Detail, Untitled, by Rich Lipscher, 2004. Ink jet print, 44"x66"
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February 16, 2005-
Exhibition dates:
February 15- March 26, 2005
Open House:
Saturday February 26, 11-5pm
Gallery Talk:
Friday, March 18, 7 pm
Reception:
Friday, March 18, 8 pm (live music by the Burnt Earth band)
Maryland Art Place is proud to announce two important sculpture exhibitions:
BEYOND THE PEDESTAL features four recent grant recipients and resident artists who received support from the Regional Mid Atlantic Arts Foundation in 2004, including two major multi-room siteworks (one by DC area sculptor, Carolyn Bernstein and another by New York artist Nancy Blum,) as well as recent large freestanding sculptures by Ghanan immigrant and Virginia resident Ampofo-Anti as well as Nicole Fall, Maryland's recent resident artist at Philadelphia's Clay Studio. Bernstein's installation was begun last year during a residency at the Women's Studio Workshop in Rosendale, New York, and only recently completed after months of arduous work. Her multifaceted career began in music, which can be perceived when viewing the complex interrelationships between hundreds of similar (yet unique) tubular objects that have been meticulously twisted and arranged into a silent and seemingly benign and gentle 'wave' that is oddly reminiscent of astonishing images that we have seen broadcast worldwide in recent months, illuminating potential power and monumental forces that may reside within and become unleashed at any moment. Tangentially, Nancy Blum's career has incorporated arts often seen in public venues, such as her iron manhole covers installed throughout the city of Seattle in 2001, and recent expansive wall installation at the Seattle/Tacoma International Airport. Blum's most recent installation (created during her residency at the Hand Workshop Art Center in Richmond, VA) balances delicately between memories of Pop Art while exploring complex conflicts and issues in contemporary culture. In Butterfly Wall, installed for the first time at MAP, Blum presents nearly one hundred huge butterflies, cast in the same material as Victorian dolls and incorporating what appears to be natural patterns one would naturally find on the insects' wings. However, Blum's inspiration for the symmetrical patterns in this graphic design is evidence of unsettled attitudes and her need to comprehend more about the culture of Islam, in which representational imagery was historically replaced by meaningful repetitive patterns. Ampofo-Anti also focused on stylistic and theoretical designs found in other cultures. The architecture and mythology of his native Ghana has been incorporated into two major architectonic works, made during his residency at Baltimore Clayworks. This duo was named after the site where they were made; Mondawmin I and Mondawmin II make little reference to the specific site, unless one considers a landscape where boarded-up doors and windows are a common sight, while the potential for amazing journeys and experiences abound. Finally, artist Nicole Fall used her residency as an opportunity to stray from her comfort zone, to make new works from fragile clay and hardened steel. The dichotomy between these two materials are evident: one work is akin to a huge mass of greenish intestines perched dangerously on a delicately balanced lacey steel perch; the other a pair of odd hornets nests hanging precariously from the wall. In both works, Fall touches a sense of vulnerability and strength, paired in each work represented by her singular style.
The other exhibition, AT THAT MOMENT, I WAS AN ARTIST: from Bauhaus to Missoula to Baltimore traces work by ceramic artists inspired by studies with three seminal mentors whose careers, teaching and lives were intertwined and significantly contributed to the dynamic evolution of contemporary culture of clay sculpture, while tracing the 'lineage' of many prominent artists around the nation. These mentors include: renowned Montana artist Rudy Autio, considered to be one of a few premiere artists who transformed his media and continues to inspire a generation with his energetic production of large scale objects and murals; as well as his longtime colleague and Kansas City-based artist, Jim Leedy, whose significant mixed media works are reminiscent of ancient architecture while exploring dark and monumental issues of our time; and their former student and longtime Baltimore artist, Doug Baldwin, whose whimsical duck-like characters equipped with World War I helmets and ridiculous mock authority address themes as wide-ranging as art history and the psychology of culture.
Each of these three mentors chose to feature several former students whose work they respect and whose dual careers (in many cases) have been based in the production of contemporary artworks as well as the art of teaching new generations of artists. Autio chose SuperMud founder and renowned ceramicist and teacher, Dave DonTigny and Virginia area artist Linda Wachtmeister; Baldwin selected mid-career Chicago sculptor Philip Capuano and Baltimore new media artist Rich Lipscher; while Leedy identified a number of younger artists, including New York area artist Adam Welch (whose modular handmade brick works represent a new aspect of minimalism,) Oklahoman Brandon Reese (whose large scale modular works are reminiscent of architecture, yet move to a new realm of sculptural representation,) while Kansas and Missouri artists Marshall Maude, Araan Schmidt, Bill Lane and Michael Wickerson explore themes reminiscent of archeology, anthropology and history in their energetic recent works.
BEYOND THE PEDESTAL ARTISTS:
Ampofo-Anti is a multimedia artist, specializing in ceramics, printmaking and painting. He is presently Professor of Art at Hampton University, Hampton, VA. He has been an art consultant for several organizations, and has conducted numerous workshops with art institutions, such as National Museum of African Art, the Smithsonian Institution and the Virginia Beach Center for the Arts. He has received several commissions, including public art commissions with the cities of Rocky Mount, NC and Richmond, VA. He has lectured extensively, and participated in numerous seminars and conferences. Ampofo-Anti has exhibited his artworks in Africa, Europe, and throughout the United States of America. In addition to receiving a number of awards his work appears in collections, including the National Museum of Ghana in Accra, Ghana; the Hampton University Museum in Hampton, VA, the Anacostia Museum(Smithsonian) in Washington, DC and many others. Ampofo-Anti received his Bachelor of Arts degree from the University of Science and Technology in Kumasi, Ghana and his Master of Fine Arts degree from Howard University in Washington, DC. He completed further studies at the Institute of African Studies at the University of Ghana in Accra, Ghana, and now lives in Virginia.
Carolyn Bernstein is a sculptor based in Washington, DC. Most recently, her ceramic and mixed-media sculptures have been exhibited in Sculpture in Four Dimensions (2004) at the Art Museum of the Americas, and in Sculpture Now 2004 in Washington. She was awarded a 2004 Mid-Atlantic Arts Foundation Creative Fellowship grant and in November, 2004 served as Ceramic Artist-in-Residence at the Women's Studio Workshop in New York. Carolyn is a member of the board of directors of the Washington Sculptors Group and she is a resident artist at Red Dirt Studio in Mt. Rainier, Maryland. She has studied at the Corcoran College of Art and Design, where she earned a Fine Arts Certificate in Ceramics and Sculpture, and at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago.
Nancy Blum grew up in the Midwest and now lives and works in New York. She received a BA from the University of Michigan and a MFA from the Cranbrook Academy of Arts in Bloomfield Hills, MI. Blum uses drawings, sculpture and installation to explore pattern and the architecture of nature and creates work that is visceral, meditative, and rhythmic and engages the subconscious. She has taught at many institutions and created new work in residency programs, including the Banff Centre for the Arts in Alberta, Canada, the Archie Bray Foundation for the Ceramic Arts in Helena, MT, and the Atlantic Center for the Arts in New Smyrna Beach, FL. Blum has received grants from the Pollock-Krasner Foundation, the Mid Atlantic Arts Foundation, and the Lower East Side Printshop in New York City. Blum recently installed a 90-foot wall piece in the Seattle/Tacoma International Airport and is working on projects for New York City Metro Transit Authority and the Charlotte Area Transit System in Charlotte, NC. This spring she will have a solo exhibition at The Hand Workshop, Richmond, VA, and has previously been featured in numerous solo exhibitions in museums and galleries, including the Museum of Contemporary Art in Scottsdale, AZ; the Boise Art Museum in Boise, ID; Connecticut College's Cummings Art Center in New London, CT; the Pentimenti Gallery in Philadelphia, PA, and the Esther Claypool Gallery in Seattle, WA. Blum's numerous group exhibitions include the Margaret Thatcher Gallery and the International Print Center in New York, NY; the Cranbrook Museum of Art in Bloomfield Hills, MI; the Center for Contemporary Art in Seattle, WA; and the World Ceramic Biennale in Icheon, South Korea. In addition, Blum's work appears in public and corporate collections, including the Arvada Center for the Arts in Arvada, CO; the Safeco Corporation, the Seattle/Tacoma International Airport and Seattle City Light in Seattle, WA; and the Scottsdale Museum of Contemporary Art in Scottsdale, AZ.
Nicole Fall is a sculptor who is a third generation artist. She grew up hearing the World War II survival stories of her French Jewish relatives. She traveled extensively with her family which gave her a broad world view. She lived in Cambodia (Campuchea) as a child where her father worked as a journalist covering the Vietnam War (he was killed there in 1967). This awareness of war and yet the strong will to survive, persevere, and even to thrive are themes that are continuously explored in her biomorphic ceramic welded steel and cast bronze works. Fall holds a BA in ceramics from the Maryland Institute College of Art and a MFA in sculpture from Towson University, both in MD. She has received numerous grants and in 2004, was an artist in residence at The Clay Studio in Philadelphia through a grant from the Mid Atlantic Arts Foundation. For many years, Fall was represented by the Gallery K in Washington, DC, where she had many solo exhibitions, and has shown in over 100 group exhibitions, including: The Hanoi College of Fine Art in Vietnam and the Charles Sumner School Museum and Archives, in Washington, DC.
AT THAT MOMENT, I WAS AN ARTIST: FROM BAUHAUS TO MISSOULA TO BALTIMORE ARTISTS:
Rudy Autio is known one of the most masterful and influential artists working with clay in the United States today. Born in Butte, Montana in 1926, Autio has lived in his native state throughout most of his career. He headed the ceramics area at the University of Montana for twenty-eight years and is now retired as Professor Emeritus of the School of Fine Arts, and continues to be an active and productive artist to this day. Prior to his appointment at the University of Montana, Autio was a founding resident artist at the Archie Bray Ceramics Foundation in Helena, Montana. Autio received a Tiffany Award in Crafts in 1963, the American Ceramic Society Art Award in 1978, and a National Endowment grant in 1980, enabling him to work and lecture at the Arabia Porcelain Factory and the Applied Arts University in Helsinki, Finland. While there, he was elected honorary member of Ornamo, Finland's Designers organization. In 1981 he was the first recipient of the Governor's Award and named outstanding visual artist in the state of Montana. Autio is a Fellow of the American Crafts Council, Honorary member of the National Council of Education in the Ceramic Arts, and recipient of the honorary Doctorate of Art from the Maryland Institute, College of Art in Baltimore, MD. In November,1999 he was awarded the American Craftsman's Gold Medal Award in ceremonies at the Mint Museum in Charlotte, NC. While Autio's best known work is figurative ceramic vessels, he has worked in a variety of materials and other media. In addition to commissions in ceramic relief and tile murals, he has worked in bronze, concrete, glass, fabricated metal sculpture, and design of colorful Rya tapestries. Most of these were commissioned for public buildings in the Northwest and one is in Finland.
Autio's Mentees:
David DonTigny has spent his life surrounded by clay and clay people, but these days, instead of driving to the ceramics department at Penn State University, he usually walks just a few yards uphill to work alone in his studio. Two years before he retired from teaching, the DonTigny's bought a spacious house in the woods on the side of a mountain. DonTigny found the opportunity very exciting but also draining, "because you think of all the things you had at the university when you were teaching there, where everything was at your fingertips. You have to start redefining what it is you want to do in the space, in the time you have left in your life. To set up a studio where you can do everything is almost impossible. You have to decide what things interest you now."
DonTigny and fellow graduate school classmate and faculty member Jim Stephenson did all their work at school. Previously, DonTigny studied with Rudy Autio, Henry Takemoto and Jim Leedy at the University of Montana, then went to Penn State in the fall of 1964, straight from graduate school. He eventually organized a small conference with two artists from the West (Rudy Autio and Peter Voulkos) and two from the East (Don Reitz and Robert Turner). Later known as "SuperMud," the conference that drew nearly 10,000 people was held a dozen times between 1967 and 1979. The list of artists who appeared at "SuperMuds" now reads as a Who's Who of clay, but many of these artists were far less well known when they appeared as guests on SuperMud's stage. In addition to ceramics artists, prestigious guests from related fields were also invited to participate, such a Frederick R. Matson, an archaeological ceramics specialist; Joan Mondale, a potter and wife of the then U.S. Vice President; Susan Peterson, author of biographies on both Shoji Hamada and Maria Martinez; and Rose Slivka, then editor of Craft Horizons magazine.
Of his time in teaching, it is clear that DonTigny misses his students; he "never had one he didn't like." Just as DonTigny has nothing but good to say about his students, his teachers have nothing but good to say about him. Jim Leedy once observed that DonTigny's "earthy approach to life, art and teaching is a cover-up for a deeply sincere, honest and giving person, whose intelligence has influenced people near and far." Rudy Autio recently cited his efforts to help students "understand that ceramic art embraces many sides, not only the recognition of a sound aesthetic based on education in the fine arts, but the practical side as well." It was Autio's belief (and many others) "that SuperMud" in its time was the most social and disseminating event in the history of the modern clay movement."
Linda Wachtmeister was born in 1950 and grew up in Warrenton, VA. In 1972 she received a BFA from the Maryland Institute College of Art in Baltimore, MD, where she studied with Doug Baldwin. In 1978 she received a MFA from the University of Montana in Missoula, MT. There she studied with Rudy Autio and Ken Little. Wachtmeister's work has primarily been exhibited in venues in Montana and Washington state. In addition, her work has been included in an exhibition at the National Museum of Women in the Arts in Washington, DC.
Jim Leedy
Since 1966, Jim Leedy has been an influential professor of sculpture at the Kansas City Art Institute while maintaining an active and prominent international career as an artist. He has received numerous degrees, including: a MFA from Southern Illinois University in Carbondale, IL; a MA in Art History from Michigan State University in East Lansing, MI; and a BFA from the Professional Institute of the College of William and Mary in Richmond, VA. In addition, Leedy conducted post-doctoral work at Columbia University in New York, NY and Ohio State University in Columbus, OH.
For numerous years, Jim Leedy has exhibited his work, lectured, and conducted workshops throughout the country as well as internationally. In 2004, he created the Millennium Wall as part of the Jingdezhen Porcelain Millenium Celebration of the Sanbao-Jingdezhen Ceramic Institute in Sanbao, Jianxi Province, China. Previously, in 2003, he was awarded a residency in the Zhujiajiao Heritage Village Art Center in Shanghai, China. His most recent solo exhibitions include: War: The Earth Lies Screaming, at the Grand Arts Gallery in Kansas City, MO, New Works, at the Dolphin Gallery, Retrospect in the Albrecht-Kemper Museum in Kansas City, MO, as well as a solo exhibition at the WEISSPOLLACK Gallery in New York, NY. Other recent commissions include large scale sculptures in Shanghai, China, the Taipei County Yingko Ceramics Museum in Yingko, Taiwan and in the United States and Canada.
Leedy has received the Governor's Award for Excellence in Teaching, the KCAI Distinguished Achievement Award and is an Honorary Member of the NCECA Council. He has been named one of the 150 most influential living Kansas Citians, and is the subject of a book by Matthew Kangas - Jim Leedy: Artist Across Boundaries. His works are held in numerous museums and private collections.
Leedy's Mentees:
"Wild" Bill Lane was born in 1973 in Kansas City, Missouri, was raised in a working class family. In 2004, Lane received a BFA from the Kansas City Art Institute in Kansas City, MO, and has worked as an assistant to artist Jim Leedy since that time. During his early years of study, he worked primarily in drawing and painting and then during his sophomore year in sculpture, he first touched clay during a mold making assignment. Since that time, clay has been Lane's "medium of choice". In 2004 Lane built Electric Mud and found its massive scale (3100 lbs and is approximately 154 feet x 36 feet x 33 feet)and texture to be the direction he had been searching to achieve. During a clay workshop taught by Jim Leedy after being given instructions to "make something you never thought you could make", Electric Mud was born. It took three and a half months to build the piece and two months to fire. The piece is installed outside, in front of Lane's current studio, which is located in the Cross Roads Art District of Kansas City, MO.
Marshall Maude is co-owner of Studio 59, a ceramics studio and gallery located on five acres of farmland near Kansas City, MO. Marshall specializes in sculptural ceramics, with an emphasis in wood-firing. He has most recently shown at the Leedy-Voulkus Art Center in Kansas City, MO and has conducted several workshops. Following his undergraduate work in ceramics, he was a special student studying wood firing under Don Bendel at Northern Arizona University in Flagstaff, AZ. Marshall received a MFA in 2003 from the University of Kansas in Lawrence, KS, and a BFA from the same university in 1996.
Brandon Reese was born in 1973, and was raised in Lawton, OK where he met and married his wife, Dawnell, in 1993. After attending Cameron University in Lawton, Oklahoma for a year, he transferred to the Kansas City Art Institute where he graduated with a BFA in sculpture in 1995. While attending the KCAI, Brandon met and formed a lasting friendship with Jim Leedy. In 1999, Reese received a MFA in the ceramics graduate program at Bowling Green State University in Bowling Green, OH, where he met artists Jun Kaneko, Peter Voulkos and Don Reitz. Recent solo exhibitions include one at the Chiaroscuro Gallery in Sante Fe, NM, regional exhibitions, and international exhibitions, including the First Taiwan Ceramics Biennale. Reese currently teaches at Oklahoma State Universit in Stillwater, OK where he and his growing family currently reside. (While attending graduate school Brandon and his wife became the parents of twins (Dallin & Gannon) in 1998, Daryn in 2003 and expect Garhett to be born sometime in May of 2005.)
Araan Schmidt was born in Iowa City, IA in1982. A printmaker, sculptor and painter, Schmidt is a 2004 graduate of the Kansas City Art Institute in Kansas City, MO. His work displays the symbiotic relationship between material, process, and the hand of an artist, with ambiguous imagery of abstract figures and architectural environments combined with an abundance of detail referencing foreign lands, poverty, war, and suffering. Of his work, Schmidt recently wrote, "The chaotic assemblage of forms reminds us that truth is not clear and easy to find."
Michael Wickerson has been part of the faculty since 2001 and is currently interim chair of the sculpture department of the Kansas City Art Institute in Kansas City, MO. He received a MFA from York University in Toronto, Ontario and a BFA University of Waterloo in Waterloo, Ontario, and has been exhibited at the Leedy-Voulkos Art Center, the Green Door Gallery, Zone Gallery and the H&R Block Artspace, all in Kansas City, MO, and at numerous galleries and public buildings throughout Canada. His work is in private collections and the University of Waterloo¹s Fine Arts Department.
Adam Welch is an artist, writer currently living in Brooklyn, NY. Adam received his BFA from Northern Arizona University in Flagstaff, AZ and a MFA from Virginia Commonwealth University in Richmond, VA. Recent exhibits include: Ceramic Biennial 2004, Made in Clay 2004, International Tea Bowl Exhibition, National Exhibition of American Art (juror Donald Kuspit), National Prize Show 2004 (juror Robert Fitzpatrick), and Out of the Fire (juror Paula Winokur), to name a few. In addition, Adam conducts lectures nationally as well as internationally in Sweden and Ireland, and is concurrently publishing scholarly essays with Ceramics: Art & Perception, www.wburg.com, Clay Times, and an upcoming article in Ceramics Monthly.
Doug Baldwin was born in Montana, and is best known for sculptures including quirky duck-like characters (forever wearing World War I helmets) who engage in a variety of art and educational activities. After thirty years of teaching, Baldwin retired from the Maryland Institute College of Art in 2003. Since that time, he returned to Montana and has been able to spend more time making art. Baldwin's early interest in art was nurtured by undergraduate and graduate studies at the University of Montana, where he first met and studied with Rudy Autio and Jim Leedy. Their encouragement gave Baldwin "an inkling about what it took to become an artist."
Baldwin's teaching was consistently infused with a vast and multi-dimensional mix, such as movies (Dr. Spodume,) the "great ceramic boat races" and "the great cup competition" being a few examples of ways he tried "to encourage students to keep their ideas ahead of their technique and keep it simple". In 1975, the exhibition catalog of the Edinboro, Pennsylvania 4th Ceramic Invitational stated, "Under the direction of Doug Baldwin, (since 1969), Maryland Institute College of Art in Baltimore, Maryland has developed one of the most innovative and dynamic ceramics program in the United States..."
Baldwin's Mentees:
Philip Capuano currently lives in Chicago for half of the year and works in his mountain studio in Upstate New York for the other half of the year, though he grew up in Connecticut. Sports such as baseball and weightlifting have played a significant role in Capuano's life, at the same time has his work as a productive artist. His work is both akin to Dada and Constructivist periods, where he draws from both found objects and innovative objects constructed from his imagination.
After high school, Capuano attended the Silvermine College of Art in New Canaan, CT, where he received an Associate's Degree, and subsequently received a BFA from the Maryland Institute College of Art. During the early 1970s, Capuano lived in the mountains of West Virginia, and eventually received a MFA from the School of the Art Institute of Chicago in Chicago, IL.
Rich Lipscher was raised in Pittsburgh and received a BFA in Ceramics from the Pennsylvania State University. During his tenure as a student he helped organize the SuperMud Conferences from 1970 to 1973. It was there that he met Jim Leedy and Doug Baldwin through his teachers Jim Stephenson and David DonTigny, both of whom were students of Rudy Audio and are now close friends. Soon after, Lipscher worked at Peerless Pottery as a production potter in the business that was owned and operated by Martin Holt, another former student of Rudy Audio. In 1989, he taught the first course in three-dimensional computer imaging at the Maryland Institute College of Art. The animation department was inaugurated and became a major for students during the fall semester of 2004, where Lipscher is currently Co-coordinator for 3D Computer Imaging, a department with forty majors and four full time faculty. Meanwhile, Lipscher's ceramics and sculpture have been shown widely throughout the country and his animations have been distributed around the world. He took part in the building of the world's largest wooden Buddha outside the Maryland Institute College of Art in 1987 and rarely exhibits his work, which is constructed within computers and printed out as three dimensional objects and two dimensional prints. In addition to his teaching, Lipscher builds jazz archtop guitars in his basement, has a new dog named Olive and still loves his wife Susie after many years.
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