical themes and the artmaking process. In The Art Aquatic, viewers will find imaginative uses of water-related materials: baskets incorporating shells by Birgit Birkkjaer, kayak and paddle sculptures by Chris Drury wrapped in salmon skin, Marian Bijlenga’s composition of fish scales, and Jeannet Leenderste’s baskets made of seaweed. Other works in The Art Aquatic offer more abstract references to life in the deep, including Ulla-Maija Vikman’s “painting,” Biagga (Sea Wind), made of viscose threads painted in marine colors and Mariette Rousseau-Vermette’s Blue Water II, made of woven tubes of beachy blue, grey, white, and yellow. A third series of works in The Art Aquatic offer watery imagery, like Judy Mulford’s  Aging by the Sea, that features a conch shell and tiny boat, Ed Rossbach’s Fish Trap Basket, with a whimsical fish motif, and the mermaid in Norma Minkowitz’s sculpture, My Cup Runneth Over. 

Sue Lawty Stone Drawing , Baskets by Hisako Sekijima
15sl Calculus, Sue Lawty, natural stones on gesso, 78.75″ x 118″, 2010. Photo by Tom Grotta

Impact: 20 Women Artists to Collect, another of the exhibitions within Ways of Seeing, will examine collecting by specific artist. Impact will present sculptures, tapestries, and mixed media works made from 1976 to 2024 by artists of significance and renown, including Kay Sekimachi, Yeonsoon Chang, Simone Pheulpin, and Carolina Yrarrázaval. Each of these artists demonstrates a knowledge of traditional and experimental techniques, while redefining the perception of textiles as fine art.

Detail of Mia Olsson
11mo Together, Mia Olsson, relief, sisal fibers, acrylic, 2021 . Photo by Tom Grotta

A third exhibition within Ways of Seeing will be Right-Sized, which considers collecting within specified parameters. Diversity is the hallmark — in materials, techniques, and approaches. In Right-Sized, viewers will find embroidery by Diane Itter, sculpture in sisal, paper, and willow by Mia Olsson, Noriko Takamiya, and Lizzie Farey, ceramics by Claude Vermette, and spheres, boxes, and baskets by Hideho Tanaka, Polly Sutton, Naoko Serino, and others, worthy of collecting in multiples.

“Ways of Seeing will celebrate the passion and individuality that spark and shape collections,” says co-curator Tom Grotta, “while offering collectors at all levels a wide selection of works to appreciate and possibly acquire.”

A full-color catalog will accompany the exhibition.

Details:
Ways of Seeing
exploring ways individuals envision and curate art collections
browngrotta arts
276 Ridgefield Road
Wilton, CT 06897

Gallery Dates/Hours:
Saturday, September 21st: 11am to 6pm [Opening & Artist Reception]
Sunday, September 22nd: 11am to 6pm (40 visitors/ hour)
Monday, September 23rd through Saturday,September 28th: 10am to 5pm (40 visitors/ hour)
Sunday, September 29th: 11am to 6pm [Final Day] (40 visitors/ hour)

Schedule your visit on POSH.

browngrotta.com