Tag: Ethel Stein

November 26th: Our Online Exhibition Opens With an Offer for CyberMonday

On Monday, November 26th, browngrotta arts will present an online version of our 25th anniversary exhibition,Retro/Prospective: 25+ Years of Art Textiles and Sculpture at browngrotta.com. The comprehensive exhibition highlights browngrotta arts’ 25 years promoting international contemporary art. Viewers can click on any image in the online exhibition to reach a page with more information about the artists and their work.

“Some works in Retro/Prospective: 25+ Years of Art Textiles and Sculpture reflect the early days of contemporary textile art and sculpture movement,” says Tom Grotta, founder and co-curator at browngrotta arts. “There are also current works by both established and emerging artists, which provide an indication of where the movement is now and where it may be headed.”

Since Monday the 26th is CyberMonday this year, sales of art, books, catalogs, videos or dvds placed online or by telephone that day will be discounted 10% (excluding tax and shipping). In addition, bga will make a donation to the International Child Art Foundation for each sale made from November 24th through December 31, 2012. Visit browngrotta.com. For more information call Tom at 203.834.0623 or email us at art@browngrotta.com.


Coast to Coast — Exhibitions Around the US

Here’s a round up of exhibitions throughout the US that are worth traveling to see.  They are listed in date order — a few of them close this month or next; others are open through the fall.

Philadelphia, Pennsylvania
Craft Spoken Here
Last Week – through August 12th

Artists in the exhibit include: clockwise; WATERFALL by Lenore Tawney; SPIRALS AND PATHS by Rebecca Medel; CERAMIC 42 by Yasuhisa Kohyama; BODY LANGUAGE by John McQueen; SEASIDE by Krystyna Wojtyna-Drouet; RAY by Mary Merkel-Hess

With Craft Spoken Here, curated by Elisabeth Agro, the Nancy M. McNeil Associate Curator of American Modern and Contemporary Crafts and Decorative Arts, the Philadelphia Museum of Art seizes the opportunity to experiment with its craft collection and to understand craft in an international context. Some 40 contemporary works from 1960 to the present in ceramic, glass, metal, wood, lacquer, paper and fiber—some by living, acclaimed artists, including Lenore Tawney, Rebecca Medel, Yasuhisa Kohyama, John McQueen,  Krystyna Wojtyna-Drouet, and Mary Merkel-Hess and others by lesser-known creators—are on view. Representing the Americas, Africa, Asia and Europe, the works highlight formal qualities that cross cultures, time, and media. Hear Agro describe the evolution of the exhibition and the installation of Tawney’s Fountain of Water and Word, in a podcast at the art blog.

Philadelphia Museum of Art
Perelman Building
2525 Pennsylvania Ave
Philadelphia, PA 19130
phone 215.763.8100
www.philamuseum.org

Myrtle Beach, South Carolina
At First Light: The Katagami Sculpture of Jennifer Falck Linssen
through September 16, 2012

Handcrafted vessel of katagami-style handcarved paper. Materials include archival cotton paper, aluminum, waxed linen, paint, varnish, freshwater pearl, and sterling silver.

Utilizing the ancient Japanese paper carving technique of katagami, Colorado-based artist Jennifer Falck Linssen creates three-dimensional sculptures that explore the beauty of line and the delicacy of nature. Since 2003, Jennifer has been shaping katagami stencils into three-dimensional vessels and sculptures, combining the katagami paper carving with more traditional metal-smithing and basketry techniques to create contemporary sculptures that transform the two-dimensional stencil into a unique three-dimensional art form.

Myrtle Beach Museum of Art
3100 South Ocean Boulevard
(across from Springmaid Pier)
Myrtle Beach, SC 29577
phone 843.238.2510
fax 843.238.2910
www.myrtlebeachartmuseum.org

East Hampton, New York
Accumulations NOW
through October 6th

Dawn MacNutt is one of the artists included in Accumulations NOW

Accumulations: NOW bills itself as, “[s]imply, the best of craft. NOW.” Cuurated by Jack Lenor Larsen, the exhibition at LongHouse Reserve features 500 works made in the last 100 years, including a number of important pieces from the collection of the late Dena Katzenberg. Artists shown in the NOW collections include, in fiber Anni Albers, Jun-ichi Arai, Dawn MacNutt, Ed Rossbach, Peter Collingwood, Ethel Stein, Helena Hernmarck and Chunghie Lee; in clay Hans Coper, Toshiko Takezu and Peter Voulkos; hollowware by Chunghi Choo; and furniture masters including Judy Kensley McKie and Edward Wormley. You can see the exhibition catalog and installation shots, here: Accumulations_Now_Catalog.pdf and here: http://www.longhouse.org

LongHouse Reserve
133 Hands Creek Road  East Hampton, NY 11937
phone 631.604.5330
http://longhouse.org

 

San Francisco, California
Fiber Futures: Japan’s Textile Pioneers
Part one through October 6th
Part two October 13 – December 29th

Takaaki Tanaka in front of his work at Fiber Futures when it was in New York at the Japan Society

If you missed this remarkable exhibition last fall at the Japan Society in New York (or in an earlier incarnation in Japan) you’ve got another chance. Fiber Futures explores a new art that is emerging from a remarkable fusion of Japanese artisanal and industrial textile making. Coaxed from materials as age-old as hemp and newly developed as microfilaments, a varied array of works by 30 artists from multiple generations, including Hisako Sekijima, Takaaki TanakaNaoko Serino, Hideho Tanaka, Naomi Kobayahsi and Kyoko Kumai, are on view in this important two-part exhibition.

Museum of Craft and Folk Art
51 Yerba Buena Lane
San Francisco, CA 94103
phone 415.227.4888
http://www.mocfa.org

Minneapolis, Minnesota
In Our Nature: Tapestries of Helena Hernmarck
through October 14th

Helena Hernmarck 2009 FOREST PATH , wool and linen, 6′ 7″ x 6′ 7

In Our Nature: Tapestries of Helena Hernmarck, is an assemblage of 19 large-scale tapestries by  legendary trompe-l’oeil weaver, Helena Hernmarck. Monumental works immerse the viewer in the best of nature: lush blooms, rich green forest scenes, and sunny poppy pastures. Hernmarck’s work represents a lifetime of closely honed weaving technique that combines intensely sensitive attention to color with one-of-a-kind combination of textures creating layered, shaded effects. The tapestries in In Our Nature: Tapestries of Helena Hernmarck are on loan from three major arts museums, several corporate and individual collectors, and from Hernmarck’s own collection.

American Swedish Institute
2600 Park Avenue
Minneapolis, MN 55407
phone 612.871.4907
http://www.asimn.org


Exhibition News: Sourcing the Museum at the Textile Museum in DC through August 19th

Sourcing the Museum Lia Cook inspired by Syrian 6-7th century and Egyptian 550-625 coptic textile

For Sourcing the Museum, 11 artists (Olga de Amaral, James Bassler, Polly Barton, Archie Brennan, Lia Cook, Helena Hernmarck, Ayako Nikamoto, Jon Eric Riis, Warren Seelig, Kay Sekimachi, and Ethel Stein) were invited by renowned textile designer Jack Lenor Larsen to artists explore the Museum’s historically and culturally varied collections. The resulting exhibition includes 12 new artworks that the artists created, displayed alongside the fabrics that inspired them. The historical textiles highlight the wide scope of the Museum’s collections, ranging from rare Pre-Columbian and Late Roman weavings to Japanese kimono and Central Asian ikats.

 

Sourcing the Museum Helena Hernmarck re-envisiones this 9th-century Egyptian fragment

Helena Hernmarck, for example, re-envisioned a 9th-century Egyptian fragment in an abstract, loose weave. “It was the color that won the day,” she says,”and getting to closely study what an 1100-year-old thread looks like woven in a carpet. There is pile in the carpet, and that made me think, in this case I would weave a looser structure to capture the illusion of pile. This is an oxymoron, since pile is the fiber being seen into its cut, and I am letting the fiber, lying down flat, carry that message. A challenge: but to me, this kind of time-consuming, visually intimate study of something greatly enlarged, is rewarding. I find the advantage of making the plastic strips carry the structure, means I am allowed flexibility how I weave the wool weft — it feels more like sketching than weaving. And it has volume, the volume of puffy wool threads, lending an extra dimension. In other words, this is a double weave, with the lower layer made with the plastic strips; and the upper, plain weave and soumak layer, made with wool, linen and cotton threads. It is the first time I have tried loosening the surface structure like this, still aiming to give an illusion of depth.”

Ethel Stein inspired by a 19th century robe , central asia, Uzbekistan and Bukhara, photo by Tom Grotta

According to the Washington’s Post (“At the Textile Museum weaving tradition into art,” Danielle O’Steen, 3/24/12), Sourcing the Museum “feels fresh and raw…” O’Steen describes the connections that the artists made between old and new as, “loose, and maybe fleeting in the grand scheme of a textile tradition. But the strength of Sourcing the Museum lies in its premise, as it challenges contemporary practitioners to consider a history of traditions, and maybe even embrace lost legacies.” The exhibition continues through August 19, 2012. The Museum is at: 2320 S Street, NW, Washington, DC 20008-4088;Phone: (202) 667-0441.


Books Make Great Gifts, Part II Artist Recommendations

More insightful answers to the question: “Is there a book that has had a particular influence on your work or decision to pursue art as a career?”
Thanks everyone for your help.

Adela Akers: Textiles of Ancient Peru and Their Techniques by Raoul D’harcourt (Univ of Washington Press, 1974; Dover Publications, 2002). I discovered this book in the Public Library in Chicago around 1958. It was a reference book and only in French. Later it was translated in English, and a few years later it was reprinted. Wonderful examples, history and diagrams; there’s nothing like it. It was like my bible. Not sure if it still available. There are many other books on Philosophy and Architecture that I would recommend, but the D’harcourt book was the most influential.

Randy Walker: There are many books that have inspired me. Here are two: Mark Tobey published by the Museo Nacional Centro de Arte Reina Sofia, 1997. The intricate, two-dimensional paintings of Mark Tobey give me a continued faith in the inexhaustible potential of delicate lines to create rich, three-dimensional spaces. A bounding framework, filaments, color and light can provide a lifetime of artistic exploration. This book is one of my most coveted possessions. Also, The Book of Looms: A History of the Handloom from Ancient Times to the Present by Eric Broudy( Littlehampton Book Services Ltd., 1979; Published by the University Press of New England, 1993). This book is absolutely fascinating from a visual, historical, and technical point of view. The forms of looms have inspired me as sculptural elements in themselves. Understanding the evolution of their forms in a cultural context is invaluable. I have to imagine this book of interest to non-fiber people as well as serious fiber artists.

Mary Giles: Agnes Martin: Writings, ed. Dieter Schwarz (Hatje Cantz Publishers; Bilingual edition 2005). Agnes talked about waiting for inspiration… and waiting…and waiting…and waiting. She also spoke of not having unnecessary distractions in your life such as pets and unnecessary friends. I put my husband and the two cats up for adoption but so far no takers.

Lia Cook: On Being Certain: Believing You Are Right Even When You’re Not, by Robert A Burton, M.D. (Reprint edition, St. Martin’s Griffin, 2009) is a book I have read recently that I think will be influential going forward. I am interested in emotional responses to visual perception of handwoven works. It is perhaps tangential to my main focus but nevertheless important to the research process.

Glen Kaufman: One book I recall reading when i was working in ceramics prior to fiber was A Potters Book by Bernard Leach (Faber & Faber 1988).

Nancy Moore Bess: How to Wrap Five Eggs: Traditional Japanese Packaging (and all of its variations)(recent reprint, Weatherhill, 2008) had a HUGE influence on my work. The Japanese have a wonderful way of using indigenous materials to wrap things…packaging, transporting, presenting. Even now, years later, the influence of these old techniques prevails. This book and its information, not basketry nor bamboo, drove me to Japan in the first place. Who knew it would have such a profound influence on my work? If you look at some of the earlier work I exhibited through browngrotta arts, you’ll see Japanese packaging everywhere. In New York, the recent reprint can be found in Kinokuniya Bookstore on 6th Avenue. Love that place!

Lena McGrath Welker: Buddha Mind in Contemporary Art (University of California Press, 2004) is the absolute cornerstone of the project I have worked on for six years for the North Dakota Museum of Art. The book contains a series of papers and artist interviews that resulted from a year-long project all up and down the west coast (why not Portland???) in which Jacquelynn Bass and independent curator Mary Jane Jacobs looked at how curators shy away (to say the least) from work that has anything to do with spirituality. There were several retreats at a Zen Center in California, where papers on the topic were delivered. There’s more information about the project on the UC Press website. As to pursuing a career, I never really did that. I do what I do because I have to. It is what keeps me in the world.

Ethel Stein: Josef Albers: To Open Eyes by Frederick A. Horowitz and Brenda Danilowitz (Phaidon Press, 2009) It’s an account of Albers’ teaching at the Bauhaus, Black Mountain College and Yale. I took a summer course with him at Harvard when I lived in Cambridge and this book sums up some of the thing he had us do. It was very exciting.