| milwaukee's online art review |
ART vs. ART
By Dorota Biczel Nelson
WISCONSIN TRIENNIAL
Madison Museum of Contemporary Art
May 5 – July 15, 2007
WISCONSIN ARTISTS BIENNIAL
Haggerty Museum of Art
Marquette University, Milwaukee
April 2 – July 15, 2007
The Wisconsin Triennial at the Madison Museum of
Contemporary Art and Wisconsin Artists Biennial at
the Haggerty Museum of Art in Milwaukee are two
survey exhibitions with seemingly similar goals.
Both titles imply directly that the purpose is to
showcase Wisconsinites’ art (we can assume – the
best of it) or, to put it in the Triennial brochure’s
words, to provide “a testament to the dedication
and sophistication of the artists working
throughout Wisconsin.”
Even though the aims appear the same, an
informed viewer might suspect the exhibitions do
not duplicate each other, since they have been
organized by very different institutions. The
Biennial is de facto “a juried fine art competition”
put together by Wisconsin Painters & Sculptors,
Inc. / Wisconsin Artists in All Media, while the
Triennial was curated by the staff of the Madison
Museum of Contemporary Art. Obviously, we can
suspect that the selection process itself might have
had a significant impact on the make-up of the
shows. The works included in the Biennial were
selected from slides by one invited juror (this year
it was Marianne Richter of the Union League Club
of Chicago), while the three curators of the
Triennial (curator of education Sheri Castelnuovo,
director of MMoCA Stephen Fleischman, and curator
of exhibitions Jane Simon) traveled the state to
conduct studio visits after the initial slide reviews.
What might also be of relevance, the slide
portfolios submitted to the Triennial were
supported by artist statements.
So when I set off to visit both exhibitions, my main
goal was to discover how different they actually
were and how much overlap there was between
them. If you have not had a chance to find out for
yourself yet, let me tell you right away: not much at
all. Among 68 Biennial artists and 43 Triennial
artists (and three collaborative teams) there are
only two whose work is presented in both
exhibitions: Gary John Gresl (notably, also the
Biennial’s co-chair) and kathryn e. martin.
Surprising? To me: yes, very much so. Considering
the fact that Wisconsin is not a huge state, even
with its lively art community, one could expect that
the list of outstanding artists would be relatively
easy to narrow down. However, radically distinct
lists of participants are not the only factor
distinguishing both exhibitions. The shows
themselves have such different attitudes in terms
of display, media and the content of the work that
their comparison bluntly reveals a radical, in my
opinion, split in how the key concept “art”
is understood today.
The Biennial resembles a relatively sparse, but
nonetheless salon style exhibition, in which each
artist is represented by a single piece of work. Two-
dimensional media dominate: there are mainly
paintings, including a very generous amount of
watercolors, as well as a few photographs and
prints. A handful of primarily small sculptures seems
almost incidental among all the framed pieces. As
far as the subject matter is concerned, “the most
prominent theme in the exhibition is nature, which
can be seen in landscapes, seascapes and more
detailed nature studies. A number of artists also
created abstract works."* However, pieces like a
non-objective, whirly, spatially complex Passage by
Leslie Vansen, or monochromatic The Minton Series
VI by Sally Hutchison are rather exceptions
confirming the rule. Representation is the primary
mode of expression in this exhibit. The viewer will
encounter familial Ginseng, Icicles, Pinecone Detail,
Crate of Pears, Fall Berries, Red Tulips, Wisconsin
Grown Red and Orange, Fall at No-Name Lake, Juniper
Trail Dunes, Road in Landscape (#18), Pier Milwaukee,
Sunrise and Reflection – Apostole Is., WI, North Cape
Bluffs, Wisconsin Fields in Early Spring, Erosion,
Round Barn Seasonal Studies and Farm Breakfast.
The Triennial, on the other hand, adapted a very
different exhibition formula. It shows either one
large installation by an artist or alternatively, a
grouping of smaller works by one author. As a
result, the focus is placed on the maker rather than
a single, individual piece and many works create
context for themselves, in some cases as if the
Triennial was a collection of mini-retrospectives.
Obviously, the MMoCA has a brand new, stunning,
roomy space at its disposal, which easily
accommodates pieces of any size and in
substantial quantity. However, it is notable that
out of the two shows it is the one with the larger
exhibition space that settled on fewer artists. In
the Triennial juxtapositions of scale and media
work surprisingly well, balancing elegantly variety
with cohesion. While the work represented in the
show is very diverse – aside of painting,
photography, drawing and sculpture, the audience
can experience also fibers, installation, video and
animation which all present their multiple facets –
the show’s arrangement seems to allow very
smooth transition between individual artists’
pieces. The overture and the coda of the Triennial
punctuate smartly the route through the exhibit. In
the lobby of the Museum the visitors are welcomed
by a geometric, grid-based wall painting by Doug
Holst, which pulsating, somewhat odd color rhythm
is based on the rules of popular sedoku. The
wanderers who make it to the roof top sculpture
garden finish their tour with a wall installation of
Roy Staab, Symbiotic, in which bunches of reeds
are arranged in a systematic pattern, forced into
geometric order by a human hand, yet, at the same
time subject to the merciless impact of atmospheric
conditions.
I have heard an opinion that the Triennial is a more
academic, stylistically tight exhibition, while the
Biennial has taken more democratic, all-inclusive
approach. Certainly, intellectual concerns or
intellectual mode of presentation (like the labels
attempting to summarize the artists’ goals and
their language pointing to loftiness of their
pursuits) can be seen as signs of contemporary
academism. It is not incidental that many of the
artists included in the show teach at various
reputable institutions around the state or are
recent MFA recipients. However, even despite of
that supposed dose of academism, the Triennial is
an incomparably fresher, more touching and
engaging than the Biennial.
There are certainly pieces presented at the
Haggerty which display thoughtfulness, visual
sophistication and technical virtuosity (for example,
Vansen’s Passage, Danica Oudens-Coale’s
Insulation, Martin’s Of Movement and Belonging or
Jean Crane’s Time Fragment II), nonetheless,
majority of the work in the show can only be
admired for their aptness or formal qualities. This
type of work remains indifferent to crucial
questions raised within last hundred years of art
history (as if it had never happened) and is still
essentially rooted in the 19th century mode of
thinking about art. A piece that stands out
remarkably is Stacey Webber’s Fancy Work, a set of
crocheted one dollar bills in which the thread
simultaneously obscures familiar information and
reveals commonly disregarded decorative patterns.
As a result of the artist’s intervention the notes
become unnerving crafty gadgets (perhaps
coasters?), hinting both at devaluation of the US
dollar and the value of manual labor. Still, Webber’s
simple, witty piece is another exception within the
exhibit.
On the other hand, there are pieces in the Triennial
which are incredibly rich as they involve not just
the sense of sight, but also emotions and intellect
of the viewers, providing in the end infinitely more
complex experiences. Perhaps the most striking is
Mark Klassen’s Payphone, which seems to speak of
our inability to connect with other people in the era
of constant connectedness. In the MMoCA gallery
Klassen installed a practically obsolete device, a
payphone, which allows the audience to dial ten
numbers across the country, from a laundromat in
Bronx, through a sheriff’s station in Texas,
Chicago’s Union Station to an emergency waiting
room in Florida. As you call the successive numbers
waiting for somebody to pick up, you slowly realize
that perhaps our ability to respond to strangers
has not increased with the spread of the media,
but has decreased instead. Michael Rea’s Time
Machine is a huge crude wooden vehicle
treacherously resembling a tank. The juxtaposition
of rough, simple material, clearly identifiable
appearance and the far-fetched title is quite
unexpected and might allude to dangerous results
of seemingly innocent boyhood games and
fantasies. Fred Stonehouse’s Selections from
Natural History, Portfolio of Marshall Deerfield also
suggests perils – personal struggles and disasters
which an individual encounters and has to
overcome throughout lifetime. A collection of
seemingly loosely related images creates the
feeling of a surreal nightmare or a mysterious
history that cannot be fully comprehended. This is
us, stumbling in life as if in the dark, trying to make
sense of the little reliable information we might
have. Captivating in their starkness and
constrained palette, large scale, figurative
paintings by George Williams Jr. at first glance
seem to deal with stereotypical representations of
African-Americans. Yet their symbolism, particularly
expressed in the gestures of the figures, implies
also universal human vulnerability and the delicate,
easily destroyable boundaries which constitute the
self.
As postmodernism taught us there is no single
universal truth. We are used to the fact that the
term art applies to a myriad of phenomena. After
all, in the liquid times (to use sociologist Zygmunt
Bauman’s term) the ideas are also liquid, always
changing and taking on different forms.
Consequently, the discussion of what art means
seems to have been banished from the public
discourse, particularly that accessible to so called
“general public”. However, if hell has circles as
Dante claimed, so does the world of art. We know
it, but we are not willing to talk loudly about it. In
the end, the Biennial and the Triennial speak of,
and perhaps also to, two ultimately separate
realms. I think the only reasonable way of
explaining different demographics of the Biennial
and the Triennial is to assume that they were
essentially aimed at distinct “circles” of Wisconsin
artists. The lack of the overlap between both
shows is most likely a consequence of their well-
known character. It is quite probable that simply
very few people applied for both exhibitions.
The Triennial embraces what could be described as
“high” or perhaps “academic” art, aspiring to
originality, formal and conceptual inventiveness,
intellectual refinement and support of verbal
eloquence. Few exceptions aside, based on
majority of the work included in the Biennial, I’d like
to claim that while the exhibition at the Haggerty
doesn’t necessarily aim at “low” art (as the
distinction between high and low today is quite
blurry), it mainly accommodates the sphere which
could be called “mediocre art”. This is the work
that shuns intellectualism (perhaps as a result of a
romantic notion of an artists as an innate genius
whose actions cannot be explained rationally),
lacks sense of humor or irony (as if not to ridicule
itself) and at the same time relies heavily on
acquired skill and technical ability (to firmly
distinguish an artist from a layman). While this
work can successfully serve as interior decoration,
it rarely sparks imagination, emotions or intellect.
Despite of these familiar, apparent divisions, we
seldom openly discuss those different “arts”. The
multiplicity of “arts” and various “art” circles seem
to be the unspoken consensus or the quiet status
quo of the scene, until, of course, somebody (like
me, teaching at a college) has to convince a
seventeen-year-old that Thomas Kinkade does not
make art after all, but plainly and simply – kitsch.
Precisely because of this, I wonder if it is really in
our interest to embrace the liquidity of the idea of
art. Can we – artists, writers, teachers and viewers
– with clear conscience agree to apply it to
anything? Or would it, perhaps, be more productive
if we stood up for our private truths publicly, no
matter how politically incorrect and odd this may
be?
I am finishing this article in my old hometown,
Warsaw, Poland, a bustling capital of a rapidly
changing country, where the hip rules and there is
little place for sentiments. I just visited my high
school science teacher who told me the story of his
artistic revelation. As a young man, he was
searching for Au hasard Balthazar, a cult film by
French director Robert Bresson. Finally, while
traveling, he found it playing in a dilapidated
provincial cinema and was initially delighted to
discover he was one of only tiny handful of people
to purchase the tickets. To his dismay, a minute
before the movie started a group of hundred crew-
cut recruits was marched into the theater (back
then Communist governments firmly believed in
culturing the uneducated masses, among them
peasants’ sons who dominated the army). As the
film slowly revealed the parallel stories of a poor
girl and her abused donkey, the recruits reacted
with a gurgle. Yet, as the narrative developed, the
group got progressively quieter. By the end of the
movie the audience fell completely silent. When the
credits finished the soldiers were still sitting in their
chairs. Only a few minutes later did the recruits get
up and marched out of the theater in a complete
silence. It was the ultimate proof that anyone,
regardless of his or her level of education or
sophistication, could understand truly valuable,
“real” art. Could we possibly have such an
experience today?
Dorota Biczel Nelson is a Milwaukee-based artist and
instructor, and frequent contributor to Susceptible to
Images.
Email comments@susceptibletoimages.com
*The quote from the introductory panel to the Biennial.
Copyright 2007. Content may not be used or
reproduced without the permission of the author.
By Dorota Biczel Nelson
WISCONSIN TRIENNIAL
Madison Museum of Contemporary Art
May 5 – July 15, 2007
WISCONSIN ARTISTS BIENNIAL
Haggerty Museum of Art
Marquette University, Milwaukee
April 2 – July 15, 2007
The Wisconsin Triennial at the Madison Museum of
Contemporary Art and Wisconsin Artists Biennial at
the Haggerty Museum of Art in Milwaukee are two
survey exhibitions with seemingly similar goals.
Both titles imply directly that the purpose is to
showcase Wisconsinites’ art (we can assume – the
best of it) or, to put it in the Triennial brochure’s
words, to provide “a testament to the dedication
and sophistication of the artists working
throughout Wisconsin.”
Even though the aims appear the same, an
informed viewer might suspect the exhibitions do
not duplicate each other, since they have been
organized by very different institutions. The
Biennial is de facto “a juried fine art competition”
put together by Wisconsin Painters & Sculptors,
Inc. / Wisconsin Artists in All Media, while the
Triennial was curated by the staff of the Madison
Museum of Contemporary Art. Obviously, we can
suspect that the selection process itself might have
had a significant impact on the make-up of the
shows. The works included in the Biennial were
selected from slides by one invited juror (this year
it was Marianne Richter of the Union League Club
of Chicago), while the three curators of the
Triennial (curator of education Sheri Castelnuovo,
director of MMoCA Stephen Fleischman, and curator
of exhibitions Jane Simon) traveled the state to
conduct studio visits after the initial slide reviews.
What might also be of relevance, the slide
portfolios submitted to the Triennial were
supported by artist statements.
So when I set off to visit both exhibitions, my main
goal was to discover how different they actually
were and how much overlap there was between
them. If you have not had a chance to find out for
yourself yet, let me tell you right away: not much at
all. Among 68 Biennial artists and 43 Triennial
artists (and three collaborative teams) there are
only two whose work is presented in both
exhibitions: Gary John Gresl (notably, also the
Biennial’s co-chair) and kathryn e. martin.
Surprising? To me: yes, very much so. Considering
the fact that Wisconsin is not a huge state, even
with its lively art community, one could expect that
the list of outstanding artists would be relatively
easy to narrow down. However, radically distinct
lists of participants are not the only factor
distinguishing both exhibitions. The shows
themselves have such different attitudes in terms
of display, media and the content of the work that
their comparison bluntly reveals a radical, in my
opinion, split in how the key concept “art”
is understood today.
The Biennial resembles a relatively sparse, but
nonetheless salon style exhibition, in which each
artist is represented by a single piece of work. Two-
dimensional media dominate: there are mainly
paintings, including a very generous amount of
watercolors, as well as a few photographs and
prints. A handful of primarily small sculptures seems
almost incidental among all the framed pieces. As
far as the subject matter is concerned, “the most
prominent theme in the exhibition is nature, which
can be seen in landscapes, seascapes and more
detailed nature studies. A number of artists also
created abstract works."* However, pieces like a
non-objective, whirly, spatially complex Passage by
Leslie Vansen, or monochromatic The Minton Series
VI by Sally Hutchison are rather exceptions
confirming the rule. Representation is the primary
mode of expression in this exhibit. The viewer will
encounter familial Ginseng, Icicles, Pinecone Detail,
Crate of Pears, Fall Berries, Red Tulips, Wisconsin
Grown Red and Orange, Fall at No-Name Lake, Juniper
Trail Dunes, Road in Landscape (#18), Pier Milwaukee,
Sunrise and Reflection – Apostole Is., WI, North Cape
Bluffs, Wisconsin Fields in Early Spring, Erosion,
Round Barn Seasonal Studies and Farm Breakfast.
The Triennial, on the other hand, adapted a very
different exhibition formula. It shows either one
large installation by an artist or alternatively, a
grouping of smaller works by one author. As a
result, the focus is placed on the maker rather than
a single, individual piece and many works create
context for themselves, in some cases as if the
Triennial was a collection of mini-retrospectives.
Obviously, the MMoCA has a brand new, stunning,
roomy space at its disposal, which easily
accommodates pieces of any size and in
substantial quantity. However, it is notable that
out of the two shows it is the one with the larger
exhibition space that settled on fewer artists. In
the Triennial juxtapositions of scale and media
work surprisingly well, balancing elegantly variety
with cohesion. While the work represented in the
show is very diverse – aside of painting,
photography, drawing and sculpture, the audience
can experience also fibers, installation, video and
animation which all present their multiple facets –
the show’s arrangement seems to allow very
smooth transition between individual artists’
pieces. The overture and the coda of the Triennial
punctuate smartly the route through the exhibit. In
the lobby of the Museum the visitors are welcomed
by a geometric, grid-based wall painting by Doug
Holst, which pulsating, somewhat odd color rhythm
is based on the rules of popular sedoku. The
wanderers who make it to the roof top sculpture
garden finish their tour with a wall installation of
Roy Staab, Symbiotic, in which bunches of reeds
are arranged in a systematic pattern, forced into
geometric order by a human hand, yet, at the same
time subject to the merciless impact of atmospheric
conditions.
I have heard an opinion that the Triennial is a more
academic, stylistically tight exhibition, while the
Biennial has taken more democratic, all-inclusive
approach. Certainly, intellectual concerns or
intellectual mode of presentation (like the labels
attempting to summarize the artists’ goals and
their language pointing to loftiness of their
pursuits) can be seen as signs of contemporary
academism. It is not incidental that many of the
artists included in the show teach at various
reputable institutions around the state or are
recent MFA recipients. However, even despite of
that supposed dose of academism, the Triennial is
an incomparably fresher, more touching and
engaging than the Biennial.
There are certainly pieces presented at the
Haggerty which display thoughtfulness, visual
sophistication and technical virtuosity (for example,
Vansen’s Passage, Danica Oudens-Coale’s
Insulation, Martin’s Of Movement and Belonging or
Jean Crane’s Time Fragment II), nonetheless,
majority of the work in the show can only be
admired for their aptness or formal qualities. This
type of work remains indifferent to crucial
questions raised within last hundred years of art
history (as if it had never happened) and is still
essentially rooted in the 19th century mode of
thinking about art. A piece that stands out
remarkably is Stacey Webber’s Fancy Work, a set of
crocheted one dollar bills in which the thread
simultaneously obscures familiar information and
reveals commonly disregarded decorative patterns.
As a result of the artist’s intervention the notes
become unnerving crafty gadgets (perhaps
coasters?), hinting both at devaluation of the US
dollar and the value of manual labor. Still, Webber’s
simple, witty piece is another exception within the
exhibit.
On the other hand, there are pieces in the Triennial
which are incredibly rich as they involve not just
the sense of sight, but also emotions and intellect
of the viewers, providing in the end infinitely more
complex experiences. Perhaps the most striking is
Mark Klassen’s Payphone, which seems to speak of
our inability to connect with other people in the era
of constant connectedness. In the MMoCA gallery
Klassen installed a practically obsolete device, a
payphone, which allows the audience to dial ten
numbers across the country, from a laundromat in
Bronx, through a sheriff’s station in Texas,
Chicago’s Union Station to an emergency waiting
room in Florida. As you call the successive numbers
waiting for somebody to pick up, you slowly realize
that perhaps our ability to respond to strangers
has not increased with the spread of the media,
but has decreased instead. Michael Rea’s Time
Machine is a huge crude wooden vehicle
treacherously resembling a tank. The juxtaposition
of rough, simple material, clearly identifiable
appearance and the far-fetched title is quite
unexpected and might allude to dangerous results
of seemingly innocent boyhood games and
fantasies. Fred Stonehouse’s Selections from
Natural History, Portfolio of Marshall Deerfield also
suggests perils – personal struggles and disasters
which an individual encounters and has to
overcome throughout lifetime. A collection of
seemingly loosely related images creates the
feeling of a surreal nightmare or a mysterious
history that cannot be fully comprehended. This is
us, stumbling in life as if in the dark, trying to make
sense of the little reliable information we might
have. Captivating in their starkness and
constrained palette, large scale, figurative
paintings by George Williams Jr. at first glance
seem to deal with stereotypical representations of
African-Americans. Yet their symbolism, particularly
expressed in the gestures of the figures, implies
also universal human vulnerability and the delicate,
easily destroyable boundaries which constitute the
self.
As postmodernism taught us there is no single
universal truth. We are used to the fact that the
term art applies to a myriad of phenomena. After
all, in the liquid times (to use sociologist Zygmunt
Bauman’s term) the ideas are also liquid, always
changing and taking on different forms.
Consequently, the discussion of what art means
seems to have been banished from the public
discourse, particularly that accessible to so called
“general public”. However, if hell has circles as
Dante claimed, so does the world of art. We know
it, but we are not willing to talk loudly about it. In
the end, the Biennial and the Triennial speak of,
and perhaps also to, two ultimately separate
realms. I think the only reasonable way of
explaining different demographics of the Biennial
and the Triennial is to assume that they were
essentially aimed at distinct “circles” of Wisconsin
artists. The lack of the overlap between both
shows is most likely a consequence of their well-
known character. It is quite probable that simply
very few people applied for both exhibitions.
The Triennial embraces what could be described as
“high” or perhaps “academic” art, aspiring to
originality, formal and conceptual inventiveness,
intellectual refinement and support of verbal
eloquence. Few exceptions aside, based on
majority of the work included in the Biennial, I’d like
to claim that while the exhibition at the Haggerty
doesn’t necessarily aim at “low” art (as the
distinction between high and low today is quite
blurry), it mainly accommodates the sphere which
could be called “mediocre art”. This is the work
that shuns intellectualism (perhaps as a result of a
romantic notion of an artists as an innate genius
whose actions cannot be explained rationally),
lacks sense of humor or irony (as if not to ridicule
itself) and at the same time relies heavily on
acquired skill and technical ability (to firmly
distinguish an artist from a layman). While this
work can successfully serve as interior decoration,
it rarely sparks imagination, emotions or intellect.
Despite of these familiar, apparent divisions, we
seldom openly discuss those different “arts”. The
multiplicity of “arts” and various “art” circles seem
to be the unspoken consensus or the quiet status
quo of the scene, until, of course, somebody (like
me, teaching at a college) has to convince a
seventeen-year-old that Thomas Kinkade does not
make art after all, but plainly and simply – kitsch.
Precisely because of this, I wonder if it is really in
our interest to embrace the liquidity of the idea of
art. Can we – artists, writers, teachers and viewers
– with clear conscience agree to apply it to
anything? Or would it, perhaps, be more productive
if we stood up for our private truths publicly, no
matter how politically incorrect and odd this may
be?
I am finishing this article in my old hometown,
Warsaw, Poland, a bustling capital of a rapidly
changing country, where the hip rules and there is
little place for sentiments. I just visited my high
school science teacher who told me the story of his
artistic revelation. As a young man, he was
searching for Au hasard Balthazar, a cult film by
French director Robert Bresson. Finally, while
traveling, he found it playing in a dilapidated
provincial cinema and was initially delighted to
discover he was one of only tiny handful of people
to purchase the tickets. To his dismay, a minute
before the movie started a group of hundred crew-
cut recruits was marched into the theater (back
then Communist governments firmly believed in
culturing the uneducated masses, among them
peasants’ sons who dominated the army). As the
film slowly revealed the parallel stories of a poor
girl and her abused donkey, the recruits reacted
with a gurgle. Yet, as the narrative developed, the
group got progressively quieter. By the end of the
movie the audience fell completely silent. When the
credits finished the soldiers were still sitting in their
chairs. Only a few minutes later did the recruits get
up and marched out of the theater in a complete
silence. It was the ultimate proof that anyone,
regardless of his or her level of education or
sophistication, could understand truly valuable,
“real” art. Could we possibly have such an
experience today?
Dorota Biczel Nelson is a Milwaukee-based artist and
instructor, and frequent contributor to Susceptible to
Images.
Email comments@susceptibletoimages.com
*The quote from the introductory panel to the Biennial.
Copyright 2007. Content may not be used or
reproduced without the permission of the author.
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| Installation view of the Wisconsin Artists Biennial (Click images to enlarge; use your browser's back button to return to article) |
| Installation view of the Wisconsin Artists Biennial |
| View of the Wisconsin Triennial featuring work by Santiago Cucullu |
| Roy Staab, Symbiotic |
| Stacey Webber, Fancy Work |