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Sunday Happenings
Tara Donovan and Rachel Whiteread are among the world's finest sculptors. It is uplifting to note that these two women (working in a traditionally male-dominated field) both have solo shows in Boston's world class museums.
Whiteread, the first woman to win the Turner Prize, is exhibiting Place (Village) at the Museum of Fine Arts. It is a collection of over 200 dollhouses that she has purchased over the years on eBay and secondhand shops. Some are handmade; others are manufactured. The interior walls and floors were preserved, but all dollhouse furniture was removed. Only light fixtures were added, so that the dollhouse glow from within, just like inhabited homes. But this procedural description makes the project sound too obvious. The dimmed lighting, slapdash stacking of the packaging boxes, and the many tiny details really need to be experienced in person.
Walking around, one has the disorienting feeling of being a giant in a neighborhood or an adult small enough to play with toys. There are a handful of house-shaped nightlights placed high on the walls, contributing to a greater sense of childlike fascination. Whether it brings to mind a toy warehouse before Christmas or Gaston Bachelard's ideas about our vague memories of childhood homes, the exhibit conveys a warm sense of nostalgia.
Meanwhile, Tara Donovan, a recent recipient of the MacArthur Fellowship "genius" grant, has her first museum survey at the Institute of Contemporary Art. Her sculptures simulate forms and patterns found in nature. She plays with repetition and variance, evoking stalagmites, ice, or bubbles.
One of the most mind-boggling of her works, Haze, appears like a wall-sized cloudscape with only a delicate suggestion of shadows and depth. On closer inspection, a concave pattern creating shadows is made from slight variation in the placement of each tiny piece she used to build it. Oh yeah, it is also made entirely from transparent plastic straws.
Indeed, every piece in the exhibition is made from everyday materials like styrofoam cups, plastic buttons, and scotch tape. But Donovan uses these pieces so intuitively, that the focus is on the sum of the parts. One could very well walk away from the exhibit never noticing the materials; not a single sculpture seems poorly executed or unnecessary. Nor does anything have the bulky or self-aware appearance that sometimes happens with recycled or "found item" art.
The most beautiful piece was commissioned by the ICA. It is made from polyester film curling under additional layers, revealing loops of transparencies. Placed in front of a window facing Boston Harbor, this is particularly recommended at night. The shimmering waves of the water add a magic kaleidoscope affect from behind the display.
Rachel Whiteread's Place (Village) and additional work is on view at the MFA until January 25, 2009. Tara Donovan's show is open at the ICA through January 4, 2009.
Image: Place (Village)¸ 2006–08
Rachel Whiteread (British, born in 1963)
Doll houses, crates, boxes, wood, electrical fixtures, and fittings, and electricity
*Courtesy the artist and Gagosian Gallery, London
*Photograph © Mike Bruce
*Courtesy, Museum of Fine Arts, Boston
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Here in Los Angeles, Whiteread has another show running concurrently with her Village. A large part of the show are casts of the boxes and packing material that the dollhouses where shipped in. I took a few pics of the press opening I posted here:
http://imoralist.blogspot.com/2008/11/rachel-whiteread-at-gagosian-gallery.html