Lois Dodd
Lois Dodd
Lois Dodd
NEW YORK
cover: Blue Laundry and Birches, 1979 frontispiece: View through Elliot’s Shack Looking South, 1971 (detail) Oil on canvas, 53 x 36 inches Museum of Modern Art, New York; Gift of Robert Gober
Lois Dodd, 2018
Closing in on Nature Lucy R. Lippard I have been looking at Lois Dodd’s paintings for some sixty years, since around 1959, when I lived near the Tanager and other Tenth Street galleries in Lower Manhattan. But it took many years of concentration on other kinds of art to get it. What continues to amaze me about Dodd’s work is the incredible freshness. Most painters take joy in the painting process, or in their subjects, but that joy is not so often available to viewers in the finished product. Dodd, however, seems to come at every day anew. Her subjects are determinedly ordinary. Houses (often derelict), buildings, trees and woods, water, windows, interiors, shadows, mirrors, and eventually wildflowers. The variety she achieves within these apparently narrow parameters is what makes her work continuously intriguing. She depends on neither style nor panache. But the relaxed skill with which she depicts and transforms where she is, what she sees, makes her paintings easily recognizable. Dodd has often been called a painter’s painter, which is the greatest compliment and easy to understand. But she is also a viewers’ painter, offering familiar sights from unexpected angles or lights, opening our eyes. One day, after working on this essay, I sat outside for a while and began to see my own coyote fence, scraggly trees, and desert views as though Dodd had painted them. She is not an impressionist or an expressionist, and she is a unique kind of realist, combining spontaneity with attention to essential detail. Dodd is her own woman,
something of a loner, with deep friendships, and her personality seems reflected in her paintings. Early on, she remarked that she was glad she didn’t study with Hans Hoffman like so many of her peers. She could have gone that way, given paintings like the gorgeous 1962 Pond and the much later Moon Shadows or Blue Quarry of 1992 and 1998. Nevertheless, she enters the realities of nature thinking like an abstract artist, attracted to clear shapes—“strange, distinct shapes . . . Sometimes I see things like that, then go back, but because the light has changed it’s literally gone. It depends on the light and a lot of wandering around.” Early hard-edge paintings soon gave way to something more spontaneous, grounded in nature herself, though meticulously composed. Those of us lucky enough to be enamored of and embedded in place know how closeups inform the distance, illuminate the context. I often insist that walking is the best way to know a place, but I have to concede that painting for years on end might be even better. Light and dark identify a place, create a place, the shifting images offering infinite variety to repeated subjects. In the 1970s, Dodd stumbled into the woods to paint at night, memorizing the placement of colors on her palette, completing the nocturnal visions in the light of day. Coincidentally, I have shared two of Dodd’s three homeplaces—decades in Lower Manhattan, and a lifetime of summers in rural Maine. I was raised with parents who were Sunday painters—admirers, though not imitators, of John Marin—and I am constantly amazed by Dodd’s ability to turn her back on the nearby coast and the seductive sea. I have visited the yellow house in Lincolnville where her affair with the inland area began; I have walked the dense
Self-Portrait in Green House Window, 1971, oil on linen, 53½ x 36 inches Portland Museum of Art, Portland, Maine,Museum purchase with support from the Contemporary Art Fund, in memory of Bernice McIlhenny Wintersteen, 2000.1
Maine woods at night trusting intuition as a guide, and Dodd’s paintings are now almost more familiar than my memories, thanks in part to Faye Hirsch’s perceptive book. Although I‘ve never been to Blairstown or the Delaware Water Gap, some of my favorites of Dodd’s paintings originate there—the almost ungainly shapes formed by shadow or slush, sunlight or ice, the looming round hill, the beckoning tunnel. Dodd is not a landscape painter, a term reserved for those who look into the distance. Her work is intimate, closeup, revealing the complexity of apparent simplicity. After decades of focusing on leaves and trees interspersed with the built environment, she conquered her fear of being seen as a “lady flower painter” and has since fearlessly explored single blooms and clouds of blossoms. It takes a certain genius to work so directly. We are surrounded by artists whose subject matter is similar but whose work looks moribund in comparison to Dodd’s vibrant images that transform the ordinary into the extraordinary. Now and then affinities with Arthur Dove or Charles Burchfield or Georgia O’Keeffe surface, as do the woodsy paintings of her friends Neil Welliver and Rudy Burckhardt. With Alex Katz, another old friend, she shares thin paint, a certain flatness and almost awkwardly empty spaces, though human figures rarely interrupt her connections to her subjects. Only the best can imbue nature with such power. Or receive such power from nature. Beginning in the 1990s, a broader, quicker execution (harking back perhaps to her initial exposure to then rejection of Abstract Expressionism) is evident. By now she knows her subject matter so well that she can treat it as a matter of fact, abbre-
The Painted Room, 1982, oil on linen, 60 x 50 inches Farnsworth Art Museum, Rockland, Maine; Gift of the American Academy and Institute of Arts and Letters, New York: Hassam, Speicher, Betts and Symons Funds, 1991.7
Sunflowers & Blue Sky, 2010, Oil on Masonite, 14 x 1911⁄16 in. Bowdoin College Museum of Art, Brunswick, Maine, Gift of the Alex Katz Foundation
viated and boiled down to essences, as in the relatively recent “flashings,” rapidly painted sketches on aluminum shingles. Her love of color, especially yellow, burns through the predictable, as do the unexpected angles at which buildings are seen, as in the muted pink Vermont Barn, of 1990. Just when you think you know Dodd’s work, its calm even in turbulence, she offers a surprise—a burning house, graphic shadows and reflections, a spectacular Winter Sunset, Blair Pond, an atypical political comment—our rude president facing down a tearful Statue of Liberty. By the 2000s, and into her nineties, Dodd seems to be dancing again on the edge of abstraction, while maintaining that inimitable freshness—a word I can’t let go of.
Lucy R. Lippard is a writer, activist, and sometime curator, author of 25 books on subjects ranging from politics to place. She lives in Galisteo, New Mexico, and spends part of every summer in Georgetown, Maine.
Moon Ring, 1982
Six Cows at Lincolnville, 1961
Pond, 1962
House + Barn, 1966
View of Cemetery and Men’s Shelter, 1967
Men’s Shelter at Night, 1969
Radiator + Broken Mirror, 1974
View through Elliot’s Shack Looking South, 1971
Chicken House, 1971
Broken Window Study, 1975
Skylight in Barn, 1971
Tunnel at Vail, Full Moon, 1977–78
Sun in Hallway, 1978
Laundry Line, Red White Black Pitchfork, 1979
Skowhegan Woods, 1979
Morning Woods, 1981
Night House (v.I), 2009, mezzotint on Rives bfk, 91⁄2 x 141⁄4 inches, ed. 50 Night House (v.II), 2009, mezzotint on Arches, 91⁄2 x 141⁄2 inches, ed. 50
Night House, 1975
Neighbor’s House in Snow, 1979
Steamed Window, 1980
Two Red Drapes and Part of White Sheet, 1981
White Sheets, Yellow Landscape, 1980
Single Sheet + House, 1980–82
Blue Laundry and Birches, 1979
Rosa Rugosa, 1982
Blue Towel, 1982
Open Door, Pink and Green, 1982
Window and Ice Bank, 1983
Roof with Snow, Cushing, 1981
Snow Patterns, 1985 above: Snow Patterns, 2019, woodcut on Nichinouchi, 19 x 131⁄2 inches, ed. 100
Leslie’s Garden in Winter, 1983
Road + Red House, 1984
Front of House and Ladder, 1985
Door, Window, Ruin, 1986
Staircase, 1988
Cherry Tree + Clouds, 2015
Pink + Gray, 1988
Quarry at Sunset, 1995
Blue Quarry, 1988
Hathorn Point Road by Moonlight, 1993
Moon Shadows, 1992
Eclipse in Seven Stages, 1997
View Across Delaware, 1995
Water Gap, March, 2003
Water Gap, Last Snow Fall, March 2003
Winter Sunset, Blair Pond, 2008
White Echinacea + Butterflies, 1997–98
Joe Pye Weed (Eupatorium), 1995–96
Digging Up Red Flowers, 2004
White Lily, 2004
Red Gladioli, 2004
Monarda, 2006
Salvia Argentia II, 2010
Iris Bud, Spring 06, 2006
Black Iris, 2007
Sunlight on Floor + Door, 2013
Burning House, Afternoon, Blue Sky, 2007
Burning House, Lavender, 2007
Men’s Shelter + Window Sashes Overlapping, 2017
Back of Men’s Hotel (from My Window), 2016
Yellow Hollyhock Blossom, 2016
Smooth Hawksbeard, 2016
Queen Anne’s Lace, Backview of Head, 2018
Black Cohosh Bloom, 2018
Queen Anne’s Lace Closed, 2017
Queen Anne’s Lace, 2017
Shed Window, 2014
Dried Lupine Pod, 2019
Black Cohosh in Bloom, 2019
The Field Cushing, 2020
Hackmatack in October, 2017
View off of Back Deck, October, 2018
West Window, Night, 2019
Elm Tree Branches and Sky, 2020
Elm Tree in December, 2020
Hackmatack and Birch, 2020
Twin Arbor Vitae in Snow, 2021
Arbor Vitae + Bill’s Cottage, 2021
Tree in Snowstorm, 2021
Checklist
View through Elliot’s Shack Looking South, 1971 oil on canvas, 53 x 36 inches Museum of Modern Art, New York Gift of Robert Gober Self-Portrait in Green House Window, 1971 oil on linen, 53½ x 36 inches Portland Museum of Art, Portland, Maine Museum purchase with support from the Contemporary Art Fund, in memory of Bernice McIlhenny Wintersteen The Painted Room, 1982 oil on linen, 60 x 50 inches Farnsworth Art Museum, Rockland, Maine Gift of the American Academy and Institute of Arts and Letters, New York: Hassam, Speicher, Betts and Symons Funds Sunflowers & Blue Sky, 2010 oil on Masonite, 14 x 1911⁄16 inches Bowdoin College Museum of Art, Brunswick, Maine Gift of the Alex Katz Foundation Moon Ring, 1982 oil on linen, 60 x 40 inches Colby College Museum of Art, Gift of The American Academy & Institute of Arts and Letters, N.Y.; Hassam, Speicher, Betts & Symons Funds Six Cows at Lincolnville, 1961 oil on linen, 47½ x 63¾ inches Pond, 1962 oil on linen, 58 x 65 inches
House + Barn, 1966 oil on linen, 24 x 26 inches View of Cemetery and Men’s Shelter, 1967 oil on linen, 16¼ x 23 inches Men’s Shelter at Night, 1969 oil on linen, 22 x 26 inches Radiator + Broken Mirror, 1974 oil on linen, 24 x 18 inches Chicken House, 1971 oil on Masonite,16½ x 20 inches Broken Window Study, 1975 oil on Masonite,18 x 10 inches Skylight in Barn, 1971 oil on Masonite, 20 x 20 inches Tunnel at Vail, Full Moon, 1977–78 oil on plywood, 18 x 42 inches Sun in Hallway, 1978 oil on linen, 50 x 30 inches Laundry Line, Red White Black Pitchfork, 1979 oil on linen, 36 x 54 inches Skowhegan Woods, 1979 oil on linen, 60 x 36 inches Morning Woods, 1981 oil on linen, 36 x 60 inches
Night House, 1975 oil on linen, 32 x 48 inches
Snow Patterns, 1985 oil on linen, 56 x 40 inches
Neighbor’s House in Snow, 1979 oil on linen, 52 x 50 inches
Leslie’s Garden in Winter, 1983 oil on Masonite,19 x 20 inches
Steamed Window, 1980 oil on linen, 36 x 28 inches
Road + Red House, 1984 oil on Masonite,155⁄8 x 13 inches
Two Red Drapes and Part of White Sheet, 1981 oil on Masonite, 16 x 22 inches
Front of House and Ladder, 1985 oil on linen, 40 x 50 inches
White Sheets, Yellow Landscape, 1980 oil on Masonite, 12 x 16 inches
Door, Window, Ruin, 1986 oil on linen, 40 x 60 inches
Single Sheet + House, 1980–82 oil on Masonite, 18¾ x 20 inches
Staircase, 1988 oil on linen, 60 x 40 inches
Blue Laundry and Birches, 1979 oil on linen, 60 x 36 inches
Cherry Tree + Clouds, 2015 oil on Masonite,14 x 117⁄8 inches
Rosa Rugosa, 1982 oil on Masonite,16 x 12 inches
Pink + Gray, 1988 oil on Masonite, 12¾ x 10½ inches
Blue Towel, 1982 oil on Masonite,16 x 15 inches
Quarry at Sunset, 1995 oil on linen, 50 x 64 inches
Open Door, Pink and Green, 1982 oil on linen, 50 x 36 inches
Blue Quarry, 1988 oil on linen, 50 x 60 inches
Window and Ice Bank, 1983 oil on Masonite,117⁄8 x 17 inches
Hathorn Point Road by Moonlight, 1993 oil on linen, 46 x 78 inches
Roof with Snow, Cushing, 1981 oil on Masonite,157⁄8 x 10 inches
Moon Shadows, 1992 oil on linen, 36 x 50 inches
Eclipse in Seven Stages, 1997 oil on linen, 22 x 54 inches
Iris Bud, Spring 06, 2006 oil on Masonite,16 x 9½ inches
View Across Delaware, 1995 oil on Masonite, 20 x 20 inches
Black Iris, 2007 oil on Masonite,171⁄8 x 13 inches
Water Gap, March, 2003 oil on Masonite, 14 x 16 inches
Sunlight on Floor + Door, 2013 oil on Masonite,19 x 13 inches
Water Gap, Last Snow Fall, March 2003, 2003 oil on linen, 30 x 48 inches
Burning House, Afternoon, Blue Sky, 2007 oil on linen, 46 x 64 inches
Winter Sunset, Blair Pond, 2008 oil on linen, 48 x 52 inches
Burning House, Lavender, 2007 oil on linen, 46 x 64 inches
White Echinacea + Butterflies, 1997 - 98 oil on linen, 36 x 58 inches
Men’s Shelter + Window Sashes Overlapping, 2017 oil on Masonite, 20 x 115⁄8 inches
Joe Pye Weed (Eupatorium), 1995–96 oil on linen, 38 x 50 inches
Back of Men’s Hotel (from My Window), 2016 oil on linen, 42 x 30 inches
Digging Up Red Flowers, 2004 oil on Masonite, 12 x 16 inches
Yellow Hollyhock Blossom, 2016 oil on Masonite, 13½ x 16¾ inches
White Lily, 2004 oil on Masonite, 16 x 10 inches
Smooth Hawksbeard, 2016 oil on Masonite, 14 x 16 inches
Red Gladioli, 2004 oil on Masonite, 16 x 10 inches
Queen Anne’s Lace, Backview of Head, 2018 oil on Masonite, 11 x 12 inches
Monarda, 2006 oil on Masonite,171⁄8 x 11 inches
Black Cohosh Bloom, 2018 oil on Masonite,11 x 17 inches
Salvia Argentia II, 2010 oil on Masonite, 12 x 12 inches
Queen Anne’s Lace Closed, 2017 oil on linen, 40 x 20 inches
Queen Anne’s Lace, 2017 oil on linen, 40 x 22 inches
Arbor Vitae + Bill’s Cottage, 2021 oil on Masonite, 121⁄8 x 121⁄8 inches
Shed Window, 2014 oil on linen, 66 x 48 inches
Tree in Snowstorm, 2021 oil on Masonite, 19½ x 121⁄8 inches
Dried Lupine Pod, 2019 oil on Masonite, 16 x 10 inches
My Shadow Painting, 2008 oil on Masonite, 16 x 157⁄8 inches
Black Cohosh in Bloom, 2019 oil on Masonite, 20 x 14 inches The Field Cushing, 2020 oil on Masonite,127⁄8 x 195⁄8 inches Hackmatack in October, 2017 oil on Masonite, 167⁄8 x 17 inches View off of Back Deck, October, 2018 oil on Masonite, 20 x 97⁄8 inches West Window, Night, 2019 oil on Masonite, 16 x 12 inches Elm Tree Branches and Sky, 2020 oil on Masonite, 16¾ x 20 inches Elm Tree in December, 2020 oil on Masonite, 16 x 12 inches Hackmatack and Birch, 2020 oil on Masonite, 19½ x 16 inches Twin Arbor Vitae in Snow, 2021 oil on Masonite, 16 x 121⁄8 inches
My Shadow Painting, 2008
Published on the occasion of “Lois Dodd” on view at Alexandre, 291 Grand Street, New York 10002 from September 9 through October 23, 2021.
Catalogue © Alexandre Fine Art Inc. Images © Lois Dodd Photography: Maria Stabio Essay © Lucy R. Lippard Photo of Lois Dodd © Alexandre Fine Art Inc. Editorial Production: Emma Crumbley, Marie Evans and Maria Stabio Design: Lawrence Sunden, Inc., Harrington Park, New Jersey 07640
No portion of this catalogue, images or text may be reproduced, either in printed or electronic form, without the expressed written permission of the gallery.
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