Transparent medium conveys opaque meaning MCMA'S new 'ART NOW Transparency' installations promote interaction

Author: Beth Connolly

Visitors to the Middlebury College Museum of Art (MCMA) can currently view a two-story-long chain of sideways raindrops and the impression of an enormous leaf floating in green glass. These works are just two of the eight pieces of contemporary art featured in the Museum's new exhibit, "ART NOW: Transparency." Some of the sculptures are made from transparent media while others explore the possibilities that result from the involvement of light. Nearly all of the pieces interact with their audiences, changing as the viewer moves or looks at them from different perspectives.

The exhibit was curated by Professor of Studio Art Jim Butler, who has been at Middlebury College since 1981. Butler recently taught at the Pilchuk Glass School in Seattle, Wash., where he will return to teach this summer. Butler began the ART NOW series three years ago to give visitors to the MCMA an opportunity to view contemporary art. The series sponsors three exhibits each year (the most recent predecessor of "Transparency" being "Travels with Myra Hudson," a 46-foot long drawing by Dawn Clements, featured in the Museum last fall). The first ART NOW exhibit, which opened in January 2004 and was also curated by Jim Butler, was titled "Images of Fictive Reality." Like "Transparency," it included works from both the Museum's collection of art and from pieces on loan from other sources.

Dennis Byng's cast resin "Split Cube," borrowed from the Museum's collection, is placed in the center of the exhibition room. This location echoes its crucial spot in the genesis of the exhibit. Though Butler first encountered it many years ago, it stayed with him when he began to pursue glasswork in the nineties, and it inspired him to unite the eight pieces now featured in "ART NOW: Transparency." "Split Cube" is demonstrative of the quality that all of the exhibit's pieces share: interaction with the viewer. In the case of "Split Cube," its colors shift depending on what is behind it.

Perhaps the most memorable of the pieces is "Horizontal Rain," the hanging sculpture of sideways raindrops. Artist Deborah Czeresko designed the sculpture on commission for the MCMA. Placed in the center of the Museum's spiral staircase, it descends majestically from the ceiling to 24 inches above the floor. As viewers climb the steps surrounding the sculpture, the piece responds to their change in perspective. Likewise, as the weather and landscape seen through the windows fluctuate, they are reflected in the sculpture, itself inspired by an element of the natural world.

Physically impressive in scale, it is also a work of intricate craftsmanship. The sculpture consists of 35 pieces, each weighing 12 pounds. In order to create each raindrop, Czeresko blew glass at the end of a six-foot pipe of 40 to 50 pounds in an 1,800 degree furnace. Once the glass had cooled, Czeresko drilled into the pieces, enabling them to be threaded onto the final strand. "Her sculpture required both skill and learned ability," said Butler.

The installation of "Horizontal Rain" was itself a major feat. It required a specially made steel hanging device and 36 individual stainless-steel rods that threaded through the glass pieces. Each piece sits below and above a rod, like a chain that falls straight because of its weight. The process of hanging the chain required two people, one to prepare each piece and hand it up, another (on a lift) to attach it to the chain. "It was a delicate process, yet heavy work," said Butler - which is representative of all work with glass.

"Horizontal Rain" shares its grand scale with another of the works on display - Mark Zirpel's leaf etched in glass. Elevated on a platform, the leaf seems to float in the far corner of the exhibition room. It draws the viewer's eye with its larger-than-life presence and intimidating attention to detail. It is entrancing precisely because of the tension between its simple subject and incredibly complex representation of that subject.

The multi-step process that created the etching began with Zirpel's photograph of a leaf. The photograph was then digitized, increased to larger proportions, and reduced to high contrast in order to make the veins evident. It was printed on transparent film and transferred to the glass through a process of darkroom exposure. Finally, Zirpel used a sandblaster by hand to etch the leaf into plate glass.

"The final sculpture unites architecture, sculpture, craft, and printmaking," said Butler.

While not immediately attention-grabbing, Richard Humann's "Codex" proves to be both intriguing and rewarding. It is a clear cast of an open book filled, layer by layer, with laser-cut letters. Butler calls it a perfect solution: a synthesis of the literary and the visual. Additionally, it offers a significant commentary on the physical and metaphorical depth of both media (resin and language), while pointing to the distinction between sight and language. "Codex" is taken from an exhibit called "Evidence of My Being," in which Humann cut up all of his identifying documents (drivers' license, art reviews, birth certificate and many others) and sifted the individual letters into vessels.

Speaking to another element of being, Marsha Pels' crystal "Spine" is next to "Codex." The sculpture, a likeness of a human spine, is taken from an exhibition focused on the Holocaust. "The spine signifies traveling beneath appearances in an investigation of history," Butler said. The piece's medium (crystal) makes reference to Krystallnacht (The Night of Broken Glass), the night (November 9-10, 1938) in which the Nazis began the physical brutality against Jews associated with the Holocaust: beatings, murders, smashed shop windows and deportments to concentration camps. With this reference, the spine's glittering accuracy does call to mind the propaganda of war, and the sinister skeleton that may lie hidden beneath a human frame.

Between "Spine" and Zirpel's leaf is a screen playing a video created by Bettina Pousttchi, which provides a transition through the thematic gap between the leaf and the spine. It bridges ideas about the human body and arcadian rhythms of opening and closing, thereby causing the viewer to think about relationships not immediately evident, said Butler. The video shows a red dot, which gradually becomes smaller and reveals itself to be something unexpected and organic. In the process, the spectator is transformed from the subject to the object of the gaze; by the video's end, it appears that the spectator is the one being observed.

Assistant Professor of Studio Art Hedya Klein makes her debut in this exhibit - "Xanadu" is her first piece to be displayed in the MCMA. It uses photos and electric lights to present the energy of collaboration and art made with a variety of materials and approaches, Butler said. It is constructed of a pile of crates, each filled with a photograph lit from behind. The photographs are of diverse subjects: candy wrappers, mirrors, a view of the sky. The piece's title is taken from the Olivia Newton John song of the same name: "Xanadu your neon lights will shine / For you Xanadu... / A million lights are dancing and there you are / A shooting star, an everlasting world and you're / Here with me eternally." Light dances throughout the exhibit, and "Xanadu" certainly captures the glow of colored light.

Using aluminum and Plexiglas, "Large Cruciform" by Michelle JaffÈ represents the shape of a woman's leotard. She fashioned the sculpture, which serves as the entry to the exhibit from the Museum, free form. Though the sculpture represents a leotard, it also appears to form a cross (hence the title). It unites the attraction of shininess with the repulsion of metal, Butler said. The sculpture fits with the theme of transparency, though it is made of metal, because it allows air and light to pass through the space within it.

The exhibit presents an impressive collection of artwork, ambitious in vision
and effective in execution. The exhibit's greatest success lies in the diversity of its components. The interaction between the pieces enhances and continues the dialogue about light and living forms both exaggerated and exact that the pieces themselves propose.