Extreme Conceptual Art

These two panels show only small parts of the
New Year  Mail Piece (top) and Spring Mail Piece.

With the Mail Piece Project, I had thought I was producing some interesting conceptual art. The project was conceived as a series of multiple originals, created by me, in collaboration with the United States Post Office and my subscribers. So far, a New Year Mail Piece and a Spring Mail Piece have been completed. I currently am at work on the Summer Mail Piece.

But now I see that by actually laboring to produce a series of physical objects, I have fallen short of the full potential of conceptual art.

I have been shown the light by a recent article in Newsweek, Blake Gopnik's "Buying Art You Can't Take Home." 

This Newsweek photo by
Lucy Hogg shows art collectors
Aaron and Barbara Levine at
Art Basel, with unidentified
dealers, and a physical signifi-
cation of their purchase from
Lawrence Weiner.

I have to say, one lives in an interesting world when it apparently makes sense to pay large amounts of money for the idea of--for one example--a museum guard "slowly removing every shred of his clothes." (Gopnik reports that this "work" was purchased by Marc and Josee Gensollens of Marseilles from conceptual artist Tino Sehgal, but "has come alive only when they've 'lent' it to museums.")

The practical Midwestern girl in me can't help feeling that--naked museum guards notwithstanding (do their contracts now have to include a nudity clause?)--there's a major "Emperor's New Clothes" element at work in this type of art.  As long as we all agree to studiously suspend our disbelief, irrespective of how wide the gulfs of "you've-got-to-be-kidding-me" we must span, then we have art.

Somehow, I just can't see it playing well in the artistic universe I inhabit.  Does that make the art buyers I know less "sophisticated" . . . or just less gullible?

If I pay $100,000 for the idea of the Brooklyn Bridge, have I actually been "taken," or am I simply an art patron?  Perhaps the test lies in whether or not I can "lend" it to museums, after my purchase.

Just as ice-climbing is
considered an Extreme
Sport, perhaps Sehgal,
Weiner, and others are
pioneers of Extreme Art.

I can see some advantages to this kind of art, though.  Insurance might be interesting to purchase, but the studio-space requirements would not be excessive.  I certainly would have fewer laundry issues.  Getting ideas splattered all over my clothes would leave far fewer stains than ink, paint, clay, or other more material art media.

Those risks might be minimized, but I can't help wondering how truly brave the pioneers of this kind of art must have been, to seriously stand up in public among the avant gard of the art world, and propose that their patrons lay out hundreds of thousands for their "works."

How courageous, in turn, must an art buyer be, to lay out money like that, then go home and (try to) explain to their friends about this wonderful artwork they just bought?  (of course, it is guaranteed not to clash with the couch).

Wikipedia defines "Extreme Sport" as "a popular term for certain activities perceived as having a high level of inherent danger, and . . . counter-cultural."  I truly think that this kind of artwork, which is definitely not for the faint-of-heart or the uncommitted, really should qualify as "Extreme" Art.

PHOTOS: The two panels from the New Year and Spring Mail Pieces are my own work; the photo by Lucy Hogg is from Newsweek; the ice-climbing photo is courtesy of Wikipedia.

Wondrously Lost in Water Lilies

I am certainly not the first artist to get my imagination tangled up in water lilies, and I doubt I'll be the last.  But certainly one of the most amazing intersections of water lilies and art came through Claude Monet.

Monet is particularly on my mind right now, because I took advantage of a rare opportunity last weekend: I  went to the Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art in Kansas City to experience in person the reunification of The Agapanthus Triptych.

This photo shows the current Kansas City installation, with a new frame.
Built specifically for this show, it was inspired by frames Monet approved
for other massive triptychs at l'Orangerie in France.  The curator standing in
front of the painting is Nicole Myers.  (photo from Art Knowledge News.)

Monet's lily pond at Giverny,
in a photo posted on deviantART
by "Cansounofargentina."

More familiarly called "Monet's Water Lilies," this trio of massive canvases actually is only one of the many works Monet devoted to the water lilies in his garden at Giverny, France.

Being in the presence of the complete triptych is an amazing, immersive experience.  Monet planned it that way, in fact.  He wanted his later series of enormous diptychs, triptychs, and four-part "quadtychs" to be housed in round or elliptical rooms created just for them.

A view of l'Orangerie in Paris shows
how Monet intended for his massive,
multi-part artworks to be seen.

This goal is reached with a collection of other Monet compositions in the Musee de l'Orangerie in Paris.

The current display of the entire Agapanthus Triptych is unusual, however, because the work has been separated for most of the time since the canvases were split up in 1956.

That was the year when the St. Louis Art Museum bought only the central panel from a New York art dealer that had acquired the entire work from another dealer in Paris.  The French dealer had displayed the entire work to considerable acclaim, after acquiring it and several other, smaller works from Monet's son Michel.

At the urging of faculty and students from the Kansas City Art Institute, the Nelson-Atkins Museum bought the right-hand panel in 1957.  The Cleveland Museum of Art finished the process in 1960, when it bought the left-hand panel.  The last time the three canvases were reuinted as the complete triptych was in 1979, so this is genuinely a rare opportunity.

I went to see the triptych with friends. As a member of the museum's Friends of Art and a lifelong Nelson-Atkins Museum-goer, I of course had seen "our" section many times over the years.  Yet when one of my companions said, "I can't remember--do you recall which one is ours?" I was embarrassed to admit I could not.

Water Lilies and Agapanthus, 1917, by
Claude Monet (Musee Marmottan, France),
 shows what an agapanthus looks like,
when painted by Monet.   The one originally
 gracing the corner of the "Cleveland piece"
pointed right, not left. 

It would've been easier for us, if Monet had left the agapanthus in.  Ironically, the work is named for a plant whose image in the lower left-hand corner of the "Cleveland piece" was painted out by Monet at some point during his extensive revisioning and repainting process between when the work was begun in 1915 and Monet's death in 1926 (a photo from his studio in 1921 shows it was still visible then).

Experts aren't entirely sure whether Monet actually considered the triptych "finished," even in 1926, but his process of increasingly moving from representation to abstraction is a goodly part of why many people feel this is a ground-breaking work.

The Agapanthus Triptych remains in Kansas City through August 7, 2011.  After that, all three pieces travel to the St. Louis Art Museum for a display that is scheduled to run October 2, 2011-January 22, 2012.

The Cleveland Museum of Art also plans to display the three paintings together, but those display dates are less certain.  A blog post on the museum's website says the paintings will be shown together in Cleveland in 2015--exactly one hundred years from the time Monet started painting them.

PHOTO CREDITS: As noted above, the photo of the full triptych in its new frame is courtesy of Art Knowledge News, and "Giverny Water-Lily Pond" is courtesy of "Cansounofargentina."  The personal blog, All the Pages Are My Days by "Mike," featured the view of l'Orangerie.  The image of Water-Lilies and Agapanthus by Monet came from the Painting Mania website, where you can buy reproductions of the image.
ALSO NOTE: I found all of the historical information for this post from a lovely little well-illustrated book that I bought at the show,  Monet's Water Lilies: The Agapanthus Triptych by Simon Kelly, with Mary Schafer and Johanna Bernstein, published by the Saint Louis Art Museum.

Jumping the Rut

It's possible for a routine to get as entrenched
as the ruts in this historic Wyoming wagon road.

It can be a real benefit to break my routine--even if it plays havoc with production for a while.

If you've been following this blog you know I sort of dropped out of sight after the May 5 post. That's because I was deeply involved in a new project that required all my time.

I was working as the Art Show Director for ConQuesT 42, a science fiction convention held on Memorial Day weekend in Kansas City, MO.  ConQuesT is the annual project of the Kansas City Science Fiction and Fantasy Society, Inc.

Four of my intrepid Art Show staff members, Kat Gibb, Kat
McCullough, Signy Gephardt, and Ty Gephardt, helped me
set up the display area Thursday May 26, 2011.

I sort of fell into the job in the early spring, only about 3 months out from the show--so I had to scramble to get ready. This was especially challenging because although I've been showing my artwork at sf conventions since 1981, was an agent who handled other artists' work for many years, and even helped co-author the ASFA Art Show Guidelines for the Association of Science Fiction and Fantasy Artists, Inc., I'd never been an art show director before.

It was a job I'd always avoided. I figured it would be a distraction.  It would keep me from creating my own work before the show, and during the show it would prevent me from making professional contacts.   Not worth it, I figured.

Here's a general view of the Art Show, after it was set up.

Oh, it certainly was a distraction. It hampered my ability to make my own work, and it anchored me in the art show all during the convention.

What I did not anticipate was how stimulating it would be, and what a great rush of creative input it would provide.

I did not realize how much more familiar I would become with the work of the other 24 artists who participated in this show, than I could have become simply by looking at their displays at the show.

Being the Art Show Director gave me a chance to interact with them, view their websites, handle their art as we put it up, sold or took it down at the end of the show, and talk with both attending artists and art buyers about this varied collection.

I'd love to offer you a chance to see their work in more detail, too.  That's why the rest of this post consists of links to the websites, blogs, etc. of all the ConQuesT 42 artists who maintain a Web presence. They are:  Allison Stein, Arden Ellen Nixon, Bev Hale, Cat (R. Cat Conrad), Chris Dame, Lubov, Lucy A. Synk, Mark Roland, Peri Charlifu, Rachael Mayo, Sarah Clemens, and Theresa Mather.

Please take time to enjoy a look at their varied and interesting artwork!

PHOTO CREDITS:  Many thanks to the "Heritage Gateways" website for the pioneer trail image, and to Ty Gephardt for the image of the ConQuesT 42 Art Show as it looked when all set up.  I took the photo of my staff at work on May 26.

Announcing the Spring Mail Piece!

After a number of frustrating delays, the Spring Mail Piece has finally started arriving in subscribers' mailboxes!

The "Sakura Panel" is part of the Spring Mail Piece.  It
features a quote by Rainer Maria Rilke.

The Spring Mail Piece is the second of a five-part series.  It is a multiple original--that is, a limited-edition print, in this case created digitally using archival-quality inkjet inks printed on acid-free paper.  Because the piece is assembled from three different drawings and an added piece, there is no single "original," from which the prints are reproduced.  The print itself, complete with an added piece, is the orignal.

The USPS provided the
 stamp design element.

I started the Mail Piece Project in January.  It is a conceptual artwork, resulting from a three-way collaboration between me (creating the images and assembling the pieces), the United States Postal Service (which provided the stamp--an integrated part of the design--and adds its own marks in the process of delivery), and the subscribers (who financed the project, and who complete each piece when they open, look at, and react to their unique Mail Piece original).

The address panel and back of each mail piece must be drawn foot-to-foot,
to look right on the finished piece.  The pansies among the rocks under the
forsythia on the address panel of the Spring Mail Piece were inspired by the
stamp chosen for this part of the series.

The elements in the Spring Mail Piece came from a variety of sources.  The pansies on the stamp inspired part of the design on the address panel.  The stamp, not totally coincidentally, was officially issued from right here in Kansas City, last June 22.  It is the Love: Pansies in a Basket stamp, and its design is taken from Hallmark Cards, Inc's all-time best-selling greeting card.  The card was created from a watercolor by Dorothy Maienschein; Derry Noyes designed the stamp.  The quotation and poem came from the "Quote Garden" website (if you like them, there are plenty more on the site!).

Inside of the Spring Mail Piece a pop-up section accents Persephone's flowery
Greek meadow.  This Mail Piece features the Persephone myth as part of its
spring seasonal theme.

Each of the Mail Pieces is proving to require about 5-6 weeks' time for development and production.  In just a few weeks I'll be starting research for the Summer Mail Piece.  If all goes well, it will arrive in subscribers' mailboxes in early July.

PHOTO CREDITS: The image of the Love: Pansies in a Basket stamp is courtesy of the United States Postal Service.  All other photos in this post were taken by Jan Sherrell Gephardt, of her own original artwork. 

Reframe IV: "Snowflake Dragons"

   

This is my original set of boxed, unmatted "Snowflake Dragons,"
at the February 2011 sf convention, Snowflake 13.

I made the first of my series of "Snowflake Dragons" as a group of whimsical color groupings for Snowflake 13, a small science fiction convention in February 2011.  I'd been invited as the Artist Guest of Honor, and wanted to do something special for the convention.  My earlier post, "Fun at the 'Flake'" tells of that adventure.

Unframed Snowflake Dragons could not have been included
in the display in the Stiles Gallery.

I wanted to display my unsold Snowflake Dragons at the March 2011 exhibition in the Stiles Gallery at Westwood City Hall, but they had to be framed, if I planned to show them there.

I set the boxes aside, pulled out some of my unused shadowboxes, and here are the results.

I added another, larger snowflake to my little piece, Orange on Blue #1,  to complete it for framing. I hope it is a fun little piece of artwork.  It also is a study in complementary colors.

The frames definitely give these pieces more presence.  This is Three Yellow on Yellow, a mostly monochromatic piece.

Yellow, Blue and Violet on Gray uses a different trio, and echoes the dragons' colors in the background.

We are warned not to judge books by their covers, and we might extend that thought to judging art by the framing, but I think no one would argue that--in the "real world"--presentation makes a difference.

Reframe III: "The Wild Thing in the Weeds"

    

This was my 2009 display at ConQuesT 40,
a science fiction convention held over Labor
Day weekend.  Clockwise from the upper left:
The White Dragon, A Nest in the Wildwood,
and The Wild Thing in the Weeds.

My small fantasy piece, The Wild Thing in the Weeds, is one of my most recent "reframes," although it was one of the earliest pieces of artwork I did.

I finished it in the spring of 2009.  I had just completed A Nest in the Wildwood, which had been in the works for nearly two years, following my first paper sculpture, The White Dragon.  All three were made in a similar way: each has a somewhat abstract, acrylic background, with a fantasy creature made of white paper nestled into it.

Wild Thing completed the "white on acrylic" phase, for me.  After I finished it, I felt I had explored that approach enough to feel satisfied.  New ideas and variations had begun to beckon, and I moved on to the "twig dragons" with Denizen of the Winter Trees and Treetop Primaries in 2009-2010.

Here's the original 2009 frame for
The Wild Thing in the Weeds.

I made Wild Thing small, in the hope that I could price it in an affordable range for the art buyers who would see it first at the Kansas City science fiction convention, ConQuesT 40.  In the interest of thrift, I also framed it in a small plastic box I had been able to adapt.  The box kept the price down, certainly, but I never really liked how it looked.

Apparently the potential buyers didn't like how it looked, either, because I didn't sell it.  I did not include it in the collection I gathered for the "Great Leawood Wall" that provided so much inspiration for the reframing work I've recently described in earlier posts, regarding Windblown and Through the Arch.

However, when I was preparing for the Westwood (KS) City Hall show in March 2011, I decided to reframe it using a similar strategy to the one I'd used on Through the Arch.

Here is the current reframing of The Wild Thing
in the Weeds, prepared for the 2011 Westwood
City Hall show.

I removed the plastic part, but kept the box I'd built the piece into. I cut a mat to fit the new, larger frame--as with Through the Arch, I used an 11X13-inch shadowbox--and attached the box to the underside of the mat's inner opening.  The mat is positioned next to the glass inside the frame, with the depth of the shadowbox accommodating the box in which the piece was made.

Reframed in this way, The Wild Thing in the Weeds became a strong new addition to the lineup in the Stiles Gallery at Westwood City Hall, in Westwood, KS.  But I'm afraid I did have to raise the price.

The Wild Thing in the Weeds started the north end of the lineup in the Stiles Gallery at Westwood City Hall in March 2011.

PHOTO CREDITS: All photos are by Jan S. Gephardt, of her own original artwork and displays.

Reframe II: "Through the Arch"

Here is Through the Arch in its original
shadowbox frame.  The frame is
barely larger than the tiny piece.

My small architectural piece Through the Arch started out as a study of the interplay between reality and illusion--in this case paper sculpture (actual depth) and linear perspective (the illusion of depth.)

How would it look, I asked myself, if some of the appearance of depth was an optical illusion, while the rest of it was real?  Would the combination work?

I liked the way the study was developing, so I decided it should not stay in my sketchbook to get squashed. Instead, I sized it to fit into a small shadowbox I had available.  I was scheduled to do a series of displays in 2010 for the "Art in the Stacks" program of the Johnson County (KS) Library, so I was happy to add it as a new finished piece.

Through the Arch, in its 4X8-inch frame, looked small next to the 15-inch-square earthenware piece, Four Seasons Courtyard, at the "Work: In Progress" show in September 2010 at the Central Resource Library.

As I did with Windblown, I first showed this piece in the "Work: In Progress" show, September 2010, at the Central Resource Library.  It looked just fine, tucked onto its display shelf with my earthenware "architectural" work, Four Seasons Courtyard.

But then, in December, I faced the challenge of the Great Leawood Wall--a blank expanse of display wall at the Leawood Pioneer Library.  I had to find a better way to give this small but interesting piece greater presence!

Here is Through the Arch in its current frame.

I decided to attach the backing box of the work, which was about one and a half inches deep and had slipped snugly inside the first frame, to the back of a larger mat.

I found some matboard in the studio that I thought was compatible, and matted the piece out to fit into an 11X13-inch shadowbox frame.  I placed the mat right under the glass, so the depth of the shadowbox could contain the backing box.

Through the Arch hangs on the third wire from the left, in this photo of my December 2010 "Paper View" show at the Leawood Pioneer Library.

This gave the piece enough size that it didn't pull a visual disappearing act on the Leawood wall!

However, my husband Pascal, who actually knows what he's doing with a mat cutter, looked at it after I'd prepared it, and pronounced the mat colors and frame size merely "adequate."  He thinks a coordinating green mat and a smaller, 8X10-inch frame would work better.  It's likely he's right, because he has a good eye for such things.

So who knows?  Perhaps there's yet another reframing in the future, for Through the Arch.