Curatorial Project

Eyes Are Not Windows

“Man’s eyes are not windows, although he as long regarded them as such. They can be baffled, boggled, and balked. They often see things that are not there and fail to see things that are. In the eyes resides man's first sense, and it is fallible.” — John Borgzinner, TIME Magazine, October 23, 1964, “Op Art: Pictures That Attack the Eye”

In 1965, the Museum of Modern Art in New York opened an exhibition entitled The Responsive Eye. The show was the peak of the Op Art movement, and was featured in national magazines, a Mike Wallace special on television, and a short documentary by Brian de Palma.

“If there's one thing more than any other that we like to assume about a work of art, it's that it will sit still and behave itself while we take a look at what the artist has created. But now, a whole movement in Modern Art is coming into focus but will not stay in focus, and responds to every minute change in the way you look at it. It hops around in varying dimensions that variously puzzle, annoy, or confound,” Mike Wallace said in the introduction to his half-hour television program.

Op Art brought Modern Art to new audiences in a way that was unprecedented; the patterns of light and dark that epitomized much of the more familiar pieces became a part of a broader visual vocabulary, becoming a fad in fashion, graphic design, and popular culture almost overnight. For the first time, a broad audience was fascinated by art that wasn’t a representation of anything; it was a pure abstraction, and the message was in the act of seeing, rather than the content.

However, like most fads, Op Art faded as quickly as it appeared, at least in the public consciousness. For the artists creating it, however, it was never a fad; it was an exploration of the way we see, the way the eye and the brain work together (or against each other) to recognize patterns, depth, and motion. It explored the points of failure between what the eye sees and the way the brain interprets it.

Artists like Victor Vasarely and Bridget Riley continued to produce Op Art for a somewhat-smaller audience for decades after The Responsive Eye, and influenced new generations of artists. The exploration of Vasarely and Riley answered many of the questions about the disconnect between the brain and the eye, but also left many questions unanswered.

New generations of artists have explored those questions; and armed with the tools of technology, have taken the exploration much farther. While Op Art may never again reach the level of frenzied public awareness it reached in the 1960s, it’s never gone away — and the artists creating it continue to baffle, boggle, puzzle, and confound.

Gallery contract assignment, 20-Mar-2015

Files are included as attachments, because formatting them to look even remotely usable in this window would make my head explode.

1. Artist Agreement Template
2. Schedule of Artworks Template
3. Deborah Bright visit contract
4. Deborah Bright agreement

Feb. 27 Questions

What is provenance and why is it such an important issue in the art world? The Universal Leonardo project, launched in 2005, focuses on the techniques and processes used by Leonardo da Vinci rather than claiming to determine attribution. Why do you think this shift has taken place?

Provenance is the records related to artwork to document its ownership, and (if you're lucky) its production. The Universal Leonardo project is attempting to document work as being Leonardo's based on how it was made -- analyzing the work itself, rather than a potentially broken, incomplete, or falsified historical provenance.

Review the ifnormation presented in Ch. 8 on Marcel Duchamp's work called Fountain (see Fig. 12). If you had been on teh committee that decided what could and could not be exhibited at the American Society of Independent Artists, would you have allowed this work to be in the show? Why or why not? What would have been your criteria for acceptance or rejection?

I'd like to think that I would've called it art, and allowed it to be shown in the show, but in the context of 1917, I probably would've rejected it.  That being said... I do think of the work as art; art is a process of making or allowing people to see something they've never seen before, or seeing something familiar in a way they may not have seen it.  (And when I say "see", I really mean "perceive", because other senses may be involved.) By that definition, Duchamp's Fountain was definitely art, and the fact that we're still talking about 100 years later is as much proof as is necessary.

Sample press release

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE / Friday, February 27, 2015

Senior art student presents capstone exhibit of digital artwork and animation after a 30-year interruption

Show runs March 15-30; Free opening reception set for March 16

Contacts: Patrick Williams, MSUB University Relations and Communications, 406.657.2270

"Just Forget", digital mixed media.

"Cannot Hold", vector graphic

Art student Patrick Williams will present his senior capstone exhibit, "Cognitive Divergence," March 15-30 in the student gallery on the first floor of the Liberal Arts building on the Montana State University Billings campus.

An opening reception, free and open to the public, will be held March 16 from 5 to 7 p.m. Refreshments (sadly, non-alcoholic) will be served.

Williams' art education was interrupted when he took a summer job as a graphic artist in 1985, and forgot to quit for nearly 30 years. The digital revolution during that time saw an unprecedented change in the tools available to artists, and Williams changed his skill set and focus along with it.

"I originally planned a concentration in drawing, with a lot of photography and sculpture thrown into the mix. Then, as digital tools appeared, and I was required to learn them for my career as a commercial artist, my fine art began to use more new media and fewer traditional materials. When I finally decided to return to school and finish my degree, and discovered that a new media concentration was an option, the choice was obvious."

The exhibition features two distinct styles.The first, a series of intensely-complex vector graphics and animations, are strongly influenced by the Op Art movement in the 1960s, and the work of Bridget Riley in particular. The second is a series of more personally emotional pieces, which combine 3-D rendered imagery, photography, and digital painting, all layered onto images of rust and corrosion.

"The two styles of art reflect two very different aspects of my personality and creativity. The Op Art-influenced pieces are an exploration of the creativity from the rational, analytical, and mathematical parts of myself -- even though artists are rarely mathematically-inclined, that part of me has always needed a creative outlet, just as much as the more traditionally emotive artist part of me."

Both sets of images are unified by the way they explore the boundaries of perception, where depth and motion and color are often filled in by the mind where they don't actually exist. "I try to find the places where years of experience seeing have taught us to interpret patterns of light and dark as indicative of a specific type of motion or depth -- and then to change the rules, so the brain still sees those things, even when faced with a reality where they don't exist."

Sample gallery call

(A much better-formatted version was turned in on paper.)

Call for Artist Proposals

The Northcutt Steele Gallery, located at Montana State University Billings, is currently accepting proposals for exhibitions. The gallery provides four shows per year to showcase professional artists on a national scope; when possible, these artists are brought in to present talks about their work and experiences, and to conduct workshops for MSU Billings students and staff as well as the general community.

Who

Professional artists working in any medium. There are some space and size constraints; artwork cannot be larger than 8 feet in any dimension. Preference will be given to artists who are willing to speak and conduct workshops related to their art.

What

Artists should submit:

• a brief introductory letter or proposal
• images of 12-15 works (or 3-5 installations)
• an image list with thumbnails of each image as well as the title, date, dimensions, and media
• a biography, CV, and/or résumé

When

The deadline for submissions for shows in the 2016-2017 school year is May 1, 2015.

Where

Proposals can be submitted online at
http://canwereallydothis.com
or by mail:
Northcutt Steele Gallery
Liberal Arts Building, 1st Floor
1500 University Drive
Billings, MT 59101

How

Images should be provided electronically via the online submission form, or on CD, DVD, or USB drive by mail. They should be in RGB JPEG format, and at least 1200 pixels in each dimension. Image list with thumbnails, introductory letter or proposal, and biography/CV/résumé should be in PDF format for online submission, or printed on standard letter-sized paper, single-sided, for mail submissions.

Questions?

For more information or clarification, please contact Dr. Leanne Gilbertson, Gallery Director, at 406-657-2903, or via email at leanne.gilbertson@msubillings.edu

Installation Art

Research installations by artists such as Kiki Smith, Bill Viola, or Jenny Holzer. Choose one of their installations and answer the following: How does the artwork interact with the physical space it occupies? Argue for or against the principles of installation art. If you are unfamiliar with the principles of installation art, do some research!

Jenny Holzer's "Projections" series consist of text projected onto very large surfaces — buildings, bridges, ships, cargo containers, etc. Because of the nature of the artwork -- projected light -- and their scale -- gigantic -- they're very limited as to where they can be effectively displayed. While the text would no doubt be impactful at smaller scales, the size really does add to the power of the artwork, and dramatically increases the impact. In addition, the limits of projection mean that the artwork can only be effectively displayed at night, and preferably in a location without too much ambient external light. Since the light "wraps" around irregularities in the surface it's being projected on, larger smooth areas would be ideal... but that combination of specifications would severely limit the locations the art could be shown, so some compromises have to be made.

For her Boston 2010 projection, an interesting series of decisions had to be made. The projection was made onto the outside of the Institute of Contemporary Art -- a large building with some flat surfaces, some stairs and bleachers, a lot of mirrored glass, and located on the waterfront.  This combination meant that the projected images were reflected, passed through some areas into others, wrapped oddly around the irregular stairs and bleachers, etc.  This combination made it difficult to read some of the type at times, but simultaneously added a fascinating multi-dimensional aspect to the moving type, especially as the scrolling type would move in multiple simultaneous directions -- the type would scroll up, and move up where it was projected on the partly-mirrored glass of the side of the ICA, would move away where it passed through that glass and was projected onto the ceiling inside, would move in a staggered progression as it moved scrolled up the bleachers, and would move downward where it was reflected in the harbor's water.

The text was readable, so that aspect of the art didn't lose its impact; but the probably-unexpected multidimensional movement added another level to the piece.

Installation art sometimes works with and sometimes fights against the space where it's installed. If too much care is taken in making sure that the piece works perfectly in its space, it sometimes feels very sterile and lifeless; if the conflicts are too great, the chaos can overpower the art.   For this particular installation, the balance seems just right -- the technical aspects work in the space, and the unexpected conflicts actually enhance it rather than overpowering it.

Vanessa German Bitter Root — exhibition details

Vanessa German's Bitter Root exhibition in the Northcutt Steele gallery is well planned for traffic flow; almost everywhere is either open enough for easy flow, or closed off enough to prevent all but the most obstinately obtuse viewer to avoid the narrow areas.  There may be one slightly-narrow space here:

... but it's easily wide enough for a single viewer to pass by without issue.  (Two people, or one person in a wheelchair, might be a bit less comfortable.)

The exhibition materials are mostly durable; the fabric wall pieces might be susceptible to tearing or other damage, but the way they're displayed would rule out almost all situations where they might be damaged (other than a deliberate act, but very little can prevent that.)  Some parts of the sculptures might be damageable as well -- particularly the hanging "beads", which could be damaged or torn off.  Again, however, they're not readily exposed to non-deliberate damage.  The clear labels used appear to be durable enough to last for the duration of the show.

The reading heights of the labels are comfortable, for the most part.  On a few of the pieces, the labels — on the pedestals — are quite low, but not uncomfortably so.  On one piece, the label may be too high for a wheelchair-confined person to read:

There don't appear to be any really dangerous aspects in the exhibit; the base of one sculpture extends beyond its pedestal, but not so much so as to be a serious concern.  With the possible exception of the aforementioned label, all aspects of the exhibit appear to be accessible to a disabled viewer.

The typography is easy to read; Gill Sans (or an equivalent font) is always highly legible, and has enough stroke variance between weights to easily discern bold and light weights for emphasis.

The fonts and their usage complement the work well; a serif font would perhaps be too formal and staid for an emotionally dynamic exhibit like this, while a geometric sans serif might be too cold. A humanist sans serif strikes a good balance between formality and warmth.

There's a set of unifying elements between many of the works in the show.  First, the repeating pattern of red and white stripes, introduced by the flag as one enters the exhibit.  There are also repeating and/or visually-related elements in the sculptures — the fabric "beads", keys, mirrors, etc. — that enhance the flow of continuity.

The exhibit's over message is one of hope, of using the powers of love and creativity to overcome the harshness of centuries of institutionalized racism and oppression.

There's a subtle but definite sequence enforced by the large piece isolated in the linoleum-floored area; its position farthest from the entrance, the large space around it, and the size of the work in that space, gives it a very great presence, and draws the viewer to it as a climax of the show. But while that flow is there, the subtlety — and the nature of the work, with many small eye-catching details — can easily derail a viewer from following the path, without losing anything by doing so.

If there's a weakness in the sequential view, it's the placement of the two hanging fabric pieces on the walls on either side of the large isolated sculpture; the monumental presence of that piece might distract viewers enough that they might not notice the quieter, more subtle works on the walls.  That's also exacerbated by the light overall colors of those two pieces; they more easily disappear as a result.

For younger visitors, the most popular aspect might be the inherent wry humor in some of the work; for older visitors, they might find enjoyment in identifying some of the elements, which might be too old or obscure for younger visitors to recognize.  For both ages, there's a inherent sense of discomfort in dealing with racism that many people feel; at the same time, though, facing those unpleasant emotions, and recognizing the power and hope in the images, is the salient point of the exhibit.

Visitors can and probably should share their experiences of the art with others... but I suspect most won't. While the art does speak that message of hope, the discomfort of facing racism might silence many people.

If I could change anything in the gallery, my first choice would be the ceiling height; there are three distinct levels, all of which are too low, and the steps between the different heights are even more distracting.