I picked this artist for the indelible impression she left on me several years ago when I came across her work quite by accident.  Her meticulously fabricated universe is reminiscent of Robert Hooke’s Micrographia–a macabre crossbreed of magnified insects, organic machinery in shades of iron and sepia , and a complex universe of intertwining solar systems.  Her work instantly brought me back to my childhood; reminding me of that awe-inspiring scene in The Dark Crystal when Olga revealed to the hero, Jen her planetary machine that predicted when the three suns align.

About five years ago, I had the opportunity to view Lee Bontecou’s retrospective in the flesh.  After decades of near obscurity, the UCLA Hammer Museum in Los Angeles and the Museum of Contemporary Art, Chicago curated a wonderful display of her art. The retrospective included both work from her public persona as well as a display of her work she fabricated in seclusion after her art career.

Her sculptures were astounding in its attention to details as she challenged artistic conventions of both materials and presentation by creating sculpture that hung on the wall like a painting. She used industrial and found materials including screen, pipe, burlap, canvas and wire.

ABOUT THE ARTIST:
Born in Rhode Island in 1930, she grew up to attend the Art Students League of New York from 1952 to 1955 where she studied with the sculptor William Zorach. She received a Fulbright to study in Rome and then received the Louis Comfort Tiffany Award in 1959. Bontecou’s work was also included in Carnegie Museum of Art Carnegie International 2004-5 exhibit in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. She also taught at Brooklyn College from the 1970s until 1991.

via Sylvia Adams, 31 October 2008 6:05pm | |