Aging by Dan R Talley

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IDA APPLEBROOG • MICHAEL AURBACH • ANGELA BOWYER. JERE BROOKSHIRE. LIZ CANE. BErn HALL COBB. SARAH DRURY. SHARON L. ELLIS. JEAN GALLAGHER. MARK GASPER. DAN GILHOOLEY • RONALD GONZALEZ. BARBARA HAMMER. HOLLY'S COMETS. KAREN HOLMES. NANCY HOLT. MAGGIE HOPP.JANEILA HOWALT. BABmE KATZ. JUDITH KELLER. HELENA KOLDA • RUTH LAXSON. ELIZABETH LAYTON. EVELYN B. LEONG. LSS THE ATRICALS. MARY MALOTT. KAREN MESSERMAN • NEIL MCGREEVY. JIM MCKAY. VESNA TODOROVlt MIKSlt • LOUISE ODES NEADERLAND • EDITH NEFF. ANNE NOGGLE. BILL NOLAN. MAXINE OLSON. KRISTIN REED/PAMELA SHOEMAKER. DAVID SCHEINBAUM • JUDITH SELBY. LUCILLE SHORT. JUDY SOMERVILLE. TYLER STALLINGS. ATHENA TACHA • JOYCE TENNESON • MARY LOU UTTERMOHLEN • HANNAH WILKE September

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This exhibition is part of The FORUM Gallery's Visual Arts Initiative which is made possible through funds provided by the Ralph C.Sheldon Foundation,Inc. Additional funds for this exhibition were provided by the Faculty Student Association of Jamestown Community College.

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS History teaches us that art, to be avalid expression of our culture, requires 'freedom for the artist to make his or her statement about the life and times in which the artist lives and works. Additionally, history will show that the validity and power of an exhibition is not derived solely from the content of the artworks but, in part, from what the viewer brings to the exhibition.

AGING: The Process, The Perception compels one to examine the values one holds. I would The FORUM Gallery is an Associate Member say that perhaps neither the exhibit nor the process of aging is the most important aspect of this experience, but the confrontation of your perception of the process is. In this spirit, The of the National Association of Artists' Or ganizations. FORUM Gallery determines to provide the community with exhibitions that go beyond vanity, challenge the viewer and foster awareness. Gallery Development Committee: I wanHo thank Dan R. Talley for curating this strong and powerful exhibition. Ialso thank The Michael Campbell. William Disbro. Carole Fasso. Mike Fitzpatrick. Robert Hagstrom FORUM Gallery Development Committee and the faculty, staff, and students of Jamestown • John Hiester. Cletus Johnson. Gloria Community College for their support and enthusiasm. I particularly want to thank the artists Lasser. Julia Militello. Lois Strickler. and those who participated in making this event areality. One must be grateful for the Faculty William Waite. Gary Winger. Student Association and the Ralph C. Sheldon Foundation, Inc., as their financial support has made this possible. Finally, I want to thank the community at large for their support and for The FORUM Gallery whom this exhibition was created. at Jamestown Community College 525 Falconer Street -William Waite

Director of Gallery and Exhibitions

Jamestown, New York 14701 (716) 665-5220, Extension 241

Gallery Hours:

Tuesday through Saturday

10:00 a.m. till 5:00 p.m.

(Wednesday and Thursday till 8:00 p.m.)

Unless otherwise noted, illustrations have been supplied by the artists. All dimensions are listed in inches with height preceding width, then depth.

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AGING: THE PROCESS, THE PERCEPTION CUR

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ticulously rendered work required that the art This show approaches aging from a variety of AGING: The Process, The Perception is an ist spend many hours of intense confrontation directions - it intentionally claims no single assembly of contemporary painting, sculpture, with his aging an experience likely charged philosophical or aesthetic point of view. Some photography, film, video, performance, and with a mixture of trepidation and self work is reassuring and positive; some is dark writing that examines the experience of our revelation. Ruth Laxson's one-of-a-kind artist and frightening. Artistic approaches reflect the own passing time, our movement through the diversity that characterizes recent contempo book presents a complex system of personal ever changing ·stages of life," and our strug symbols that suggest her view of universal rary art and range from controlled illustrative gle to face our own inescapable mortality. The truths. Laxson's relationship to her aging pro pictorials depicting inner strength and wisdom show presents a range of reaction by 48 art cess has informed the development of this to expressionistic outpourings that border on ists from across the country to the hopes, personal visual language that effectively the grotesque. The artists in the show range in fears, realities, and myths that have become moves the willing viewer into direct confronta age from early twenties to early eighties, but it part of our collective knowledge on this sub tion with questions of cosmic proportion. ·Self is impossible to assign certain attitudes to a ject. Portrait: Stroke" by Elizabeth Layton address particular age group no one has "the an es the fears of the transition between health The exhibition will likely make some people swer" and no single perspective accounts for and illness. The piece is a reminder of the val all variables. All the artists have valid personal more aware of the situation of the elderly. In ue of self-determination in times of adversity. the process, it will trigger reflection on their views, presented from unique vantage points In Layton's case, her entire artistic career determined by their particular experience and own relative positions in the process of grow started as a reaction to a serious illness. Mary age. ing older and, inevitably, it will stir some of Malott's untitled work incorporating text, pho them to speculate on the very nature of their to, and oil paint bravely and somewhat humor Several artists in the show have used their ag existence. The show accomplishes this ously looks at turning 60 and examines the through a survey of the social, political, and ing as the subject for their work. Much of the work in this autobiographical mode has strong events set in motion by crossing this arbitrary philosophical issues that surround aging. boundary. Athena Tacha's work in this show documentary elements and contains allusions Some work in the show directly and unflinch documents her aging process in what first ap ingly examines attitudes about growing old in to traditional self portraiture, as well as refer ences to the conceptual and narrative modes pears to be rather clinical words and pictures. our culture while other works address the sub But her work's straightforward style effectively of the past 25 years of art history. Betty Hall ject more metaphorically. All the work exam isolates the aspects of the process that many ines ideas, attitudes, and emotions that range Cobb's poems in this catalog chronicle the trials of the aging process in a direct and con fear the most the slow physical change of from optimism to deep seated fear - feelings the body. In a similar autobiographical mode (although sometimes suppressed) that are fed frontational manner. In many ways, her exami nation of the transitions one goes through in but in a less documentary fashion, Michael from sources as diverse as covert and overt Aurbach's "Final Self Portrait" comments on later life is some of the most direct and pointed messages in the media to information embed work in the show. Dan Gilhooley's unfinished the way lives are often summed-up (especially ded deep in the recesses of our genetic code. triptych self portrait examines his aging pro at death) by occupations (John Doe was a But this exhibition is not exclusively about the good carpenter). Aurbach's life as an artist is human physical aging process, it is also about cess in much the same way that we look at old photographs of ourselves against our current cleverly summarized by a coffin/trailer/ how we measure and conceptualize the pro museum. cess through our notions of time, memory, perception of who we are, and our hopes and fears of who we will become. Gilhooley's meand change.

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Art often finds its base in extremes. Many art ists in the exhibition have dealt sensitively with the time leading up to the death of a loved one or have crafted works that memorialize the completed physical life. Nancy Holt's gripping works, ·Ransacked" and ·Underscan," address the aging and death of her aunt and point to the victimization that is sometimes the fate of the elderly. Maggie Hopp uses straightforward photographs to document the final years in the life of her Great-Aunt Belle. Hopp's photos in the exhibition, selected from a series of over 50 images, present a view of her great-aunt's gradual transition from life into death. Similar ly, Helena Kolda's short video studies are based on her husband's medical treatment and his subsequent death. Her elegiac work is highly evocative and has a quality of memorial. Kolda edited the tapes 18 months after her husband's death and although the editing caused her to go through the experience of his death again, this second time brought with it a sense of closure. Hannah Wilke's work in this show, completed after the death of her mother, Selma Butter, also has a feeling of peaceful resolution. One senses a loving release in the work that seems to signal the end of one phase in the artist's life. The inclusion of love birds in the image suggests a recognition that the process of living is marked by repeated in stances of joy and sorrow and that they must be met equally. Tyler Stalling's video pieces also deal with the death of his mother. His tapes are explosive audiovisual expositions that have a rawness that suggest the almost primal sense of an guish often experienced with the death of a parent. Stalling's work strikes a fearful plain tive note that tends to hold the viewer long af ter the tape ends. Judith Selby's work •... how old women die," evolved out of time spent with her Aunt Alice and her peers in a convalescent home. The piece, originally conceived for wall display but because of space limitations pre sented here in book format, is confrontational and somewhat indictiAg. The aggression dis

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played in Selby's work is a plea for societal ac tion to combat the painful physical and psycho logical isolation experienced by many older cit izens. Selby wants the viewer to "know what it means to put someone away." The bookworks of Louise Odes Neaderland in this exhibition are all from "Where is Home? " a project that takes its title from a line in a letter she re ceived from her father who spent the last years of his life with ,Neaderland's. mother in a nursing home outside Jamestown. Formally Neaderland's works play with the conflicting feelings created by the presentation of intimate personal emotions through xerography, a me dium often thought of as distant and imperson al. This formal conflict mirrors the emotional conflict associated with the helplessness one experiences as age slowly overtakes a loved one's life. Janeila Howalt and Babette Katz are also rep resented in this show by bookworks. "Refrac tions Within Definitions," Howalt's xerographic book of drawings, is a multi-layered narrative that focuses on the relativity of our existence. In her statement for this catalog she discusses how our relationship to our first ball changes as we age and summarily states, • ... the ball is still a ball, but not to us. The ball has aged as we have aged. The world is as old as we are." She implies that even the "constants" are variable when examined in the context of our personal experience. Babette Katz's book, "At the Beach," presents a narrative that equates a day at the beach to a lifetime. The baby that arrives at the beach in the morning is an old man by late afternoon. Katz feels the book is "as much about maturation in the sense of ac cepting one's limits, as it is about aging." Many works in the show deal with aging by re casting myths or through the inclusion of myth ic references. These works speak to the conti nuity of life and the recurrence of themes throughout recorded history. These allusions are not only used for their internal narrative po tential, they also compare and contrast con

temporary society's attitude on aging to the philosophies of different cultures and previous societies. "The Significance of Cycling," by Vesna Todorovic Miksic draws on her Yugo slavian heritage in a poetic sculptural work that includes live wheat. The wheat not only sym bolizes sustenance, its living presence is a physical reference to our own life-cycle, a re minder of the beginnings and endings we ex perience as well as an affirmation of belief in a continuing spirit. The notion of rejuvenation and renewal is also prominent in Edith Neff's painting, ''The Return." The work is from a se ries based on the myth of Demeter and Per sephone and according to Neff, "... (it) is also involved with the idea of age and youth , the re volving cycle of the year, and of life." Maxine Olson's painting, ·Rodin Revisited," continues this theme with another reference to a cyclical perspective. She juxtaposes the figure of an old woman ascending a staircase leading to an ·unknown reality" with the figures of the two lovers from Rodin's "Kiss." The implication in herent in the erotic Rodin quotation is of sex and procreation; the old woman can be read as receding from the procreative ideal embod ied in the Rodin and ascending to another lev el of existence. Kristin Reed and Pamela Shoemaker collabo rated to propose a mural project on aging for Jamestown. Their proposal drawing in the ex hibition examines problems faced by the elder ly in a society that has been woefully uncon cerned with their needs. The artists have selected seven contemporary problems and il lustrated the "irony and inappropriateness of such dilemmas" by having Biblical and mytho logical figures such as Lazarus, Noah, Phile mon, and Baucis confront the situations. The work has an air of humor to it because of the anachronistic juxtapositions the artists have created, but their message is forcefully clear and extremely serious. The work's title, "Mu tare Possibilis Est" (Change is Possible), sums up their feeling that once a problem is under stood, the next step is to work for change.

France," also capitalizes on the expressive na "examines women's concerns about the aging Several film and video artists in the show deal process ... (and) what many perceive to be the ture of the aging face. Somerville states, "Old with contemporary stereotypical myths. Liz great societal pr~ssure to retain a youthful ap people are the perfect subject matter for my Cane's "Libido" rejects the popular notion that paintings for if we see the elderly as beautiful, pearance." Messerman sensitively presents sexuality and romance end in later life. Her this information through one woman's decision sensual, vital persons, we are then taking re work, included in the program of experimental to have surgery and augments that woman's sponsibility for our own destiny." The face of film and video works, uses film to "move be the subject in Somerville's painting is present story with comments conveying the attitudes of yond stereotypes and ... (examine) the reality ed frontally with all of time's erosions clearly many others. of people's lives." Judith Keller's 1977 film, indicated. The subject's face becomes a re "Rose by Any Other Name," also explores sex In a mode similar to Messerman, Jim McKay is flection of our own gaze and demands that we uality in the elderly through a dramatic piece represented in the exhibition by "Lighthearted respect its (our) inherent nobility. about intimacy and its consequences in a Nation," a video documentary/essay. McKay's nursing home environment. The piece is quite Like Somerville, Sharon L. Ellis works in a piece grew out of his interest in the "Duplex direct in its confrontation of the prejudice and Planet," an "enigmatic, small-press magazine large format representational mode, but her intolerance encountered in the home by a resi that has been published since 1979 ... that untitled drawing's tone is diHerent. Ellis' work dent named Rose and her newfound lover Ap contains interviews and conversations with the elegantly presents the loss and isolation which proaching the topic from a diHerent perspec residents of the Duplex Nursing Home in Mas is sometimes the fate of the elderly. The ges tive, Mark Gasper's 1988 dramatic film, "An sachusetts." The 53-minute tape can be diffi ture of the subject head down, and face hid Empty Bed," presents a powerful portrait of a den creates an air of anonymity. The sub cult for some viewers because McKay rejects gay man in his mid-60s. The film examines smooth cinematic conventions and fast-paced ject could be anyone. This universal human "choices that we all make in our lives - in editing in favor of a tone and pace that more cries out to be identified and understood by love, in sexuality, and in our ability to express closely parallel the lives of the tape's five main our true feelings. " Through flashbacks, Gasper each of us. subjects. McKay does not attempt to mediate subtly connects a day in the central charac Mary Lou Uttermohlen's work from her series the experience or moralize on why the lives ter's life with previous events that have shaped represented in this tape are significant or "Who Is Elnora Simms?" documents the re his current life situation. Because of the film's worthwhile - he simply lets them speak for unusual point of view, some miss its central fo duced physical ability many encounter in later life. Through photographs and quotes from her themselves. "Returning the Shadow," by Karen cus which Gasper describes as '1he range of Holmes, takes a diHerent approach in its cine subject, Elnora Simms, Uttermohlen gives us a conflicting emotions (that people in their 60s view into the private world of suffering experi matic and philosophical direction. Holmes' experience including) love, fear, doubt, frustra film explores memory and the subtlety of enced by those afflicted with a debilitating dis tion, lust, and romance." things forgotten in a piece that incorporates ease. These highly charged works avoid ex ploitation by presenting the subject with text from Proust's Remembrances of Things David Scheinbaum's photographs of Miami Past. She deftly references these issues compassion and understanding. In a compara Beach deal with the contemporary myth of "the ble manner, Anne Noggle uses photography to through the repetition of elements including old good life" and the often bleak downside of that explore '1he tension between the iron determi photographs and a scene of a couple looking dream. His images document life among the at an apartment. She calls into question how elderly Jewish citizens of Miami Beach. The nant of age and the individual character of the subject. " Two of her images from her "Stellar we base our understanding of who we are on photographs suggest that instead of reaching documents of our history and on our conscious the "Promised Land," many elderly instead find by Starlight Series" explore this balance using dreamlike staged images. These provocative and unconscious recollections. Her work clear themselves at the border of poverty due to rap idly increasing medical, housing, and food works are filled with humorous exuberance ly addresses the perception of our unfolding and fantasy that serves as an emotional coun lives. costs that can't be adequately met by fixed So cial Security payments. Despite the tribula terpoint to Noggle's other more searching and Two film/videomakers in the exhibition have tions, Scheinbaum has captured a pride and direct portraits in the exhibition - one of which determination in many of the age weathered presents a view of the convalescent phase of used footage of older people to structure high ly individualized works that comment on per faces. her own facelift surgery. The subject of cos metic surgery is also explored in "Skin Deep," sonal myth and personal vision. "How Big Is It?" a videotape by Sarah Drury, is construct a videotape by Karen Messerman. Messerman Judy Somerville's painting, "Somewhere in

ed around scenes taken at a movement class the need for intergenerational understanding. illustrates the view that human lives and for older people. Drury's work, however is not Lucille Short's monologue, "Don't Worry, knowledge never become irrelevant no mailer a documentary about the class; it is instead a We're Just Fine," incorporates humorous gen how ancient they are." visual and aural weaving that speculates on eral observations to comment on aging from creation, growth, and human potential. The her experience as a "senior citizen." In both Jean Gallagher's piece, "Graceful Degrada work of Barbara Hammer has some similarity cases, the works express an optimism about tion," deals with the "sense of uselessness im the possibility of greater understanding and to the structuralist filmmakers of the seventies posed on (the elderly) by the values of our but her work goes beyond an exposition of the hope for increased communication. Holly's American culture." Gallagher makes her state Comets, an improvisational theatre group of ment through a metaphorical mixed medium film's technical properties and into its poetic potential. Hammer's film, "Optic Nerve," incor 16 men and women, 65 years old and older, piece that is based on the computer concept explore similar issues through performance. porates highly manipulated footage of her that describes the reduced level of perfor "Lives of the Comets," their videotape in this grandmother made in the nursing home where mance a computer system can maintain after exhibition, chronicles the group's history and the failure of one of its components. Gallagh she lived. Hammer's work hits us with a bar rage of sounds and images, swamping the documents their creative process. In their er's work laments the loss of respect for hu man values in a culture obsessed by efficiency senses to a degree that conscious reading of statement for this catalog, they stress that they the work is replaced by an almost visceral un 'explore the mailer of aging as it is happening and expediency. derstanding of a life well lived that is nearing to them now as a process, not an event." In its end. all three cases, the particular point of view af Similarly, Neil McGreevy's work addresses the forded by advanced age is used as a source of notions of progress in our culture but in an "Changes," Bill Nolan's video piece, uses the ideas and situations not generally found in emotionally distant non-judgmental way. His mechanics of video technology to construct a contemporary performance. pieces isolate areas of change in the environ metaphor for human aging. Nolan made a ment by documenting a site before and after short video clip of himself saying, "Over time Not all the work in the exhibition is clearly con the demolition of a significant structure. His I've noticed how some things get beller, some nected to aging through depictions of the eld photographic presentations refer to radical things get worse, some things are just differ erly or through explicit reference to the human change in our environment over a period of ent, and some things just stay the same." He aging process. Angela Bowyer's untitled draw time, and allude to the function of memory as dubbed this clip and then made a dub of the ing from her 'Mold Drawing Series" is an expo markers in our own aging process. They stark dub. He repeated this process dozens of time, sition of the process of change through time. ly remind us of the adages "you can never go always copying the copy. Greater audio and The work is the result of the growth of organic back" and "nothing lasts forever." video distortion develops in each successive material on drawing paper The piece re generation of the clip's removal. After dozens minds us of the organiC processes taking Joyce Tenneson's atmospheric photographic of repetitions, the original audio and visual in place in our own bodies throughout our entire images in the exhibition first allractthe viewer formation is lost to aural and visual "noise." life - processes that slowly alter who we through their subtle beauty and then deliver Nolan intends for the viewer to become aware physically are and what we physically become. their softly stated point. Her two photographic of the process he used to make this work and works in the show can be read as metaphors to realize that although aspects of the image for various possibilities of intergenerational re and sound have been changed, the changes Jere Brookshire's maquelle proposing an out lationships. In one image a young man and an are not necessarily bad, only different. In a door sculptural installation uses archaeological old man are standing back to back - no com Zen-like manner the piece urges acceptance reference to suggest forgollen time and knowl munication, no cooperation; in the second im of process and its resulting change. edge. The actual piece, if constructed, would ' age, the young man is holding the older man, resemble ancient ruins and alludes to Brook demonstrating support and caring. The econo The exhibition includes several performance shire's 'understanding of how information trav my of means in these images lends a quality pieces that incorporate oral history and mono els from one generation to another, how ideas of mystery to the scene. While the intergenera logue to explore problems often associated are shared and processed, and how new crea tional reading is certainly an obvious way of with aging. LSS Theatricals' production ot tions come into being." Brookshire feels the approaching the work, the images provide the "Gramma's Allic" uses memories of time past piece "addresses the mystery of past ages and willing viewer a variety of other interpretive op rekindled by objects in an allic to comment on their philosophies of life, aging, and death, and tions.

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Ida Applebroog's work also presents open ended narrative possibilities. "Poor Max" sug gests a mood of sadness and shock, as if the woman on the phone has just received bad news. While the image is non-specific, the tone suggests that someone has just died. We are reminded of the life cycle and the way we sometimes mark our histories by remembering tragic events such as the situation and circum stances surrounding the death of a friend or relative. Ronald Gonzalez's "Aging Chair" is an amal gamation of materials that combine to produce a vision of consolidated time where the toys of childhood and the ravages of age coexist in the same instant. Although the work resists ab solute interpretation, it seems to propose that we concern ourselves less with calendar time and focus instead on the eternal present. Its lack of specificity seems analogous to the sub tle shifts in understanding we are capable of experiencing if we free ourselves of strict ad herence to structure and become adept at liv ing in the moment. Gonzalez's piece, with its interpretative lati tude, provides a good model for dealing with the entire experience of this show and of the process of aging itself. None of us can ever really know what the other is experiencing: I can't feel your sadness, you can't feel my joy. No two people can ever completely agree on what it feels like to age another year. We can only develop clever slogans and neat catego .ries that will work for everyone and no one. We can compile endless data but never really account for the difference in behavior between one 70-year-old who is happy, outgoing, and optimistic, and another who is resigned as though waiting for the end to come. We can construct new theories and plan new social programs, but we can't stop the never ending flow.

chological problems are built around an almost cliched emphasis on life in the present. The knowledge that we can't change the past or control the future frees us to be in the present - with all of its good, bad, and indifferent events. It is my hope that this exhibition will provide some instances of clear revelation for each viewer so that we mayall, at least briefly, truly experience and appreciate this time that is our age. -Dan R. Talley Curator and Special Project Director The FORUM Gallery

This exhibition is dedicated to the citizens of James town, New York, and particularly to the 17+% who are over the age of 65. In September 1989, we mailed out approximately 400 'Calls for Artists" to participate in this exhibition.

These 'calls" were mailed to artists, galleries, mu seums, newsletters, magazines, and the local and regional electronic and print media. We received packets from over 200 artists from all parts of the United States, Canada, and Europe. Most artists in the show responded to the call and were curated into the exhibition based on the material they submit ted to us. Several artists who have significant repu tations for their work on the subject of aging were di rectly invited to participate. All of the artists who took the time to respond to our call and the artists who so graciously responded to our invitation to participate have my deepest grati· tude. I would also like to thank the following people for their enthusiastic support of this exhibition: JCC President Paul Benke; Dean of Administration Gary Winger; Dean of Academic Affairs Ted Smith; the board of The Ralph C. Sheldon Foundation, Inc., the Faculty Student Association of JCC; Bob Hagstrom and the members of the Gallery Development Com mittee; Bridget Johnson and Nelson Garifi; Shelley Grice; Bill Waite; Pattie Belle Hastings; Bob Beach and staff; Art Hand and Steve Volpe; Todd Guynn, Kim Erickson and Tim Plaskett; Norm Carlson and staff; Sue Swanson; Laurie Livingston; Dick Weber and the Social Sciences Division of JCC; Les Bu hite; Mac McCoy, Chautauqua County Office for the Aging; Sara Teranno, Family Service of Jamestown, Inc., Barbara Fendrick, Barbara Fendrick Gallery; Martinia Batan, Ronald Feldman Fine Arts, Inc., and especially Julie Erickson - thanks. -DRT

Many contemporary therapeutic programs es tablished to treat a variety of physical and psy

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Over the last several years, we have commemo crow's-feet ironed out. You could get your empty people who should, as Ida Applebroog poignantly bosom pumped up. And it would all be a dreadful expresses in one of her paintings, "Hurry Up and rated the 20th anniversary of major events in his waste of time, money, and energy. The people Die." By using this phrase as the title for her tory. In the year 1983, we acknowledged the painting and by including it within the picture it you pay to carry out these tortures will tell you passing of two decades since the death of John you look wonderful but the young would still sniff self, she shocks us into awareness; who is F Kennedy and, in 1985, that of Malcolm X. Then in 1988, we marked the 20th anniversary of you out as not one of them ." And they will be speaking? A predella of a young couple dancing sniffed out because growing old in the United has the aforementioned phrase written as a cap Martin Luther King's death. Now, in 1990, revi States means losing a sense of self. Although tion. The incongruity between the visual image sionist and traditional art historians alike are wit women, in general, are perceived in many socie and the unloving words puzzle the viewer at first, nessing the 20th birthday of the feminist art movement.' Since so many years have passed, ties as the Other, an aged woman is put into that but upon further inspection, one notices the ten role with double intensity. However, we do this to sion which exists between the two figures. In fac\' there is a need to look back and analyze the progress women have made - in the home, in ourselves for "Only the invention of someone else in all three sections of the painting, there is a se can establish an individual as an Other." 2 Unlike vere tension which permeates the canvas the workplace, and in the arts. oriental cultures where growing old, for both the each couple is locked in struggle, in agitation. male and the female, is not necessarily a process Which one should "Hurry up and die"? Or why There is also a need to examine the passing of time which has affected all those who began the which is feared but often envied, western cultures should one be saying this to the other? And if movement; when once they created art about still find it difficult to accept the reality of aging. they are not speaking to each other, then who their procreative bodies, now they create art Being an "elder" is a position of respect and ad are they speaking to or about? In "Promise I which gives power to their postcreative bodies as miration among the Asian cultures; not only does Won't Die" (1985). which is in this exhibition, one well as their "coming of age." Finally, they have it signity wisdom, but it also demands the security has a feeling that these two paintings (both paint reached their moment of ideal maturity - if only of the young to act as caretakers of the old. Un ed in the same year) are in dialogue with one an the media would allow women to age naturally fortunately, the signals we receive in the west other. There is a sense of loneliness, or waiting. and thus, enjoy the process rather than inundate from television, print ads, and music never let us The predella in this painting shows a couple sit our senses with youth-oriented magic potions. forget that life is for the young (or at least those ting side by side. The woman appears elderly; Those of us who were youngsters when these who look young). In fact and in fiction, we are led the man might be her son. They are not locked in women began fighting for their rights (and, in to believe that to lose one's youth is to lose one's tension with each other as the couples in "Hurry turn, our rights too) are probably bound up in the self. The shells that remain are all that is visible Up and Die" are. Rather, they seem locked in ap imago society has fed us. As the ad for a youth and in time, the shells become invisible as well. prehension. protecting lotion says, "Why grow old gracefully? However, this is where certain artists fight against Fight it with Oil of Olay." gerontophobia. Applebroog's works rely heavily on the psycho logical undercurrents that exist between human Women who are approaching thirtysomething In this exhibition, AGING: The Process, The Per beings. The imagery and content of her work can learn a lesson or two from those women who ception, we are able to confront our personai' zero in on the pain of the human condition; she is are fortysomething, fiftysomething, and sixtyso fears about aging and death as well as see how not afraid to paint people waiting for death wheth mething. As Germaine Greer wrote in an article artists use various media to comment on socie er it be due to disease, old age, or abuse and of entitled, "Letting Go" for Vogue in May 1986, ty's role in perpetuating those fears. While some ten the figures in her paintings suffer from any "Ours is a difficult culture to age in....You could of us believe that the elderly remain assets in the one of the above. In fact, paintings such as "Hill fight matronliness. You could dye your hair. You .. community and that growing old need not be crest State" (1983-84). "Riverdale Home for the could diet until you were as thin as a rail and then looked upon as negative, there are those who Aged" (1984), and "Promise I Won't DieT (1985), get your collapsed jowls hiked up and your continue to treat the old as nuisances, useless directly address the issue of how society neglects

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and is fearful of the aged and/or the ill. But peo ple aren't only afraid of those who are already old; they are afraid of growing old themselves. These three paintings "conjure up the incongruity of suburban landscaping around what amount to prisons for the insane, the old, and others whose families no longer wish to take care of them.' J Applebroog recognizes that the elderly are treat ed very similarly to people who are suffering from disease or abuse - the decay and fragility these people experience do not always elicit sympathy or care. Instead, it proves easier for everyone if these people would just go away. Applebroog won't let them go away and pushes the viewer to take in what they so do not want to accept. In her painting "Poor Max' (1987), death and grief saturate the viewer. The fear of death far ex ceeds the fear of aging. "Poor Max' is the subject and here, the name itself is ironic because of its association with the dog in the picture - Max be ing a common name for a dog. However, there is an ambiguous tone in the painting regarding to whom the name refers. A woman grasps a tele phone in her hands and we can assume the news she has just received was bad. The back ground to the five panels is painted black (a sym bol of death) which suggests too clearly that someone has already "hurried up and died.' In a powerful and unsettling painting entitled "Beulahland (for Marilyn Monroe)" (1987), Apple broog shows us what happens to the ultimate American sex symbol when she does not die pre maturely. Marilyn Monroe, who continues to serve America's (and, perhaps, other countries') need for the iconic beauty, shall forever remain young. Death at 36 allowed her to stay 36, but Applebroog took the liberty to depict Monroe at the age she would have been today, 61 Posed in a famous and typical Monroe stance, the aged Monroe looks painfully out of place. Dishevelled and sagging, she has finally reached the stage she had always expressed discomfort with. As a photograph caption attributed to her reads, "Grav ity catches up with us all.' • Monroe would proba bly have never matured into an older woman. She would have grown old, but she would have fought it in every possible way.

Ida Applebroog is only one of many artists who find it important to work on this subject. With the realization that so many artists (in particular, fem inist artists) who were in their 20s and 30s in the 1970s and are now in their 40s and 50s, we are seeing more work which deals with the subject of what it is like to be entering middle-age. These artists need not ask the question, ''what is the perception of middle-age?" Rather they know enough to ask, "Why is middle-age perceived as a taboo?" In recent years, the statistics of women between 35 and 50 having their first child are phenomenal. After having wrestled with the diffi cult choice between establishing a career or start ing a family, older women are now deciding to have children. Sometimes this decision comes too late, but the number of women who are suc cessfully giving birth to healthy babies is inspiring to all those who are just beginning to confront this dilemma. In the early 1970s, many feminist artists demonstrated essentialist beliefs and focused on the body, often showing the passage into woman hood as being through the experience of mother hood: "It is in maternity that woman fulfills her physiological destiny; it is her natural 'calling, since her whole organic structure is adapted for the perpetuation of the species" , (emphasis mine). Now that these women have had children and are facing menopause and middle-age, the female body is in a state of crisis. Should we ac cept the image and role patriarchy has set up for women as being only useful and desirable when able to bear offspring? Why have "Ruling men and the Church spent 300 years persecuting witches, i.e. sexual menstruating women" 6 only to persecute women again when they can no longer menstruate; when they can no longer act as life-producing vessels? Although Mary Kelly's work was not available for this exhibition, she must be included in this essay for she has produced significant work relating to the issue of aging. Her much referred-to piece "Post-Partum Document" (1973-79), documented the first seven years of her son's life. During that time, she charted the deep connection between her body and her son's, both physically and emo tionally. As he grew older, so did she and his con nection to her womb grew fainter. In her most re cent work, "Interim" (1984-89), Kelly addresses

the political, cultural, and economic my1hs sur rounding the aging woman. While Dustin Hoff man's Benjamin found excitement and danger in Anne Bancroft's Mrs. Robinson in the film The Graduate, most women who are past their child bearing years discover that they are no longer considered sexy, appealing, or powerful. In fact, just the opposite occurs and they become power less because power only "accrues to a woman in a patriarchy by virtue of her body's procreative capacities and its potential for fetishization, . [therefore] the aging or aged female body be comes a relic, a site of loss." ' "Interim" locates the woman at the moment of awakening and tran sition. She realizes that she is gradually entering a stage in her life where she has been "betrayed by age...separated forever from sexl social my1hs...[and] mothering stereotypes." At this moment, she is practically invisible with no cate gory, no role to place herself under or in. Like the young southern belle played by Bette Davis in the film Mr. Skeffington, who quickly fades into a withered old woman, she cannot go back but she also refuses to go forward. As Mary Kelly has said, "She is looking back at something lost, ac knowledging perhaps that 'being a woman' was only a brief moment in her life." • However, the important work which is being pro duced by feminist artists today allows the viewer to either think about his/her own aging process or see himlherself in the work. From childhood to adulthood, mirrors playa significant (perhaps, too significant) role in our lives. We perceive our selves according to the image that is reflected in a piece of glass. Juliet Mitchell has compared a child's first response to its own image in a mirror to that of its identification of itself as a whole be ing, "not a mess of uncoordinated movements and feelings." 10 Not having been able to perceive him/herself prior to discovering the mirror, except through his or her emotional state or physical awkwardness, "this first identification with the im age clearly suggests that it is not only the mirror that is a reflection, but also the very 'identity' the child forms." " All through our lives, we rely on the mirror to inform us of our identity. In "Corpus" (Part I of "Interim"), Kelly purposely uses reflective plexiglass to interrupt the viewer's

•

direct vision of the text or image. Rather than be free to read/see the pieces clearly, one is con stantly moving between the mirrored image of oneself and the speaker. This persistent shift be tween reader and read creates a relationship be tween what one is seeing and how one sees one self. Although "Corpus" acts as a first person account of how the female body functions (or should I say dysfunctions?) in society as an aged and thus, aHered female body, a male viewer can arrive at a better understanding of what it means to be female moving from young to old. Society has trained us to see men grow distinguished while women just grow old; however, reality often puts things back into perspective. We all grow old and become faced with the realization that death looms closer. Athena Tacha's powerful book "Reaching Fifty: The Process of Aging, II," provides her readers with a more literal, straightforward analysis of her own aging. Like Kelly, Tacha is primarily a visual artist who has also chosen written language to document the changes that occurred within her self, both physically and psychologically. From her "pocket pieces" series, "Reaching Fifty," is a journal-like document which records Tacha's ag ing process. She acknowledges that turning fifty pushed her into a different category; that of mid dle-age. As mentioned previously, when, in an cient cuHures, this marked the peak of one's life (particularly for men), this also elevated one to a position of respect and wisdom. No longer does our contemporary society put such value on liv ing; where the young used to profit from the ex perience of their elders, "in a fast-changing, tech nology-dominated culture, old knowledge soon becomes obsolete, and young minds can master fresh information quicker - and move on faster. Personally, I tend to agree with the Ancients, and 11m quite impressed that I have managed to live half a century!" Tacha notes the various changes which took shape in her body, all gradual at first, but indica tors of age all the same. Even before she reached forty, she noticed more white hairs; by forty-two, she found a white pubic hair. Since then, her teeth have become more fragile and her eyesight less sharp. One of the major discoveries

•

she makes is the fact that her hands have aged most noticeably. Suddenly, there is a feeling that disease (which is often associated with old age) is setting in: "Already in my late thirties they [hands) had started having a few brown spots that turned gradually darker. At age forty-two, a painful little lump appeared on the second joint of my left middle finger, the first sign of arthritis, I thought... .Similar pains appeared, on and off, in a hip-joint, a knee, or a shoulder." For the reader, she embodies deterioration and we begin to feel a sharp decline taking place. Throughout this account, Tacha is poignantly honest; so much so that the reader can see him! herself in the work. Like Kelly, we are looking into a mirror, a reflective piece of glass, where we can recognize ourselves and what we are or will be experiencing in time. The artists are our mirrors - they compel us to see what we often wish to deny. However, these artists do not believe that they reflect only negativity. Instead, they seek to expose and thus, dispose the false illusion that age negates beauty and vitality. Agreed, the changes which occur in one's body while aging are not always pleasant. In fact, some changes are often uncomfortable and painful (fragility of bones, loss of clear eyesight or hearing, etc). And for women, aging introduces the process of men opause which often proves psychologically con fusing as well as physically painful. Women had been warned as early as 1945 about the reality and socio-interpretation of this natural phenome non. Helene Deutsch informed women about the topic of climacterium in her book, The Psycholo gy of Women: "Woman has ended her existence as bearer of a future life, and has reached her natural end - her partial death - as servant of the species. She is now en~aged in an active struggle against her decline." Deutsch also not ed the external changes such as the skin's loss of tension and "a masculine growth of hair" IJ on the face and abdomen. Still, we need to disasso ciate ourselves from the way we, in a Western culture and society, judge each other. Our harsh judgements about the aged are socially con structed and have little to do with our actual bod ies. Why do we place less value or importance on a person (women, in particular) according to the number of wrinkles around one's eyes, the num

ber of white hairs which spring from one's head, or the evolution of one's body from being repro ductive to post-productive. Tacha tries to exam ine this phenomenon "because I (and others) have often perceived beauty in middle-aged and even very old faces ....So, if I manage to remove the stigma of age, then perhaps I can look at the present changes on my face as structural altera tions ('rearranging of features' to an extent), which have produced a different face'" not neces sarily aworse face. Again, as in Kelly's work, Tacha wants to go for ward with positive anticipation rather than fearful trepidation. Although she acknowledges that looking fOlWard also means looking toward death, Tacha agrees with Kelly that being a woman should not be a brief moment in [a woman's) life. Mary Lou Uttermohlen uses her camera to docu ment the last stage in one woman's life in her se ries, "Who is Elnora Simms?" When comparing all of the aforementioned work with Uttermoh len's, we can see how these artists know the power which is created when combining an im age with text. Four black and white photographs of a woman stricken with arthritis face the viewer. The woman (Elnora Simms), speaks to us with her eyes and the handwritten tex1s fill in the gaps. We learn very quickly that she lives with pain; that being old and handicapped with disease means being lonely - Uttermohlen forces us to ask why these two things should naturally and normally lead to solitude. By making the subject someone else rather than focus on the personal (Uttermohlen, herself), the artist opens this forum on aging to the public. As opposed to Kelly and Tacha, Uttermohlen acts as the messenger and her model, Simms, is the message. The first photograph introduces us (viewerl reader) to Elnora Simms and her arthritis. Unlike Tacha, whose body represents the beginning of bodily deterioration, Simms is the body deteriorat ed. In the text, she wished that the doctor had told her that she had cancer rather than arthritis so that "at least then I would die." In the second photograph, she confesses that she could not live without her special lamp, one which goes on with a touch. Her elongated, swollen-jointed fingers

reach out to lightly touch the side of this lamp. The deep chiaroscuro which moves throughout the image, subtly suggests the dense loneliness of Simms' room. Without this special lamp, she would live in darkness because she "can't turn a normal lamp on, period...cause you see you have to push a button and I can't push the button." But in reality, Simms does live in darkness regardless of the light from her lamp; by living alone and helpless, society does not see her and she is, thus, rendered invisible, conveniently covered up by darkness.

edge is how these artists, who have given us works which come not only from creativity but also from deep, soul searching reflection, have given us lessons we can use.

the catatog, Ida Applebroog: Happy Families (Houston, TX: Contemporary Arts Museum, 1990), page 13. 4. Anthony Summers, Goddess: The Secret Lives of Marilyn Monroe (New Yorll: Macmillan Publishing Co., 1986), page 240-41 .

In the catalogue interview which accompanied her exhibition "Self-Portrait: An Installation," at 5. Simone de Beauvoir, The Second Sex (New Yorll, The New Museum of Contemporary Art, Pat Steir NY' Vintage Books, 1974), page 540. expressed her belief that the reason why Rem 6. Monica Sjoo, an inlerview with the artist conducted brandt's self-portraits were used as reference by Moira Vincentelli and pubtished in Visibly Female guides on aging in an old people's home in HoI (New Yorll, NY' Universe Books, 1988), page 84. land was because the pictures were so touching. In these self-portraits by Rembrandt, who record 7 Marcia Tucker, "Picture This: An tntroduction to 'tnter ed the wrinkles and changes in his own face over There is also a sense that once we reach a cer im'" an essay from the catatog, Mary Kelly: Interim (New the years, one could see another human being tain stage in our lives, we wait for death (a paral Yorll, NY' The New Museum of Conlemporary Art, age. These were not pictures done up to make lel to Applebroog's work). As we get older, the 1990), page 18. the subject look heroic, romantic, or young. death of others is harder to avoid and we begin to 8. Arlene Raven, Exposures: Women and Their All (Pa These were pictures made to represent reality, see much of it around us. In the third segment, sadena, California: New Sage Press, 1989), page 84. the passing of time. As Steir explained of her own Simms admits that her memories are relived in work, "all art is a kind of self-portrait...The older her mind - the body or the physical part of our 9. Mary Kelly, from the epigraph of a calalog essay by you get, the older I get, the more temporary I selves exists only to remind us that death is im Griselda Pollock entitled, 'Interventions in History: On know I am. The more people there are who die pending. Tacha explains in "Reaching Fifty," "So, the Historical, the Subjective, and the Textual," pub around me, the more clearly I am able to meas it is not that one's body gets older and weak lished in Mary Kelly: Interim (New Yorll, NY' The New ure the important qualities versus the insignifi er....More to the point, one's relatives and close Museum of Contemporary Art, 1990), page 39. friends start dying or getting incapacitated, and cance of a life's experiences. As there are.. _how 10. Juliet Mitchell, Psychoanalysis and Feminism: one faces for the first time seriously...real old age many selves in one person, you're never the Freud, Reich, Laing and Women (New Yorll, NY' Vin and death." Depending on how well we took care same self you were. Everyone is always chang tage Books, 1975), page 40. of ourselves in earlier years as well as our heredi ing. Even the ones who resist change are chang ing." .. With age, dying becomes more a fact of tary roulette wheels, we can anticipate losing 11. Ibid some of our capacities and faculties to varying life than ever, leaving people afraid to look at degrees. Being elderly, as in Simms' case, has themselves as old. Still, it is necessary to ac 12. Helen Deutsch, The Psychology of Women: Volume restricted her to her home; her only "social life" is knowledge that growing old is not the beginning II: Motherhood (New Yorll, NY' Grune and StraHon, found by the window, w'atching people and occu of the end. Instead of having us believe that time 1945), page 459. pying herself by trying to figure out where every hangs heavy, have us believe that we can still be 13. Ibid, pages 460-61 . one else is going. For Simms, sitting at her win worthwhile even when we reach middle-age and dow is "getting out" because she knows that she beyond. 14. Pat Steir, "Self-Portrait: An Installation," an interview will never "get out there again" But do any of us between Marcia Tucker and Pat Steir (New Yorll, NY' ever bring the outside in? Why is there a feeling -Evelyn B. Leong The New Museum of Contemporary Art, 1987), page that no one visits with Simms (and, more general New York, New York 10. ly, with the elderly)? Notes: Evelyn B. Leong is an independent curator By allowing us to witness several frozen mo who lives in New York City. She recently curat 1. This date is arguable as lhis was actually the second ments in this elderly woman's life, we are made slage of an earlier feminist movement. The year 1968 ed "The Book as ArVThe Book in Art," and to confront our own destinies. However, where can also marll the beginning of this movement; there "Flaneur/Flaneuse: Out for a Stroll," at the Bar we try throughout most of our lives to negotiate fore, the anniversary date is somewhat vague. bara Fendrick Gallery, New York, and "Women the delay of aging, we realize, through Uttermoh in the City," at the Hunter Art Gallery in New len's work, that we do not want to end up living 2. Simone de Beauvoir, The Second Sex (New Yorll, York. NY' Vintage Books, 1974), page 301 . such a life as Simms' But we also realize that, as a society, we neglect what we deem useless. 3. Marilyn A. Zeitlin, "Happy Families," an essay from Therefore, what we must determine and acknowl

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Art Fair, Frankfurt, W. Germany, 1990.

that lurk - mute and malignant - behind "Art at the Edge," organized by the High Museum of Art,

everyday events are her subjects.Applebroog Atlanta, GA, 1989 (traveled to Carnegie Mellon Art Gal New York New York translates current events into human events, lerY, Pittsburgh, PA, 1989). .

for she probes the broader political issues at "Nostrums," Ronald Feldman Fine Arts, New York,

"Ida Applebroog surveys our social land NY, 1989.

hand with arare, and often wrenching,sense scape with a sharp and uncompromising "Ida Applebroog ," curated by Andrea Miller-Keller,

of intimacy." Wadsworth Atheneum, Hartford, CT, 1988.

eye. Her work addresses what she calls the "Painting, Prints, and Artist's Books," The Picker Art

-Susan Krane, excerpted from Terra Infirma: "psychopathology" of contemporary life; GallerY, Colgate University, Hamilton, NY 1988.

Applebroog's Recent Paintings, an essay published in she chronicles the ills, paranoias, violence, Solo exhibition at University of Kentucky Art Museum,

Art at the Edge: Ida Applebroog, 1989, High Museum of psychological and sexual tensions, and LeXington, KY 1987

Art, Atlanta, GA. social conventions that circumscribe human Reviews, Publications, Catalogs:

• Poor Max, 1987, oil on canvas, 32 X 48 inches. interaction. Her art is often about power and Ida Applebroog: Happy Families, AFifteen- Year Survey, Courtesy of Ronald Feldman Fine Arts, New York, NY catalog with essays by Marilyn Zeitlin, Thomas

how power works, examined through the • Promise I Won't Ole, 1989, lithograph, 36 X 48 Sokolowski, and LowerY Sims, ContemporarY Art Mu roles of both the aggressor and the victim. inches. Ccurtesy of Ronald Feldman Fine Arts, seum, Houston, TX, 1990.

Applebroog confronts this charged terrain New York, NY "Medusa Redux, Ida Applebroog and the Spaces of Post

with an empathy that is rarely found in art Modernity: by Mira Schor, Artforum, 1990.

Selected Exhibitions:

Ida Applebroog, Nostrums, Bel/adona, catalog with es today. The anger of her social critique is "Ida Applebroog," Riverside Studios, London,

say by Carlo McCormick, Ronald Feldman Fine Arts,New

saddened and subjective, for Applebroog's England, 1990.

York, NY, 1989.

"ldaApplebroog: Happy Families, AFifteen-Year Survey"

focus is on the individual; her pointed sar Ida Applebroog, catalog with essays by Ronald Feldman,

(traveling retrospective) organized by Marilyn Zeitlin,

casm is always warmed by compassion for Carrie Rickey, Lucy R. Lippard, Linda R. McGreevy,

ContemporarY Arts Museum, Houston, TX, 1990.

Carter Ratcliff, Ronald Feldman Fine Arts, New York, NY

the lives at stake. The "collective anxieties" Solo exhibition at Barbara Gross Galerie at the Frankfurt

IDA APPLEBROOG

1987

•

Ida Applebroog, "Poor Max," 1987 oil on canvas, 32 X48 inches. Photo by D. James Dee, courtesy of Ronald Feldman Fine Arts, New York, NY

MICHAEL AURBACH Nashville

Ten n e sse e

My existence is constantly burdened with a large trailer (fortransporting art). So here is living proof that you can actually "take it with you."

"Aurbach: Sculpture," solo exhibition at Arkansas State

University, Jonesboro, AK, 1989.

"Birmingham Biennial V," Birmingham Museum 01 ArI,

Birmingham, AL, 1989.

Reviews, Publications, Catalogs, and Awards:

"Final Self-Portrait" is awork from aseries Tennessee Arts Commission Individual Arlist Fellow'ship

-MA called "Final Portraits." Based on the ex Recipient, 1990.

pressions "body of work" and "corpus," the • Final Sell Portrait, 1985, plywood, wheels, electrical "Getting Better All the Time, " by Janet Kutner, The Dallas

series reflects avariety of issues or themes conduit, photos, 60 X 24 X 144 inches. Courtesy 01 Morning News, Dallas, TX, 1989.

Bernice Steinbaum Gallery, New York, NY "Art Review," by Catherine Fox, The Atlanta Journal and

related to life and death. Among the themes Constitution, Atlanta, GA, 1989.

represented are death as a journey and the Selected Exhibitions:

"Excellence '88," by Tom Moody, ArtPapers, Atlanta,GA,

"Aurbach: Sculpture," solo exhibition at Bernice

fact that one's identity in life and at the time 1989. .

Steinbaum Gallery, New York, NY, 1991.

of death is often synonymous with one's "Memento Mori: Memorials by Michael Aurbach," solo

Education:

profession. exhibition at East Carolina University, Greenville,

M.F.A., Southern Methodist University, Dallas, TX, 1983.

NC, 1990.

B.F.A., University 01 Kansas, Lawrence, KS, 1981.

This self-portrait not only attempts to echo "Aurbach: Sculpture," solo exhibition at Midwestern

M.A., University 01 Kansas, Lawrence, KS, 1981.

the themes just mentioned, but it pokes fun State University, Wichita Falls, TX, 1990.

B.S.J. and B.A., University 01 Kansas Lawrence, KS, at artistic vanity. The museum crate's inte "1990 Mid-Year Exhibition: Part One," Memphis Center

1976 and 1974 respectively. lor Contemporary Art, Memphis, TN , 1990.

rior is my final exhibition. I am giving the "Michael Aurbach : Final Portrait," solo exhibition at

famous painters the wall space while I, the Macon Museum 01 Arts and Sciences, Macon,GA, 1989.

sculptor get the museum's floor space. "Aurbach: Sculpture," solo exhibition at University 01

Fame has deadened these paintings and Kansas, Lawrence, KS , 1989.

hopefully the same will happen to my work.

Michael Aurbach, "Final Sell Portrait, " 1985, plywood, wheels, electrical conduit, photos, 60 X 24 X 144 inches. Courtesy 01 Bernice Steinbaum Gallery, New York, NY.

•

ANGELA BOWYER Atlanta

Georgia

• Work from the series, Mold Drawings, 1989, mold on rophyll green and purple and orange, spores paper, 30 X 22 inches. on a gentle wind , dandelion caught in an Selected Exhibitions:

updraft, give birth to houses of sod, a gar "Earth Affair," Atlanta Gallery ASsociation, Atlanta, GA,

den, the smell of the jungle.

Fertile stink of oil and sewage, green mold, 1990.

"Woman As Protagonist," New Vision Gallery, Atlanta,

organic, black mud, germs, bacteria, infec Time bound, pasteurized , homogenized, GA, 1990.

tion, ugly landscape, dirty earth, kinetic sterile hospital-clinic, cold blue, varying "Ant Art/Art Ant," Gallery 100, Allanta College of Art,

potential, map/time, dust particles, tendrils degrees of opacity, meaningless coded Atlanta, GA, 1990.

of fungus, curling , geometrically progress messages,hungry machine, grey, archivally Education:

ing, endless movement, process, proce contained/bound, synthesized city of pre B.A., Atlanta College of Art, Atlanta, GA, t 990.

dure, document, sediment, silt, skeleton, cious curation. Representation, processed remnant, ruins' tale, the scum in the bath smell of indirect death (life), immaterial tub, deer tracks, a whiff of perfume, it's reference, the record , the document of the abbreviated and compacted (history), frag reference, hollow frame/boundary, subju mented, decomposed, compost, burnt for gated context, defined by negatives and ests, waste (shit), fertilizer fertile, birth, absence, suspended , ageless, pickled insect lives, the bodies diSintegrate in chlo specimens in a laboratory/museum. - AB

.,"., '.

,..

,/"

. ~.

•

• ,

Angela Bowyer, detail of a piece from the series, "Mold Drawings," 1989, mold on paper, 30 X 22 inches.

JERE BROOKSHIRE Atlanta

Georgia

1988.

"... The idea behind this piece comes from "LaGrange National XIII." Lamar Dodd Art Center

my understanding of how information trav laGrange. GA. 1988. •

els from one generation to another how "The Atlanta Show." Nexus Contemporary Art Center.

ideas are shared and processed and how Atlanta. GA. 1987

"Untitled." Ersatz Gallery. Atlanta. GA. 1986.

new creations come into being. This piece ..Juried Alumni Exhibition." The Atlanta College of Art

abstractly add resses the mystery of past Gallery. Atlanta. GA. 1986.

ages and their philosophies of life, aging Reviews. Publlcallons. Catalogs:

and death, and illustrates the view that hu "Site Sculptures. Words. Georgia Roots: Arts Festival of

man lives and knowledge never become Atlanta." by JW. Cullum. Art Papers. Atlanta. GA. 1988.

irrelevant no matter how ancient they are." "Gene AlicoH. Jere Brookshire. Dennis Darling " by

"This piece will consist of the construction of four concrete forms, grouped together in ~n ou~door area. The shapes are angular ImplYing pyramids or corners piercing through the earth's surface. Each piece will be highly textured with myriad symbols carved into the surface. Each form will be Leslie Schworm. Art Papers. Atlanta. GA. 1987 .

-Excerpted from aproject proposal from Jere Brookshire cracked in various areas to allow light from "Sculpture in its Own Light." by Ellen Berman Fix.

to The FORUM Gallery. Southern Homes. Atlanta. GA. 1986.

inside the piece to glow outward. The light "Light and Color Cast Brookshire's Work in Illusive but

• MaqueHe for a Sculptural Installallon for' AGING: ~ill fluctuate, as well as change color to Gestural GlOW." The Atlanta Journal and Constitution.

The Process, The Percepllon' 1990. mixed mediums. Imply movement or power within the forms. Atlanta. GA. 1985.

24 X24 X 8 inches. Each form will also contain one heavy duty Educallon:

Selected Exhibitions:

~peaker which will continuously play multi B.F.A.• Atlanta College of Art. Atlanta. GA. 1973. "Neon." New Visions Gallery. Atlanta. GA. 1989.

hngua~ sound~ (thousands of voices) that "New Works." Dalton Fine Arts Guild. Dalton. GA. 1989.

blend Into a single voice. "Regional Site Work." Atlanta Arts Festival. Atlanta. GA.

Jere Brookshire. "Proposal Drawing for aSculptural Installation for 'AGING: The Process. The Perception·... 1990. chalk on black paper. 12 X 14 inches.

•

Los Angeles

c California A N E

My goal in making "Libido," as well as my other work, is to move beyond stereotypes and to use film as ameans of examining the reality of people's lives. This particular film was an attempt to briefly examine the persistence of romance and sexuality among the elderly. -LC • Libido. 16 mm film (screened in 3/4 inch videotape format). running time 4:30. Education:

Graduate Certificate. Film Studies. University of Califor

nia. Santa Cruz. CA. 1986.

B.A.. University of California, Santa Cruz, CA, 1985.

Liz Cane, stills from "Libido," 16 mm film

(screened in 3/4 inch videotape format) , running time 4:30.

•

S A R A H

D R U R Y

Brooklyn

New

York

My work in photography, video and in my life is an effort to locate and sustain mo ments of wholeness within a world that is often fragmented . These fragments are the categories into which identity is broken down, broken up, fixed : woman , lesbian, child, elderly, history, holiness, abandon ment, redemption . Words which identify, but may also cover up, rupture, the con nections underlying the definitions. My concern is finding the thread that moves me through the divisions inside myself and the separations between people, finding the movement that connects. -so • How Big Is It. 1990. 1/2 inch videotape. running time 7:00.

Selected Exhibitions:

"New Television." PBS broadcast of "Virginia Dare's

Vision." by Sarah Drury. April 22. 1990.

"World Wide Video," The Hague, Netherlands, 1989.

"Literacy on the Table, " Longwood Gallery, Bronx, NY,

1989; also at Franklin Furnace, New York, NY, 1989, and

Hallwalls Contemporary Art Center, Buffalo, NY 1989.

"The Fairy Tale: Politics, Desire and Everyday Life,"

Artists Space, 1986.

"Spiritual America," curated by Collins & Milazzo, CEPA,

Buffalo, NY, 1986.

"Gender Polemics, " StokkerlStikker Gallery, New York,

NY 1986.

"Art Against Apartheid ," Public Image Gallery, New

York, NY 1984.

"Adams's House in Paradise," Storefront for Architec ture, New York, NY 1984.

Reviews, Publications, Catalogs:

"The Student Body," by David Trend, Afterimage,

Rochester, NY 1989.

Sarah Drury responds to David Trend's article, Afterimage,

Rochester, NY 1989.

Education:

M.A., International Center of Photography, New York

University, New York, NY 1986.

B.A., Barnard College, New York, NY 1981.

Sarah Drury, still from "How Big Is It," 1990, 1/2 inch

videotape, running time 7:00.

•

SHARON l. ElliS New

York

New

York

My aim is to create a collection of people fastened to paper - bone, sinew, eye, muscle, flesh - captured and pinned in a frozen moment on the margin of time and memory. Our reality envelopes us like afragile cara pace - we're curious about what's outside, but want someone else to look. In the fetal position, the cornered solitude, do we see the real identity, or areflection of our own nostalgias and fears? -SE • Untitled. 1988, charcoal and pencil on paper, 68 X40 inches. Selected Exhibitions:

"An Uncommon Subject," Brainerd Art Gallery, SUNY at

Potsdam, NY 1988.

"Self-Exposure," Smithtown Arts Council, Saint James,

NY 1986.

· Paper Oolls. " Smithtown Arts Council. Saint James.

NY. 1985.

"Three Person Show," Palm Gallery.Brooklyn. NY, 1985.

"Two Woman Show," Center Gallery, Albany, NY 1982.

"Group ShOW," College of SI. Rose Gallery, Albany, NY

1980.

"Graphic Artists Group ShOW," Center Gallery, Albany,

NY 1979.

"Two Person ShOW," SUNY Art Gallery, Albany, NY

1979.

Reviews, Publications, Catalogs:

An Uncommon Subject, catalog published by Brainerd

Art Gallery, Potsdam, NY, 1986.

"Not So Innocent Paper Dolls," by Helen Harrison, New

York Times, New York, NY, 1985.

Bradley National Print and Drawing Exhibition (catalog),

Peoria, IL, 1977

Education:

M.A., Fine Art, State University of New York at Albany,

Albany, NY 1975.

MA, University of Texas Health Science Center, Dallas,

TX,1970.

B.SA, University of Texas at Austin , Austin, TX, 1966.

Sharon L. Ellis, "Untitled," 1988, charcoal and pencil on paper, 68 X40 inches.

•

JEAN GALLAGHER Chico

California

Although trained as apainter, Iwas attracted to art which embodied the idea rather than the medium in the early eighties. In addition, the interactive role of the viewer became vitaito my work as it evolved into multimedia installations. Depending on the needs of an idea, I have combined a variety of media including painting, photography, sculpture, sound, computer graphics, video, and computerized slide projections.

asense of uselessness imposed on them by the values of our American culture.

Selected Exhibitions:

"Bizarre Games," Window on Broad, Philadelphia Col lege of Art and Design, Philadelphia, PA, 1990.

"Kam eflazh," Nexus Contemporary Art Center. Atlanta,

While reading about computer graphics, I GA, 1989, and Pyramid Arts, Rochester, NY, 1989.

came across aterm called "graceful degra "Party Animals," Center for Contemporary Art and Per dation," which was defined as " ... asystem, formance, Henry Street Settlement, New York, NY 1988.

"Aftermath," Spirit Square Center for the Arts, Charlotte,

that, after failure of one of its components, NC.1987

can continue to perform at some reduced "Scarcity," P.S. 1, Long Island City, NY, 1986.

level of performance" (from The Computer Reviews, Publlcallons, Catalogs:

Glossary: The Complete Illustrated Desk "Jim Lewis and Jean Gallagher: Bizarre Games," by Lora

Reference by Alan Freedman). The perver McKenna, Art Papers, Atlanta, GA, July/August, 1990.

sion of our contemporary value system "Kam e flazh," by Jean Gallagher, Independent Spirit,

became self-evident: our reverence for Columbia, SC, 1989.

"Party Animals," by Jane Kessler, Artvu, Chapel Hill, NC,

machine over ourselves. 1988.

"Jean Gallagher:Aftermath," by Betsy Bilger,Art Papers,

The piece, "Graceful Degradation," produced In general, my work stands in reaction to Atlanta, GA, 1987

specifically for this exhibition, acts as a human behavioral activities that are de "Jean Gallagher, Scarcity," by Craig Pleasants, Art Pa

metaphor for this blasphemy. structive to the individual. The work derives pers, Atlanta, GA, 1987

from responses to situations I have experi -JG Education:

enced or feel strongly towards. The call for Doctor of Arts candidate, New York University, New

• Graceful Degradation, 1990, computer hardware, proposals for "AGING: The Process, The York, NY, 1990.

plexiglas, computer graphics, b&w photography, wood, M.F.A., University of South Carolina, Columbia, SC,

Perception," touched upon feelings I have plastic, 84 X 28 X 4 inches (approximate). 1980.

maintained about the elderly for many years: B.F.A., University of South Carolina, Columbia, SC, 1975.

Jean Gallagher, "Graceful Degradation," 1990, computer hardware, plexiglas, computer graphics, b&w photography. wood, plastic, 84 X28 X 4 inches (approximate).

•

of the slice-of-life contemporary short story. It is a film that as one reviewer phrased it, "becomes a celebration of the little things that give life meaning."

Selected Exhibitions:

"Bombay International film festival," Bombay, India,

Astoria New York 1990.

"What's Happening?" The Museum of Modern Art, New

York, NY, 1989.

"An Empty Bed" is a sensual and evocative "Chicago International film festival," Chicago, Il, 1989.

dramatic, fictional film about an aging gay The film is intended to present a three "Sao Paulo International film festival," Sao Paulo,Brazil,

man that challenges its audience's percep 1989.

dimensional portrait of asoon-to-be elderly "Uppsala film festival," Uppsala, Sweden, 1989.

tion of the choices that we all make in our man. Although the film touches on and "Denver International film festival," Denver, CO, 1989.

lives-in love, in sexuality, and in our ability explores issues related to aging and being "Houston International film festival,"Houston,TX, 1989.

to express our true feelings. gay, its primary focus is an evident fact "San francisco International Festival of lesbian and Gay

film, " San francisco, CA, 1989.

which is all but ignored by the media and by

MAR K GAS PER

The film revolves around aday-in-the-life of Bill Frayne, agay man in his mid-60s living alone in Greenwich Village. On this typical day, Bill encounters objects, people, and places which stir and revive memories from the past. Told largely through flashbacks, the film is a time tapestry where past and present weave together to form a poignant picture of his life.

our culture. Even though as we age, the physical vessel may be decaying and the visage may be wrinkling and withering, people in their 60s still experience the range of conflicting emotions and feelings that people one-third their age do, such as love, fear doubt, frustration, lust, and romance . -MG

Reviews, Publications. Catalogs:

"Growing Old is the Best Revenge," by Vito Russo, The

Advocate, 1990.

"Filmmaker Struggles to Present Tough , Realistic look

at Aging ," by Dann Gire, Arlington Daily Herald, 1989.

"An Empty Bed," review by lewis Covington, Etcetera,

Atlanta, GA, 1989.

Review by Robert Miller, In Touch for Men, los Angeles,

CA,1989.

Education:

BA, Queens College, flushing, NY "An Empty Bed" combines traditional narra • An Empty Bed, 1988, 16 mm film (screened in 3/4 videotape format) , running time 56:00. Courtesy of tive filmmaking conventions with a pOint Yankee-Oriole Company, Astoria, NY of-view style that approaches the technique

•

1979.

Mark Gasper, a scene from "An Empty Bed," 1988, 16 mm film, running time 56:00. left: Thomas Hill (Elmer). RighI: John Wylie (Bill frayne) . Photo by Michael Taylor, © 1989, Yankee-Oriole Company, Astoria, NY All rights·reserved.

DAN

GILHOOLEY

Bel I P 0 r t

New

York

Itry to be observant. The portraits I make satisfy my desire to observe and reveal , and when they're successful, they can provide the viewer with a picture rich in visual and emotional complexity...

tions of people offered in my pictures certainly aren't real or factual. Like dreams, the stories I tell are fictions created for my own satisfaction, often expressing as much about meas my subject. -DG

"New Narrative," Guild Hall Museum, East Hampton, NY,

1989.

"Dan Gilhooley:Recent Work," solo exhibition al Fairleigh

Dickinson University, Hackensack, NJ, 1988.

"Long Island Artists," Nassau County Museum 01 Fine

Art, Roslyn, NY 1988.

"Work on Paper," Gallery Henoch, New York, NY 1987.

• Two Panels Irom Sell-Portrait Triptych, 1990, pencil on paper, 48 X42 inches each.

Reviews, Publications, Catalogs:

American Artists: An Illustrated Survey of Leading Con

temporaries, edited by Les Krantz, American Reler Selected Exhibitions: ences, Chicago, IL, 1990.

"Dan Gilhooley and Friends," solo exhibition at Arizona In making aportrait, I try to heighten emotions New Narrative, by Helen Harrison, Guild Hall Museum,

State University, Tempe, AZ, 1990. embedded within an image. If these emotions are East Hampton, NY, 1989.

"This Is Not APhotograph," solo exhibition at University Who 's Who Among Scholars in American Community powerful enough, or clearly revealed , then my 01 Wisconsin , Madison, WI , 1990. and Junior Colleges, American AssOCiation 01 Commu portraits tell stories. Though I deeply enjoy in "Dan Gilhooley: Works on Paper," solo exhibition at nity and Junior Colleges, National Center for Higher Benton Gallery, Southampton, NY 1990, 1988, 1987 terpreting images, trying to understand what Education, Washington, DC, 1986. "Dan Gilhooley," solo exhibition at Rensselaer Council faces or bodies reflect or mask, the characteriza lor the Arts, Troy, NY, 1989. Education: M.A., Hunter College, New York, NY BA, Hunter College, New York, NY

Dan Gilhooley, "Sixty Years," pencil on paper, 17 X 14 inches. (This piece is not Included In the exhibition. Mr. Gllhooley's "Self-Portrait," was still in progress at the catalog deadline and a photograph was not available).

•

RONALD GONZALEZ Binghamton

New

York

"Verily I say unto you. Except Ye be con verted! And become as little children. Ye shall not enter the Kingdom of Heaven." Matthew 18:4 Do not dream; sl..p. Child's face is water skull full of eyes blossoming tears and cries.The mountain overthere is as terrifying as death. Endless memory, interior form is truncated and sometimes afish. Alone, the crowd is under the tree of despair Hideous Nature is a beautiful day. Do not scream, body, under a spell, impossible flowers ignore nature. "Nothing is without time," said the clock to

•

the moon;objects,mirrors, animals, jewels. Your armchair has hands. Pink silence. Age is mutilated nothingness. Set ladders on fire. The stone is withering away. Head full of darkness, exhausted by swarming visions. -RG

.The Aging Chair. 1990, assemblage, mixed mediums,

"Contemporary Saints," Henry Street Settlement, Louis

Abrons Arts for Learning Center, New York, NY, 1989

(traveled to P.S. 39, Bronx Council on the Arts, Bronx,

NY 1989).

"New Visions of the Apocalypse," Rhode Island School

of Design, Museum of Art, Providence, RI, 1988.

"A Collection of Figures," Installation Room, Newhouse

Gallery, Snug Harbor Cultural Center, Staten Island, NY

1988.

Reviews , Publications, Catalogs:

16 X 12 X 11 inches.

"The Ghost Figures of Ronald Gonzalez," by Joseph

Selected Exhibitions:

Merkel, Artspeak, October 16, 1989.

"Turning Bodies Into Souls," solo exhibition at INTAR

"Sculpture Pieces in ObiectS/Figures," by Robert Long,

Gallery, New York, NY, 1990.

The South Hampton Press, September, 28, 1989.

"Sculpture/Drawings," solo exhibition at Allan Stone

"Three Artists' Work Filled With Symbolism: by Ruth

Gallery, New York, NY 1989.

Latter, The Daily Progress, Charlottesville, VA, January

"ObiecVFigures: four person exhibition at East Hamp

15, 1989.

ton Center for Contemporary Art, East Hampton, NY

"On Galleries," by Victoria Donohue, Philadelphia In

1989.

Quirer, Philadelphia, PA, January 14, 1989.

Education:

B.A., State University of New York, Binghamton, NY

1982.

Ronald Gonzalez, "The Aging Chair," 1990, assemblage, mixed mediums, 16 X 12 X 11 inches. Photo by David W. Tuttle.

BARBARA HAMMER New

York

New

York

The film confronts death and dying. In the end, the filmmaker's own outstretched han(l enters the film frame touching the dying woman. Through this gesture, Hammer connects to her subject and the viewer is given his release.

"Independent America," American Museum of the Mov ing Image, Astoria, NY, 1987

"Mots: Dites, Image," Musee National d'Art Moderne,

Center George Pompidou, Paris, France, 1984.

Reviews, Publications, Catalogs:

"Optic Nerve" is asurrealistic documentary "Phelan Award Winners," by R. Anbian , Release Print, Film

that hits center immediately. A barrage of Arts Foundation, San Francisco, CA, 1989. .

abstract images evolve into the face of an "Barbara Hammer: A Woman's Vision," by Jan Ventura,

-Scott Hunt old woman, lost in her elements. Old age is High Performance, Astro Arts, Los Angeles, CA, 1988.

"Bodies Displaced," by ClaudiaGorbman, Jumpcul1 32,

represented as a touchstone that exists • Optic Nerve, 16 mm film (screened in 3/4 videotape Berkeley, CA, 1987

through a life long lived. Hammer has cre format) , running time 16:00. "Exhibition Pamphlet," by Kathleen Hulser,Centre George

ated an homage to someone she has felt and Selected Exhibitions:

Pompidou, Paris, France, 1985.

experienced. The original film footage of "Recontres Internationales Art Cinema, Art Video, Art

Education:

Ordinateur, " Paris, France 1990.

Anna in a nursing home is a superb docu M.A. (Film), San Francisco University, San Francisco, "Dorothy Arzner Film Festival," Institute of Contempo

mentation of a life turning towards its end. CA,1975. rary Art, Boston, MA, 1990.

This footage is then manipulated with opti M.A. (English Literature), San Francisco University, San "Video Witness," Hallwalls Contemporary Art Center,

Francisco, CA, 1963. cal effects, creating amultilevel visual. This Buffalo, NY 1990.

B.A. (Psychology), University of California at Los Ange "1989 Whitney Biennial," Whitney Museum of American

manipulation creates the internal con les, Los Angeles, CA, 1961 . Art, New York, NY 1989.

sciousness of Anna. The viewer realizes "1987 Whitney Biennial," Whitney Museum of American

through this technique the essence of Anna's Art, New York, NY 1987

"optic nerve."

Barbara Hammer, still from video copy of "Optic Nerve," 16 mm film (screened in 3/4 videotape format), running time 16:00.

•

HOLLY'S COMETS Woodstock

New

York

Holly's Comets is a group of 16 men and women, 65 years old and older who meet Monday mornings in Woodstock, New York, at the Community Center for a 2 1/2 hour workshop of improvisational theatre. Their subject is always themselves - who they are now, who they were years ago. When they go on the road to perform for school children, residents in senior facilities, and occasional public performance for live audiences, etc., they call themselves Holly's Comets. Ten of Holly's Comets. Photo by Ruth Craig .

•

County Office for the Aging , and donations (The) purpose of the group's work is to ex from a number of business concerns , the plore the matter of aging as it is happening to them now - as aprocess, not an event. The "Comets" produced a 57 .1/2 minute docu group has been meeting for five years as of mentary video aboutthemselves called "Lives of the Comets...... (The) video made it to the October 1990; the original seven members are still together today. By now, several semifinals of the National Media Contest in thousand people have seen the "Comets" at Chicago this year one performance or another. Many people -HC drop in on Monday mornings just to watch the • Lives of the Comets, 1990, 3/4 inch videotape , run workshops, which have been sponsored from ning time 57:30. the start by the Senior Recreation Committee Selected Performances:

of Woodstock, New York. "Holly's Comets Workshops ," Omega Institute ,

In 1989, through grant money from the New Rhinebeck, NY, 1990.

"Night of the Shooting Stars, " Hallwalls Contemporary

York'State Council on the Arts Decentraliza Art Center, Buffalo, NY, 1989.

tion Program, as administered by the Dutchess "Holly's Comets Live," Town Hall,Woodstock,NY 1989.

County Arts Council, together with the Ulster

K ARE N H 0 L M E S San Francisco

California

"Boundaries of Filmmaking," Cork International Film

cular structure allows the viewer to contrib Festival, Cork, Ireland. 1987

ute personal experience in an effort to place "American Film and Video Festival," New York, NY

the characters in their relationships and, 1987

possibly, to reflect on one's own identity "Fifth International 'Film Festival, " Uppsala, Sweden,

1986.

within his/her family . "Returning the "Athens International Film Festival," Athens, OH. 1986.

Shadow" explores the tension between re "The Exchange Show," Galerie Franz Mehring, Berlin.

corded and remembered past and present West Germany, 1981.

as it creates its own internal memory.

Old family photographs evoke memories and invite comparison to the present. Using five family photographs taken in the 1940s, "Returning the Shadow" considers how the Reviews , Publications, Catalogs:

meaning ofthese visual documents changes Yesterday and Tomorrow: California Women Arlists, -KH with our life experiences. Working to find "Filmmakers," Sylvia Moore (editor). published by the identity of the people in the photographs, • Returning The Shadow, 16mm film (screened in 3/4 Midmarch Arts Press, New York. NY 1989. fragments of the images are isolated and inch videotape format) , running time 23:00. Distributed The Critical Eye: An Introduction to Looking at the by Canyon Cinema, San Francisco. CA. Movies, by Chris Sax10n and Margo Kasdan, published extended in visual and aural associations. by Kendall-Hunt. 1988. Significant shadows are used as a motif, a Sefected Exhibitions:

New York City Experimental Film and Video Festival. by "Family Ties," London Film Co-op, London, England,

reminder of the light and shadow of a pho Hunter Yoder. New York. NY 1986. 1988.

tograph and the transitory nature of its Screening at The Collective for Living Cinema, New

Education: meaning . The sound involves spoken text, York, NY 1988.

MA (Cinema). San Francisco State University. San questions raised by Marcel Proust in Re "Memory: The Art and Science of Remembering ," The

Francisco. CA, 1977 Exploratorium, San Francisco, CA, 1988.

membrances of Things Past. The film's cir

Karen Holmes, still from "Returning The Shadow." 16mm film (screened in 3/4 inch videotape format), running time 23:00. Distributed by Canyon Cinema. San Francisco. CA.

•

NAN C Y New

York

H 0 L T New

York

Nancy Holt's sculptures of concrete, brick, stonemasonry, earth, and steel evolve out of their sites and are concerned with, among other things, perception and space changes in scale at various distances, perceptual disorientation .between inside and outside space, and seeing in depth through layered openings and tunnels. Each work draws the viewer within its structure, creating a sense of transition from outside to inside, and often from light to dark. The works surround and enclose but at the same time frame and extend out to the horizon in the distance... The films, videotapes, and books, also conceived of in a perceptual framework,

are usually evocations of landscapes or Post Campus, Bronxville, NY 1990.

"Making Their Mark," Cincinnati Art Museum Cincin displacements of places. Indications of nati, DH, 1989. '

space (through tracking, pans, aerial and "Projects and Proposals: New York City's Percent for the

walking shots) and aspects of nature Arts Program," Department of Cultural Affairs, New

York, NY, 1988.

sunlight patterns, billowing dust, water re "Alaskan Impressions," Visual Arts Center, Anchorage,

flections are caught visually and trans Alaska, 1986.

ported elsewhere via film through time, "Artist as Social Designer," Los Angeles County Mu seum of Art, Los Angeles, CA, 1985.

while the psychology of the place is dis "Content: Contemporary Focus, 1974-84," Hirshhorn

closed through the local voices, sounds, Museum and Sculpture Garden, Smithsonian Institu and lor music in the sound tracks or ac tion, Washington , DC, 1984.

companying text. Reviews, Publications, Catalogs:

• Ransacked. 1980. artist book, lOX 8 112 inches. • Underscan, 1974, 1/2 inch videotape, running time 8:00 Selected Exhibitions:

Solo exhibitions, John Weber Gallery, New York. NY,

1986, 1984,1982, and 1979.

Solo exhibition, Ace Gallery, Los Angetes, CA, 1985.

"The Political Landscape, " Hillwood Art Museum, C.w.

Site and Sculpture: The Collaborative Process, by Kay

Wagenkneckt-Harte, Van Nostrand Reinholt, New York

W1~a '

"Touching the Sky," by Janet Saad-Cook, Archaeoas

tronomv. Vol. VII. Aoril 1987

'Nancy Holt's Dark Star Park: by Joan Marter. Arts Maga·

zine. October. 1984.

Education:

B.S., Tufts University, Medford, MA.

N.ancy Holt. still from "Underscan," 1974, 1/2 inch Videotape, running time 8:00

"Portraits: The Hotel Chelsea and Other Worlds," Cathe "Great Aunt Belle" images are representa dral of Sl. John the Divine, New York, NY 1983.

tive of the approach taken to illustrate the New York New York "16th Juried Exhibition," Pennsylvania State University,

gradual departing of the physical body and State College, PA, 1982.

the tenacious life force which is evident "Stoopsitters," Cathedral of Sl. John the Divine, New

In the "concerned" photographic tradition, York, NY, 1981 .

throughout. We celebrated Belle's 108th my images made while traveling around the "The Prison Show," Whitney Museum, New York, NY

birthday last May,and in October, 1989,she 1981 .

world on my own and under contract for the died peacefully at home. "International Drinking Water and Sanitation Decade,"

United Nations and CARE are mostly por United Nations, New York, NY 1980.

-MH traits, the majority of which are third world Reviews. Publlcallons. Catalogs:

women and address women's issues: work, • Photograph from the series "Great Aunt Belle," 10/ Lost Broadway Theatres. by Nick von Hoogstraten, pho pregnancy, motherhood, aging. I was pre 14/89, silver gelatin print, 14 X 11 inches. tos by Maggie Hopp. book published by Princeton Uni pared when an opportunity closer to home versity Press, 1990.

• Photograph from the series "Great Aunt Belle, " 4/ "The Outdoor Stage" by Hilda Bijur (review of

presented itself: In 1987, my then 106-year 12/89, silver gelatin print, 14 X 11 inches. "Stoopsitters"), Chelsea Clinton News, New York, NY

old great aunt, Belle Hopp, a retired "spin • Photograph from the series "Great Aunt Belle, "12/ 1989.

ster" schoolteacher who I'd known only 4/88, silver gelatin print, 14 X 11 inches. "With Child," by Jill Kirshenbaum, Photo District News,

slightly, telephoned to ask me to help take New York, NY 1989.

• Photograph from the series "Great Aunt Belle," 2/ charge of her affairs, and agreed to be my "Hopp on Stoops," by Catherine Calhoun, Modern

10/88, silver gelatin print, 14 X11 inches. Photography, New York, NY 1987. .

subject in acollaborative documentary pho "Seeking World Peace with Shutter Diplomacy," Amencan

Selected Exhlbilions:

tographic effort.Thus I began to visit, inter Photographer, New York, NY 1981 .

"9th Juried Photography Exhibition," Perkins Center for

view,and photograph her weekly in her New the Arts, Moorestown, NJ, 1990.

Educallon:

York City apartment. "Great Aunt Belle" and 'With Child: Soho Photo Gallery,

MAGGIE

HOPP

New York, NY t989.

B.A., Bard College, Annandale-On-Hudson, NY, 1967

The four photographs selected by The FO "Stoopsitters," aorough Presidents Gallery, David

Dinkins' Office, New York, NY, 1989.

RUM Gallery from my portfolio of over fifty

Maggie Hopp, photographs from the series "Great Aunt Belle,"silver gelatin print, 14 X 11 inches.

•

JANElLA HOWALT Alpharetta

Georgia

"Refractions Within Definitions" is my sec ond book exploring the nuances and changeabilities within and during the using of definition/definitions. This particular ex ploration consists of two secondary stories simultaneous to the primary story: respec tively representing a beginning point, a middle point, and an ending point. Each man defines within his realm of expe rience . These definitions are directly im pacted by how old we are. Our first red ball becomes a mesh of wonder, accomplish ment, and object. The ball grows, shrinks, elongates, and changes color Its speed keeps increasing. Accuracy becomes more important than the ball. It symbolizes our strength. One day our impetus diminishes. The ball becomes an impropriety. The ball is still aball, but not to us.The ball has aged as we have aged.The world is as old as we are. -JH

• Refractions Within Definitions, 1990, artist book, xerographic copy on paper, 11 X 17 inches.

Janeila Howalt, pages from "Refractions Within Definitions," 1990, artist book, xerographic copy on paper, 11 X 17 inches.

•

B ABE T T E KAT Z Mamaroneck

• At the Beach, 1988, offset black and white linocut artist book, 9 inches X 7 inches X40 pp.

New York

Selected Collection.:

New York Public Library, New York, NY

Museum of the City of New York, New York, NY

"Atthe Beach" is as much about maturation, Metropolitan Museum, New York, NY

in the sense of accepting one's limits, as it Museum of Modern Art, New York, NY.

is about aging.The artist's book form, in this Smithsonian Institution, Washington, oc.

instance, is a hand-held piece of wordless Library of Congress, Washington, DC.

Harvard University, Cambridge, MA.

theater in which a condensed visual narra Yale University, New Haven, CT.

tive is permitted to unfold.

-BK

Reviews, Publications, Catalogs:

"Artist's Book Beat," by N. Princenthal, Print Collectors'

News/eNer, New York, NY, 1989.

"Review," by J. Hoffberg, Umbrella, Glendale, CA, 1989.

Babette Katz, "At the Beach," 1988, black and whitelinocut, 9 X 14 inches.

•

families, caretakers, and those who work or will work in gerontology.

"Media Production Festival," National Council on the

Aging, Washington, DC, 1990.

"Media Festival," American Society on Aging, San Fran New York New York cisco, CA, 1990.

Compelling stories make it possible for con "Media Presentation," Mid-America Congress on Aging,

cerned and diverse audiences to relate to Film and video are the most effective media Kansas City, MO, 1990.

the same video, triggering animated and to reach the broadest audience. An engag "Media Presentation," Association for Gerontology in

Higher Education, Kansas City, MO, 1990.

meaningful responses in a wide variety of ing screen drama emotionally involves the "Media Presentation," The Gerontological Society of

settings - community, institutional, and viewer When the story concerns a social America, Minneapolis, MN, 1989.

educational. There are no easy answers, but problem, the drama - affecting the audi "Media Presentation," American Association of Homes

feeling the issues is the beginning of action. ence on an intimate, gut level- motivates for the Aging, Baltimore, MD, 1989.

"Media Presentation," National Osteopathic Conference

adesire for solutions. -JK on Aging, Chicago, IL, 1989.

The elderly in America have a history of • Rose by Any Other Name, 1977 16 mm film (screened Reviews, Publlcallons, Catalogs:

in 1/2 inch videotape format), running time 15:00. Cour neglect and adearth of audiovisual material "And the Home of the Brave," by E. Jacks, RN, MS,

tesy of Tricepts Productions, New York, NY. expressing their needs from their own points Geriatric Nursing, American Journal of Nursing, New

York, NY, 1990.

• And the Home olthe Brave, 1989, 1/2 inch videotape, of view. As a film and video maker and "Non-print Editors' Choice," American Library Associa

running time 17:00. Courtesy of Tricepts Productions, nurse, Ihave chosen to raise issues through tion, Chicago. IL, 1989.

New York, NY. drama which can encourage self-determi "Video Reviews, " by W. Hawkes, Library Journal,

Selected Exhlbillons:

nation among the elderly and inspire posi CahnersiBowker, New York, NY, 1989.

"Media Festival Competition" (winner, 1st place), spon

"And the Home of the Brave," by Abraham Monks, Ph.D.,

tive changes in attitudes and actions of sored by the American Journal of Nursing, Boston, MA,

The Gerontologist, Gerontological Society of America,

1990. Washington, DC, 1989.

JUDITH

KELLER

Judith Keller, still from "And the Home of the Brave," 1989.1/2 inch videotape, running time 17:00. Photo by Sandy Stillman. courtesy of Tricepts Productions. New York, NY.

H E LEN A K 0 LOA Ken t

Connecticut

Both "Noon Song" and "Chemo" deal with the illness (and subsequent death) of my husband, Ivo Duchacek. "Noon Song"was made, as if in premonition, one ortwo months before doctors found arecurrence of cancer after a13-year remission. Asad Slovak folk song,dealing with loss of alove, became the basis for the visuals, in which Ivo was the actor. After we learned about the illness, the video took on asorrowful personal meaning.

Helena Kolda, stililrom "Noon Song," 1987, 112 inch videotape, running time 4:40.

"Chemo"...the footage was shot in hospitals during Ivo's chemotherapy. The hospital envi ronment and the mechanics of chemotherapy always struck me as surreal and full of absurdi ties - my way, I suppose, to distance myself from the raw horror of that reality. I put myself behind the camera in order to escape from that world. In editing thetapes 18 months later, Iwent through the experience again, and this time left it behind. Ithink that was the purpose of doing the piece. -HK • Noon Song, 1987 1/2 inch videotape, running time 4:40. • Chemo, 1989, 1/2 inch videotape,running time 10:30. Selected Exhibitions:

"Seattle Shorts Festival," Seattle, WA, 1990.

"14th Annual Poetry Film Festival," San Francisco, CA,

1989.

"11th International Festival 01 Super 8 and Video,"

Brussels, Belgium, 1989.

"Film and Video Festival," San Francisco Art Institute,

San Francisco, CA, 1989.

Continuous screening at Real Art Ways, Hartford, CT,

1988.

"Connecticut Commission on the Arts Film and Video

Competition," aired on Connecticut Public Television,

August, 1988.

"The Independents," aired on The Learning Channel,

July 1988.

"Women in the Director's Chair Festival," Chicago, IL,

1988.

Education:

B.A., Columbia UniverSity, New York, NY 1955.

•

"Artists Look at Travel," Wustum Museum, Racine, WI,

ing substance to the images. Art is now 1989.

assuming a large amount of responsibility "Women and the Constitution," Atlanta College of Art

Atlanta Georgia for moral and social issues, once thought to Gallery, Atlanta, GA, 1988.

be the task of religion and politics. (Looking "Matiere de Reves" (drawings and artist books),

Exploring the purely visual is an approach to Erasmushaus, Basel, Switzerland, 1988.

askance at aging and treating it like a men work that "serious" artists sometimes claim "Georgia Artists in the High Museum," High Museum of

ace has caused some rather convoluted Art, Atlanta, GA, 1988.

diffuses the impact ofthe content, but Ican't thinking here). Through the subtle state "Artists in Georgia," Nexus Contemporary Art Center,

deny that the visual appeal of the lexicon of ments and questions it raises, I hope my art Atlanta, GA, 1988.

human markings that we all use to commu "Artists Books from the Sackner Collection," Center for

makes asmall contribution to the new body nicate is one of the two devices I use to Book Arts, New York, NY 1987.

of thought now growing around this sub engage the viewer (in) my work. For in Reviews, Publications, Catalogs:

ject. stance, the elegance and consistency of "Reviews," by Judith Holtberg, Umbrella, Glendale, CA,

-RL 1989.

math and physics equations or the rhythms "Review of Measure Cut Stitch," by Dick Higgins, Art

and kinetics of handwriting are sources of .AboutAglng. one-of-a-kind artist book, drawing, type,

Papers, Atlanta, GA, 1988.

beauty and excitement which nourish my dye cut paper and board, 12 X 12 inches. Courtesy of

"Review of Measure Cut Stitch," by Judith Holtberg,

Granary Books, New York, NY

work. High Performance, Los Angeles, CA, 1988.

RUT H L A X SON

"Review 01 (Ho+Go)2= It," by David Finkelstein, Art Pa

Selected Exhibitions:

Secondly, through automatic writing in pat pers, Atlanta, GA, 1987

"Fine Editions," Granary Books, New York, NY 1990.

terns and matrices,ideas and feelings about "A Book in Hand," Arvada Center for Ihe Humanities,

the human condition emerge, hopefully giv Arvada, CO, 1989.

•

Ruth Laxson, "About Aging," one ol-a-kind artist book, drawing, type, dye cut paper and board, 12 X 12 inches.

ELIZABETH LAYTON Topeka

a n

"In 1977, at the age 68, Elizabeth Layton saved her own life and added immeasurably to ours. The medium of salvation was large, colored-pencil drawings ... Her drawings are not only 'high-quality,' but offer aview of American life rarely reflected in contempo. rary art. Aging , depression, dieting, mar riage, grand mothering,death,world hunger, the nuclear threat, capital punishment, and the ERA are only a few of her subjects. Overriding them all is the theme of hope ... She is one of the most original and most feminist artists in the U.S. today." -lucy Lippard, In These Times, August, 1985. • Sell-Portrait: Stroke,1978,crayon and colored pencil on paper, 28 X 22 inches. From the collection of Don Lambert, Topeka, KS. Selected Exhibitions:

"Through the looking Glass" (touring solo exhibition),

Chicago Public Library Cultural Center, Chicago, Il,

Honolulu Academy of Art, Honolulu, HI;National Council

on Aging,Washington,DC; WicMaArt Museum,Wichita,

KS; Grand Rapids Art Museum, Grand Rapids, MI, 1980

through present.

'Women's Caucus for Art, Award Winners," Newark Art

Museum, Newark, NJ, 1990.

"Kansas Collection," National Museum of Women and

the Arts, Washington, DC, 1987

"Life Lines," Phoenix Art Museum, Phoenix, AZ, 1986.

Reviews, Publications. Catalogs:

Drawing on the RightSide ofthe Brain,by Betty Edwards,

los Angeles, CA, 1989 (revised edition).

"A Hidden Talent," by Michael Ryan, Parade Magazine,

Parade Publications, New York, NY, 1989.

"Portrait of the Artist as an Old Woman," by Anne

Fadiman, Life Magazine, 1987

"Grandma Layton's Drawings," by Alexandra Mezey,

People Magazine, 1986. Education:

Basic Drawing Course at Ottawa University, Ottawa, KS,

1977

Elizabeth Layton, "Self-Portrait: Stroke," 1978, crayon and colored pencil on paper, 28 X22 inches. From the collection of Don lambert, Topeka, KS.

•

LSS THEATRICALS Jamestown

New

York

Ours is ayouth-oriented society. Too often, older people are seen as useless and "in the way." Older people's reminiscences are fre Quently greeted with "there he goes again," and "we've heard that one before." "Gramma's Attic" speaks to this concern in two ways.The play itself involves the sharing of memories, the paSSing of wisdom down through the generations that our society too often neglects. This shared wisdom of the past can help clarify the present, and can help us understand how we got here. The co-authorofthe play, the woman portraying "Gramma," also speaks to this concern in another way. She is not only elderly, but is aresident of anursing home. She had never been on stage before entering the nu rsing home, and she had certainly neverattempted to write a play. Elderly people - and that includes those in nursing homes - have much to offer All we have to do is listen. -LSST • Gramma's Attic, performance. (Nina Everhart, co author and "Gramma;" Beth Gustafson, "Granddaugh ter;" Carole Karchesky, co-author, stage manager).

Selected Performances:

"The Way We (Really) Were," JCC One Act Play Festival,

Jamestown Community College, Jamestown, NY, 1990.

"Gramma's Attic," Lutheran Home, Jamestown, NY,

1989.

"The Night Before Christmas," Lutheran Home,

Jamestown, NY 1988.

"Any1hing for a Laugh," Lutheran Home, Jamestown,

NY 1988.

Review:

"The Critical Eye," by Robert W. Plyler, The Post-Jour·

nal, Jamestown, NY 1990.

LSS Theatrlcals, scene from performance of "Gramma's Attic."

MAR Y MAL 0 T T Austin, Texas , and New York , New York

and who would have power of attorney until this was decided. I hated it,but filled them in and signed, though.

• Untitled, 1990, photo and oil on canvas glued over board and text panel, 15 X 12 inches. Selected Exhibitions:

"New American Talent," Laguna Gloria Art Museum,

Suddenly I was sixty, and I had trouble My college sent material urging me to come Austin, TX, 1990. .

"Food: From Pleasure to Politics," Goddard-Riverside

believing it. Yesterday, being in my fifties to aclass reunion , and write something for Center. New York, NY, 1990.

was a decade that hadn't bothered me. In a yearbook. They also want to know what "Feather, Fur, and Fin," Laguna Gloria Art Museum,

fact I had celebrated becoming 50 in Texas are my plans for retirement. But, as my life Austin, TX, 1990.

with a big party that was like a Halloween just began in its fullest sense a few years "121h Anniversary Benefit," New Museum for Contem porary Art, New York, NY, 1989.

event. One of my mottos anyway was "ev ago, there can't be such athing. I write and Hewlett Gallery, Carnegie Mellon College of Fine Arts,

eryday is Halloween," everyday is for wearing tell them so. Pittsburgh, PA, 1988.

fantasy clothes and having all kinds of people Trabia-MacAfee Gallery, New York, NY, 1988.

Then, there was a dream, or at least a fully mixed together "Comment," Nexus Contemporary Art Center, Atlanta,

awake image that was eerie and remains GA, 1988.

Besides, the last seven years before now with me. I'm naked and on the top of a "Witness of the Time," Urban Institute for Contemporary

have been the best and happiest of my Art, New York. NY 1988.

mountain peak, then I am on a rock that whole life, so why should I suddenly be projects from this top out over nothing. It's Reviews, Publications, Catalogs:

categorized into this older class in our cul not cold, and I'm not afraid, but is seems "Mary Malott's Cosmic Conflicts," by Dennis Wepman,

Manhattan Arts, New York, NY 1989.

ture that has so many negative connotations? very strange. An old Webster's dictionary "Mary Malott at Carnegie Mellon," by Walter Thompson,

First, the American Association of Retired defines "abyss" in 2. as "any deep immea Art in America, New York, NY 1988.

People started sending me its magazine surable space, chasm, or void; hence, infi "Mary Malott:Time After Time althe Hewlett," Greenburg

which I cancelled immediately. Then, my nite time; avast intellectual or moral depth." Tribune. Pittsburgh. PA. 1988.

"Mary Malott," by Ted Castle. Arts, New York. NY 1988.

well-meaning lawyer sent papers having to I guess that's it. It's the best I can come to do with who was gOing to decide to pull the understanding what's ahead, eventually. Education:

tubes in case I became non com pis mentiS, M.F.A., University of Texas. Austin. TX, 1970.

-MM

Mary Malott, detail of "Untitled," 1990, photo and oil on canvas glued over board and text panel, 15 X12 inches. Photo by Tim Yohn.

•

KAREN MESSERMAN Rochester

New

York

• Skin Deep, 1988, 1/2 inch videotape, running time 15:00. Selected Exhibitions:

"Upstate Invitational Exhibition," Pyramid Arts Center.

Rochester, NY 1989.

"Rochester Student Exhibition," Memorial Art Gallery,

Rochester, NY 1989.

"Skin Deep" is a video which examines women 's concerns about the aging process relative to what many perceive to be the Education:

great societal pressure to retain ayouthful Currently completing M.F.A. at Visual Studies Work appearance. The video traces one woman's shop, Rochester, NY, 1990.

experience of the aging process and docu B.A. (Anthropology), University of Michigan,Ann Arbor, ments her ultimate decision to undergo MI , 1982. cosmetic surgery. This specific "narrative" is interwoven with amyriad of other women's faces and spoken feelings about aging as they consider its impact both culturally and personally. -KM

Karen Messerman. stili from

·Skin Oeep." 1988, 1/2 inch videotape,

running time 15:00.

NEIL MCGREEVY Albany

New

York

"Vly Road ... " and "20 North Ferry Street ... " are selections from an ongoing long-term art project en titled "Demolitions." Working with city building in spectors,and with access to town records, Iam able to locate prospective sites of buildings and houses that are scheduled to be demolished.The first photograph is taken of the site while the structure is still intact. After demolition, I return for the second photograph. This second photograph is shot from exactly the same viewpOint as the first.

Neil McGreevy, "Vly Road, Ashley Residence, Latham, NY," Print 11, August 25, 1988; Print 12, October 20, 1988. From the "Demolitions Series," silver prints on acid-free board, 24 X 46 inches.

The information that these "Demolitions"photographs provide is meant to be neither negative or positive. Iam not attempting to make a social or environmental critique. The photographs show time marching forward, the evidence of change, change brought on by humans as well as nature. Life evolves in cycles. Nothing remains stagnant. When one event ends, inevitably another begins. Some years later I will again return to each site for a third photograph. So one could say that the entries in this exhibit are still in progress. -NM • Vly Road, Ashley Residence , Latham , NY, Print '1, August 25,1988; Print 112, October 20, 1988From the "Demolitions Series," silver prints on acid-free board, 24 X 46 inches. • 20 North Ferry Street, Albany, NY Printll , May 24, 1988; Print' 2, May 18, 1989,From the "DemOlitions Series," silver prints on acid-free board, 24 X46 inches.

Neil McGreevy, "20 North Ferry Street, Albany, NY," Print 11, May 24,1988; Print 12, May 18 1989. From the "Demolitions Series," silver prints on acid-free board, 24 X 46 inches. '

Selected Exhibitions:

"Multiple Images," Rensselaer County Council for the

Arts, Troy, NY, 1990.

"Photoworks:Muhi-composite Images by Neil McGreevy

and Barry Koblenz," Albany Academy Art Gallery, Al bany, NY 1990.

"Master of Fine Arts Thesis Exhibition," University Art

Gallery, State University of New York at Aibany, Albany,

NY 1989.

Reviews, Publications, Catalogs:

"Images Multiple and Fascinating," by Peg Churchill

Wright, The DailyGazetteatRCCA, Schenectady, NY, May

17 1990.

Education:

M.F.A., State University of New York, University at

Albany, Albany, NY, 1989.

•

Lancaster

M C KAY Pennsylvania

I'm interested in documentary-whether it's afour second shot of something on the street or acontinuous three minute shot of people talking. I like to see "real life" cap tured on film . How one gets that real life into the camera and how one puts it together to be viewed are questions now being healthily discussed and challenged in the film com munity. I admire and am influenced by the work of four documentary filmmakers whose styles are wildly different - Frederick Wiseman , Danny Lyon, Errol Morris, and Robert Epstein. (My film) "Lighthearted Nation" can be long and difficult for some viewers, as avisit to a nursing home can sometimes be. It can be happy, sad, boring, stimulating ... and sometimes the best thing avisitor can ask is "Did you ever have a bloody nose?" I hope that "Lighthearted Nation" shows that the visit is worthwhile for both parties. -JM • Lighthearted Nation, shot in Smm video, edited 3/4 inch to 1 inch (screened in 3/4 inch videotape format), running time 53:00. Courtesy C-Hundred Film Corpora tion, Lancaster, PA.

Jim McKay, stills from "Lighthearted Nation," shot in Smm video, edited 3/4 inch to 1 inch (screened in 3/4 inch videotape format), running time 53:00 Photos by Mark Alcarez.

•

"Flesh and Blood" (curated by Ken Bloom and Cordelia

over the past decade, whether I worked in video, Williams). The Light Factory. Charlotte. NC. 1990.

performance, photography, or installation. I se "Lost Places/Last Things" (curated by Rachel Vaccaro) .

lect my images and text from diverse contexts, Painted Bride. Philadelphia. PA. 1990.

Philadelphia Pennsylvania ranging from everyday life to the distant past, in "Media Show" (curated by Don Russell). Maryland Art

Place. Baltimore. MD. 1987

order to examine the ways in which our con My work as an artist has redefined disciplinary "U medjuvremenu" (curated by Jadranka Dizdar).

sciousness layers and changes their meaning. I Umetni~ki paviljon Cvijeta Zuzorit. Belgrade. Yugosla boundaries many times in the past ten years in would like to further my exploration of images via. 1985.

order to express my cross-cultural experiences. and text as poetic tools. I am interested in cre "Book as Art as Book." Maryland Art Place (curated by

Born in Yugoslavia, now residing in the U.S.A., I June F. Farmer). Baltimore. MD. 1984.

ating new linear structures which merge seem traveled widely in order to better understand "IUme Biennale de Paris:' Musee National d'Art

ingly disjunctive and disparate elements. In this Moderne. Paris. France. 1982.

issues of cultural identity and communication. way, I attempt to construct poetic sentences Trained as apainter, and having gained recogni Reviews, Publications, Catalogs:

which pull my fragmented experiences together Vesna Todorovic Miksic (exhibition catalog) . inter tion for my painterly language and poetic images, into acoherent world. viewed by G. Sarcevic. published by Galerija Savremene

I soon ventured into video art, photography, likovne umetnosti. Novi Sad. Yugoslavia.

-VTM book making, action art, and performance,seek "The Unavoidable Context. by Belle Gironda. The Arts

ing more immediate means of communication. Journal, Ashville. NC. June. t990.

• Significance of Cycling. 1984. book of rotating im "What Is It About Halley's Comet That Makes Me Re The culture in which Igrew up differed drastically ages and text on Rolodex cards with living wheat. 7 X 4 member My Great-Grandmother? at the Maryland Art

X 7 inches. from the one in which I now find myself. The Place:' by John Strausbaugh. High Performance, Los

barrage of images and sounds demanding quick • What Is It About Halley's Comet That Makes Me Angeles. CA. 1987

Remember My Great-Grandmother? 1987 black and response has clashed severely with the tactile "Performances and Propositions," by Judith Vassallo,

white photographs mounted on wooden boxes. twelve New Art Examiner. Chicago, IL. 1986.

intimacy of the tapestries, weavings, and myths photos. 8 X lOX 1 3/4 inch each. with which I grew up. I felt a need to directly Education:

Selected Exhibitions:

address the issues of change taking place in my M.F.A.. Syracuse University. Syracuse, NY 1983. "Ziii dusa koia putuie dok telo spava: ' solo exhibition at

B.F.A., Art Academy of Novi Sad, Novi Sad, Yugoslavia, environment.

V E S N A TODOROVic MIKSIC

Tracing the meaning of images and text has become a common underpinning in my work

Salon Muzeja savremene umetnosti. Belgrade. Yugosla

1980. via. 1990.

Vesna Todorovic Miksic, "Significance of Cycling," 1984, book of rotating images and text on Rolodex cards with living wheat, 7 X 4 X 7 inches. Photo by Bora Vojnovic.

•

LOUISE ODES NEADERLAND New

York

New

York

My work which appears in this exhibition is part of an ongoing xerographic bookworks project titled "Where is Home?" The series title is derived from a letter received from my father shortly before his death. It was written from a nursing home not far from Jamestown where he and my mother spent their last years. In nearly illegible script, my father wrote, "... your mother constantly talks of going home. But I ask her, 'where is home?' As soon as it warms up abit we will look for something else."

Beyond the wrenching personal experience of my father's letter lies the universal Question each of us asks many times, "...what is the point of our lives and where do wefit into the larger scheme?" The Quest for a physical as well as a spiritual home, a sense of belonging, is basic to every human being. For some, the search is everything for others, the discovery is all. I use the copier to create and edition my books. I make books because they enable me to share my vision with people all over the world.

Selected Exhibitions:

"Electrografia," Museo Internacional, Cuenca, Spain,

1990.

"Books and Bookends," traveling exhibition, organized

by the Maryland State Arts Council, 1990.

"Vessels of Message: Contemporary Book Art, " Art

Center of Battle Creek, Battle Creek, MI, 1990.

"1 X 1 = Copier Books," Minnesota Center for Book Arts,

Minneapolis, MN, 1990.

"Art Ex Machina," 1708 East Main Gallery, Richmond ,

VA,1990.

"A Book in Hand," Arvada Centerfor the Arts,Arvada,CA,

1989.

"ISCAGRAPHICS," Ringling School of Art and Design,

Sarasota, FL, 1989.

Reviews, Publications, Catalogs:

"Where is Home?" by Louise Odes Neaderland, Gal/erie

• Open Roads, Empty Nests, 1988, xerographic Magazine, 1989 Annual.

bookwork on paper, 8 1/2 X 5 1/2 inches. "Artists in the Age of the Copy Machine," by Louise Odes

My work is characterized by the repetition, al Neaderland, Women Artists News, Summer, 1988.

• A Book of Short Stories, 1986, color xerographic teration, and exploration of a single image or ISCAGRAPHICS, catalog for traveling exhibition with

bookwork on paper, 8 1/2 X 7 inches. series of related images. I try to create avisual introduction by Louise Odes Neaderland, 1985.

narrative from multiples of asingle image which • License Life-Sense, 1985,xerographic bookwork on Education: paper and board, 6 X 11 X 1 1/4 inches. says something about the human condition and M.F.A., State University of Iowa, Iowa City, lA, 1957 our experience of life. B.A., Bard College, Annandale-on-Hudson, NY 1954. • Our Glass, 1984, xerographic copy and sand on pa per, 10 X 8 1/2 inches. Louise Odes Neaderland, "License Life-Sense," 1985, xerographic bookwork on paper and board, 6 X 11 X 11/4 inches.

•

-LON

• Scenic Tunnels, 1983, xerographic bookwork on pa Louise Odes Neaderland, "Our Glass," 1984,xerographic per, 8112 X 6112 inches. copy and sand on paper, 10 X 8112 inches.

E D

T H

Philadelphia

N E F F Pennsylvania

(My) painting, "The Return," is the last in a series based on the myth of Demeter and Persephone . In keeping with the seasonal and vegetational nature of the myth, the time of year is spring, when Persephone returns; and her mother, Demeter renews the earth in gratitude (and triumph). The painting is also involved with the idea of age and youth, the revolving cycle of the year and of life. -EN • The Return, 1987 oil on canvas, 80 X 70 inches.

Selected Exhibitions:

"Edith Neff, Pastels," Southern Alleghenies Museum of

Art, Loretto, PA, 1989, and The School Gallery, Pennsyl vania Academy of the Fine Arts, Philadelphia, PA, 1989.

"The New Landscape," Delaware Center for Contempo rary Art, Wilmington, DE, 1989.

Solo exhibition, The More Gallery, Philadelphia, PA,

1988.

"Selected Drawings from the Rita Rich Collection," Na tional Academy of Design, New York, NY (traveling

exhibition),1987-88.

"The Artist's Studio in American Art, Allentown Art

Museum, Allentown, PA, 1983.

Solo exhibition, Adam L.Gimbel Gallery, New York, NY

1982.

Reviews, Publications, Catalogs:

"Edith Neff, Pastels," by Michael Allison, The Chronicle

of Higher Education, July, 1989.

"Edith Neff," areview by Patricia Stewart, Art in America,

November, 1988.

"Edith Neff," by William P. Scott, Arts Magazine, Feb ruary, 1988.

Selected Drawings from the Rita Rich Collection, catalog

produced by the National Academy of Design, New York,

NY 1987

Edith Neff, "The Return," 1987 oil on canvas, 80 X 70 inches. Photo by John Carlano.

Education:

B.FA, Philadelphia College of Art, Philadelphia, PA,

1965.

•

ANN E NOGGLE Albuquerque

New Mexico

.1/1 from the series Stellar by Starlight. 1986, silver gelatin print, 20 X 16 inches.

• , 2 from the series Stellar by Starlight, 1986, silver

"First Person Singular: Self Portrait Photography," High

Museum of Art, Atlanta, GA, 1988.

"Recent Acquisitions," The Museum of Modern Art, New

York, NY, 1988. .

Solo exhibition, Visual Studies Workshop , Rochester,

NY 1985.

gelatin print, 20 X16 inches. I photograph people, mostly older women , • Yolanda , Sic Transit Gloria Sepse, 1983, silver focusing on the tension between the iron gelatin print, 16 X20 inches. determinant of age and the individual char Reviews, Publications, Catalogs:

"Return of the WASPs: Story and Portraits by Anne

acter of the subject. Trying for an image that • • 3 from the series FaceliH, 1975, silver gelatin print, Noggle," Air and Space, Smithsonian, June/July 1990.

16 X20 inches. gets beneath the surface into that unchang Ann Noggle, exhibition catalog with text by Barbara De

ing arena of the human psyche, formed in Selected Exhibitions:

Genevieve, Photographer's Gallery, London, England,

Solo exhibition, Southampton Art Gallery,Southampton,

early life, which grows into maturity but 1988.

England, 1990.

Silver Lining: Photographs by Anne Noggle, University

does not relinquish its basic character Solo exhibition, A Gallery for Fine Photography, New

of New Mexico Press, Albuquerque, NM, 1984.

throughout one's life, and is discernible Orleans, LA, 1990.

Education:

only to one who is patient, and watchful,and "A History of Photography from California Collections,"

M.A., University of New Mexico, Albuquerque, NM.

San Francisco Museum of Modern Art, San Francisco,

perhaps older oneself. It is of youth be 1966.

CA,1989.

trayed by age, of spirit strong but fragile B.F.A., University of New Mexico, Albuquerque, NM,

"Illustrious Graduates," Art Museum, University of New

with time. Old people already belong in the 1969.

Mexico, Albuquerque, New Mexico, 1989.

past - historical objects occupying space. Solo exhibition at The Photographers Gallery, London,

England. 1988.

I want to show who they are and how damned difficult it is, as each of us in our time, becomes one of them. -AN

•

Anne Noggle. # 3 from the series "Facelift," 1975, silver gelatin print. 16 X 20 inches.

L L

N 0 LAN

Avondale Estates

Georgia

"Changes" is an example of my recurring interest, as an artist, in process. Not only art, but everything that exists is a reflection of the process that brought it into existence. By focusing only on the product, it is easy notto seethe process,Furthermore, the use of words like "create" and "destroy" with respect to process, can direct attention from the fact that all processes involve some form of transformation, and transformation is not inherently good or bad.

In "Changes" the image and sound under goes a step-by-step deterioration to the point where little of the original experience is retained . Without the intervening steps it is unlikely that step # 40 could be easily identified as steaming from step # 1

Bill Nolan, stilllrom "Changes," 1990, 1/2 inch videotape, running time 11 :20,

The destruction of the original experience, however is accompanied by the creation of a new and different sound and visual expe rience which, for me, is at least as interest ing if not more so, than the original. -BN • Changes, 1990, 1/2 inch videotape, running time 11 :20.

Selected Exhibitions:

"Forrest Avenue Farewell," Nexus Contemporary Art

Center, Atlanta, GA. 1989,

"ound ,or installation with sculptor Richard Hill, CNN

Center, Atlanta, GA, 1989,

"Artists In Georgia: 1988," Nexus Contemporary Art

Center, Atlanta, GA, 1988.

Sound for video with Wynn Ragland, CNN Center, At lanta, GA, 1988,

"Atlanta Show" (installation), Nexus Contemporary Art

Center, Atlanta, GA. 1987

"Atlanta Arts Festival," WREK Radio, Atlanta, GA, 1987

Education:

M.F,A., University of Washington, Seatlle, WA, 1965,

B,F,A" Minneapolis College 01 Art and Design, Minne apolis, MN, 1960,

•

MAXINE Kingsburg

OLSON California

Much of my work at this time appropriates im ages from my ancestors, art history,and gender to weave astory about the many levels of expe rience that have shaped my life. In the painting entitled "Rodin Revisited," an old woman, tired and misshapen, ascends into an unknown reality while two lovers from Rodin's "Kiss" (frozen in time) give evidence of the romantic illusions and promises of youth. The narcissus flowers refer to the myth of Narcissus, the "garden," and rebirth.The stairway, found in Lisbon, Portugal, was a magical place which symbolizes the connection between earthly plea sures and the metaphysical as well as the jou rney from birth to death. -MO • Rodin Revisited , 1989, oil on linen canvas, 48 X 60 inches. Selected Exhibitions:

"Group Show," Soho 20 Gallery, New York, NY, 1990.

"City on aHill," Palazzo Casali, Cortona, Italy, 1989.

' Comment,' Nexus Contemporary Art Center, Atlanta, GA, 1989.

"American Realism," William Sawyer Gallery,San Francisco, CA,

1985.

'Wesl Coast Realism," Fresno Arts Museum, Fresno, CA, 1984.

"West as Art (1800-1982)," Palm Museum, Palm Springs, CA,

1982.

' Invitational," Oakland Museum, Oakland, CA, 1980.

Solo Exhibition, Orlando Gallery, Los Angeles, CA, 1979.

RevieWl, Publications, Catalogs:

Gazetta, by C. Guidarelli, Cortona, Italy, 1989.

Sex: Female, Occupation: Artist, catalog with essay by Nicholas

Treadwell, Kent, England, 1984.

West as Art (1800-1982), catalog published by the Palm Springs

Museum, Palm Springs, CA, 1982.

' Review.' by Suzanne Muchnic, Los Angeles Times, Los Angeles,

CA,I982.

Education:

M.A., CaI~Qrnia State University, Fresno. CA, 1975.

B.A., California State University, Fresno, CA, 1973.

Studied at Otis Art Institute, Los Angeles, CA, 1971 and 1972.

•

Maxine Olson, 'Rodin Revisited," 1989, oil on linen canvas, 48 X60 Inches.

Station/Space 2B. New York. NY 1989.

right-hand panel, in which "Lazarus Is Raised "PeacelNun/Piece" (one -week performance).

From the Dead by the Sound of His Children Windopeace. New York. NY 1987

Wailing Over a Mountain of Funeral Bills;" "Tango U.S.A.... mural for Jackson Heights. Queens.

New York New York and on the left, "Though Their Cottage Was New York. NY. 1986.

"Mythophilia: Drawings." solo exhibition at Moonmade

Changed to aTemple, Philemon and Baucis This is the first artistic collaboration we Space. New York. NY. 1985.

Still Find That on Social Security They Can't "The Creative Process." Lincoln Center. New York. NY

have done with each other although we have Make Ends Meet." Other panels encompass 1990.

been waiting for several years forthe oppor such problems as the disrespect and faulty "China: June 4. 1989." BlumHelman Warehouse. New

tunity to work together York. NY 1989-90.

perceptions of the elderly held by younger "The Changing Face of SoHo." Broadway/Lafayette Sub people, and experiences of loss and threats Individually our work is very much related in way Station. New York. NY. 1988-90.

to entitlement. inspiration and content. We both use deco "Contemporary Narrative." City Without Walls. Newark.

rative elements common in medieval manu NJ. 1987

"Mutare Possibilis Est," means "Change Is scripts and early Renaissance art and the Reviews Publications, Catalogs: Possible," and we believe that the first step myths and legends of ancient history com (Kristin Reed)

is to recognize and understand the problem "Fate olthe World as aTheme." by Phyllis Bra!. New York

bined with 20th century iconography to in a historical perspective and the next step Times. New York. NY 1990.

comment on the cyclical nature of time and is to work to change it. "Environmental Themes." by Karen Lipson. Newsday,

the ways of today's social foibles and curi New York. NY, 1990.

-KR & ps. June 1990 osities. Although stylistically our work is Art in the Public Interest. edited by Arlene Raven. UMI

Press. Ann Arbor. MI. 1989.

quite different, these common threads lead • Mutare Posslbllls Est (A Proposal Drawing for aMural "Drawings by Contemporary Women." byJudyCollischan

to a natu ral collaboration. Project for Jamestown. NY). 1990.gouache and colored

KRISTIN REED PAMELA SHOEMAKER

pencil on paper. 16 X 39 inches.

Van Wagner. Lines of Vision. Hudson Hills Press. New

York. NY. 1989.

In this study for acommunity wall, we have Selected Exhibitions: zeroed in on arange of problems associated (Pamela Shoemaker)

(Kristin Reed)

"Election '88 at Bronx Gallery..." by Vivien Raynor. New

with aging in ayouth-oriented society with "Political Landscape." Hillwood Art Museum. Long Is

York Times. New York. NY November. 1988.

little or no provision for the care and main land University. NY. 1990.

"An Immovable Feast: Murals in the City." by Grace

"Lines of Vision." BlumHelman Gallery. New York. NY

tenance of its elder members. The seven Glueck New York Times. New York. NY July. 1988.

1989.

panelled work casts Biblical and mythologi conte';'porary Narrative. catalog with essay by Claire

"Comment." Nexus Contemporary Art Center. Atlanta.

Marcus. City Without Walls. Newark. NJ. November.

cal ancients in situations often experienced GA. 1988.

1987

by contemporary older people and means to "The Extinction of the Guinea Pig." CEPA. Gallery. Buf

"PeacelNun/Piece: April 17-24. 1987 "by Pamela Shoe falo. NY. 1987

show with some humor the irony and inap maker. MIElAlNIIINIG 12. November. 1987

"Urban Images of the '80. " Exit Art Gallery. New York.

propriateness of such dilemmas. Examples NY. 1987

Education: include the central panel, "Noah Distributes "Mass: Group Material." New Museum of Contemporary

(Kristin Reed) His Wealth to His Animals So That He May Art. New York. NY 1986.

M.F.A.• Pratt Institute. Brooklyn. NY. 1982. Receive Medicaid in the Nursing Home;" a B.F.A.. Massachusetts College of Art. Boston. MA. 1979. (Pamela Shoemaker)

"The Land of Smiles (South Africa) ." billboard at Gas

(Pamela Shoemaker) . Diploma. Painting and Drawing, Cooper Union. New York. NY 1973. B.A. (History of Art) . Vassar College. Poughkeepsie. NY 1966.

Kristin Reed/Pamela Shoemaker. "Mutare Possibilis Est (A Proposal Drawing for a Mural Project for Jamestown. NY)." 1990. gouache and colored pencil on paper. 16 X 39 inches. Photo by Andrew Solloway.

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DAVID SCHEINBAUM Santa

New

Mexico

Soon after my grandmother's death in 1971 my grandfather moved to Miami Beach. It did not take Grandpa long to shed the immigrant lifestyle that he had been living for sixty years. In one month's time he was wearing white slacks, white shoes, and wraparound sunglasses. Gone forever were the heavy dark overcoat and wool cap.

• Miami Beach. 1977 gelatin silver print on archival Ispoke with many people who had innumer board. 22 X 28 inches. able stories to share, stories of leaving the • Miami Beach. 1977 gelatin silver print on archival old country,struggling for work,organizing board. 22 X 28 inches. unions, and modifying their religious be liefs. These Jewish immigrants helped to • Miami Beach. 1977 gelatin silver print on archival board. 22 X 28 inches. build our America.As one elderly gentleman told me, "This is the last generation of its Selected Exhibitions:

"Miami Beach/Bisti:' Photo GrouP. Coral Gables. FL.

kind. What we have here is millions of years 1990.

of experience walking around. Surely, mil "Bisti:' Museum of Natural History. Albuquerque. NM.

lions of years of knowledge could still make 1988.

a contribution to American life?" "Bisti: ' The Center for Metropolitan Studies. University

of Missouri. Sl. Louis. MO. 1988.

When my grandfather's health began to fail "Bisti." Neikrug Gallery. New York. NY 1988.

Those first years in Miami Beach were his he took to staying in his hotel room , forced "David Scheinbaum/Janet Russek." Photo Gallery Inter happiest. The American Dream was now a national. Tokyo. Japan, 1988.

to keep his swollen legs raised, often miss reality. Grandpa took a long-awaited and "Arte en la Frontera: ' EI Museo de Arte. Ciudad Juarez.

ing his daily pinochle game. I thought that Mexico. 1987

hoped-for trip to Israel, which he couldn't his reclusiveness was the result of embar "Photography and the West:' Rockwell Museum. Corn do when Grandma was alive because she rassment. It was not. If the management of ing. NY 1987

wouldn 't fly. He even stopped questioning the hotel discovered that his health was Reviews. Publications, Catalogs:

my long hair and jeans. Retirement was failing, he would be asked to leave. So Miami Beach: Photographs of an American Dream. wonderful. Miami Beach was aland of sun University Presses of Florida. Gainesville. FL. 1990.

Grandpa, like many others, spent much of shine, leisure, and safety: it was the land of Bisti. University of New Mexico Press. Albuquerque.

his time in his room , the prospect of a NM. 1987

milk and honey in America. nursing home looming in his future. New Mexico. U.S.A.. The Santa Fe Center for Photogra This is the dream of all of America's elderly: phy. 1985.

When I arrived in Miami Beach, a stranger to be able to relax after a long life of hard Education:

with acamera, I was welcomed everywhere work,and to have the time to come to terms B.A.. City University of New York. New York. NY 1973. I went. I was included in card and shuffle with one's own life as it nears its end. For board games and conversations. I was gra one large group of Americans, American ciously invited into many homes. The com Jews, Miami Beach has long been the place pany was wonderful, the conversations to fulfill this dream. Unfortunately, many of memorable and revealing, and for an intro the retired elderly are in fact living impover duction alii ever needed to do was answer ished and unhappy lives. The promised yes to "Nuu ..You're Jewish?" land exists for only ahandful of people.The These photographs record the visits into the $500 monthly Social Security check does lives that I was invited to share. not get them through the month. Food, housing, and medical costs are all rising, -David Scheinbaum while the check stays relatively the same. from the introduction to his book Miami Beach: Photo graphs of an American Dream Some men and women live together to help each other financially, hiding the arrange ment from their children out of embarrass ment, unable to remarry due to the partial loss of Social Security payments that would result. Many are unable to go to temple for lack of transportation and are unable to take advantage of the free lunch programs of fered because the food is not strictly ko sher

•

David Scheinbaum, "Miami Beach," 1977 gelatin silver print on archival board, 22 X28 inches. Courtesy Scheinbaum & Russek, Ltd.. Santa Fe, NM.

JUDITH Novato

SELBY

California

"...Selby has begun her next innovative project ("how old women die.. .") ... astudy of shunned people,her new work's subjects are Selby's own Aunt Alice and her peers, who live in a convalescent hospital. 'I want people to know what it means to put some one away,' says Selby. 'It's an issue we all have to face. On abigger scale, it's how we as asociety are not set up to cope with these people, how we have created these places because we don't know what else to do.' "...although her art makes public the private pains of our time, it is not meant to deepen the wounds but to begin ahealing process. (Her piece) focuses on how we avert our eyes from issues that are important but make us uncomfortable. Underlying it is a deep recognition of human dignity." -Mirka Knaster. excerpted from "Healing Through Art, " East-West Journal, February, 1990. • how old women die.. , 1990, photos and text in spiral ring binder and cassette audio tape, 15 X 12 112 X 2 inches. Selected Exhibitions:

"Vinti: One Year," Intersection for the Arts, San Fran

cisco, CA, 1989.

"Vinti: One Year," National AIDS Convention, San Fran

cisco, CA, 1989.

"the subject is AIDS," Nexus Contemporary Art Center,

Atlanta, GA, 1989.

"Crocker-Kingsley," Crocker Art Museum, Sacramento,

Jud~h Selby, image from "how old women die..." 1990, photos and text in spiral ring binder and CA, 1988.

cassette audio tape, 15 X 12 1/2 X 2 inches. "NuclearVisions,"Traveling Ihrough the U.S. and Canada,

organized by the Oregon Council for Ihe Arts.

Reviews, Publications, Catalogs:

"Healing Through Art," by Mirka Knaster, East-West

Journal, Boston, MA, 1990.

"Fight Against AIDS," by Liz Lufkin, San Francisco

Chronicle, San Francisco, CA, 1989.

"Vinti: APortrait of Hope," by Catherine Seidenberg, San

Francisco Sentinel, San Francisco, CA, 1989.

•

LUCILLE Lakewood

SHORT New

York

I have written and performed my mono logues for many years to both large and small groups - over 100 presentation in the last three years.

Most of my skits are humorous and it gives me great pleasure to hear the positive re sponse in the form of laughter from the audiences. Many times the comments have been, "We need to laugh more often," or "I needed that!" My repertoire consists of approximately 20 monologues and I am constantly adding new ones.

I have often thought of writing amonologue on aging and was pleased when The FORUM Gallery presented the opportunity for me to compose "Don't Worry, We're Just Fine." Since I am a"senior citizen, " I can relate to the theme both from experience and obser vation. -LS • Don't Worry, We 're Just Fine, live monologue.

Judith Selby, Image from "how old women die... " 1990, photos and text in spiral ring binder and cassette audio tape , 15 X12112 X 2 Inches.

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JUDY SOMERVILLE New

York

New

York

Old people are the perfect subject matter for my paintings for if we see the elderly as beautiful, sensual, vital persons, we are then taking re sponsibility for our own destiny. Maybe part of it is never knowing what it all means or where it all goes - just like life. Yet when life seems incomprehensible and vague, harshly realistic yet mysterious, the camera is my brush. The lens seems to penetrate beneath the surface of reality and see what we cannot with our eyes. Somehow there is a reality beyond reality,more profound, more insightful, and more relevant; another dimension so to speak. After drawing initially from the photo, the painting, a gigantic autobiographical collage,takes on alife of its own - more often than not reflecting fantasy, the supernatural, the unreal. Some where along the way;breaking one rule oranother, it finds its route. -JS • Somewhere In France, 1978, acrylic on canvas,60 X 60 inches. Selected ExhiBItions:

Solo exhibition, Lavignes Bastille Galerie, Paris, France,

1990.

Solo exhibition, Yokota Design Work Studio, Tokyo,

Japan, 1987

Solo exhibition, Gallery A-Z, Osaka, Japan, 1987

"West 99th Street." American Cultural Center, Brussels,

Belgium, 1986.

"West 99th Street," The Loft Gallery, Munich, Germany,

1985.

Solo exhibition, Dyansen Gallery, New York, NY, 1982.

Solo exhibition, Ward Nasse Gallery, New York, NY

1982.

Solo exhibition, Galerie Jean Pierre Lavignes, Paris,

France, 1981 .

Reviews, Publications, Catalogs:

'''Oeil des Galeries," by Otto Hahn, ['Express, Paris,

France, 1990.

"Reader's Forum," Playboy (Japanese Edition), Tokyo,

Japan, 1987

"Vielseitige Kunst Von Frauen aus dem Beton Moloch:

by Iris Billaudelle, Die Wahreit, Berlin, Germany, 1985.

Review by Jerry Talmer, New York Post, New York, NY

1978.

•

Judy Somerville, "Somewhere in France: 1978, acrylic on canvas, 60 X60 Inches.

TYLER STALLINGS Atlanta

Georgia

My mother, my mother, Isold the house, dad dead, sister dead, pets dead, my mother - I'm here, she's there, we're blurring, our flesh melds - her decay, my rejuvenation combine to compete against others.Her yellowness from jaundice, my pinkness from acne: our bodily processes combine to create new colors. I inhale, she exhales, I inhale, she exhales, I inhale,she exhales, I inhale,she exhales - my mother stops.No fluids are streaming.She becomes static, as if in defense of something,as if she were asoldier awaiting my attack. Iattempt to expel my insides so as to enter her and unclog the flesh attacking itself. This expulsion is freedom I do not exploit either body - but attemptfreedom for both. Iam conscious full of this activity - my mother is too - neither of us are in atrance but able to be here and there at any time. Healing is the attempted activity - be it by my fluids or by drug fluids, whatever to provide recomposition . The meat becomes stale the longer it remains inside or outside.It needs aspecial protective agent so that it may be at both places.There is movement in the lips, awhisper to say that for me to rub her hand - that which Ithought to soothe, is abrasive,

• Wishful Deterioration of the Body, 1990, 1/2 inch too much friction, too much incongruous skin videotape, running time 6:22. texture sliding, not enough softness, not enough lubricant. It is the corrosion: Leaking acid. ... • Hospital Thoughts, 1989, 1/2 inch videotape ,running

Her sex is disappearing, her gender is subsumed, trampled - "IT" becomes the pronoun - but only in abstract thought - for the tubes are still resting in their inserted position through the orifice absent in me, in males still sucking urine away.

time 6:49.

Selected Exhibitions:

"Breaking New Ground: Image FilmNideo Center, At lanta, GA, 1990.

"Social Terrorism," The Blue Gallery, Portland, OR,

1990.

"Children of Alcoholism," The Arts Exchange, Atlanta,

Perhaps Imay retrieve her eggs,to fertilize,to make GA, 1990.

some companion lor me.The somatic cells are too "The Figure When It's Speaking: The World Gallery,

Asheville, NC, 1989.

far disrupted,are too far burst, in order to activate "The End of the Weather as We Know It," Randolph

replication .My mother is being aborted. Soon she Street Gallery, Chicago, IL, 1989.

will congeal into nothingness, becoming indescrib Two person show, Hillman Holland Gallery, Atlanta, GA,

able, dimensionless, asolidified heap. 1989.

"New Faces: New Visions Gallery, Atlanta, GA, 1989.

My mother is my shadow, I am her shadow but this "Comment," Nexus Contemporary Art Center, Atlanta,

is no dream where we are shadowy creatures GA,1988.

symbolizing arepressed consciousness.The shad Reviews, Publications, Catalogs:

ows simply mean the place that no doctors can "The Figure When It's Speaking," by Mark Clark, NewArt

infest with instruments of curiosity. Examiner, April, 1990.

"'End of the Weather' tackles environment," by David

And so this history is to be avoided for awhile, so McCracken, Chicago Tribune, Nov. 17, 1990.

that I may become agenius for myself - that is, "Southern Artists Look at Postmodernism," by Christian

creating an artificial self-assuredness. I'll twist and Walker, The Atlanta Journal and Constitution, June 28,

turn to run down self-doubt. I will not alternate 1989.

"Nexus's 'Comment'· Political Art That Cuts Straight to

between self-elevation and self-debasement. Ishall the Heart," by Catherine Fox, The Atlanta Journal and

celebrate myself. Constitution, Dec. 4, 1988.

-Tyler Stallings, text from "Hospital Thoughts."

Tyler Stallings, still from "Wishful Deterioration of the Body: 1990, 1/2 inch videotape, running time 6:22.

Educallon:

B.F.A., Atlanta College of Art, Atlanta, GA, 1990.

•

A THE N A Oberl

T AC HA o

• Eighteen YIII1 of Aging , project ongoing till death of artist, black and white photographs and phototape. 28 X 135 inches and 28 3/4 X 63 inches.

• Thl Process of Aging , 1974, printed text on accor dion-folded, satin-finish, pale aqua paper, in a clear As an artist whose work matured during the plastic pocket, 5 112 X 17 1/2 inches (5 3/4 X 3 inches social upheavals of the late sixties, I feel that, folded). given the present state of the world, it would be Reaching Fifty, 1986-87, printed text on accordion • morally untenable to pursue an art career unless folded , maUe-finish, pale blue paper, in a clear plastic one makes art available to everybody (not only pocket, 51/2 X 15 inches (5 314 X 3 inches folded). the financially or educationally privileged). One Selected Exhibitions:

way of achieving this aim is to bring art into the "New Works 1986·1989,- solo exhibition at Cleveland Cen·

urban environment and to endow it with asocial ter for Contemporary Art (Galleria), Cleveland, OH, t989

(catalog essay by Thalia Gouma·Peterson).

function....Anotherway is to make art approach 'Public Works 1970·1988: solo retrospective at the High

able by avoiding deliberate offensiveness and by Museum of Art, Atlanta. GA, 1989 (catalog essay by

allowing the work to be attractive. I am not Catherine and John Howett).

interested in shocking the middle class ("epater "Massacre Memorials' solo exhibition at Max Hutchinson

Ie bourgeois"), and I am not afraid of beauty. Gallery, New Yorl<, NY, 1984 (catalog essay by Lucy lip

Rendering art functional or beautiful does not pard).

"Fragmentation" solo exhibition at Zabriskie Gallery, New

need to entail an artistic compromise - it merely Yorl<, I981.

makes art less an act of self-indulgence... -AT, 1980

Solo exhibition, Zabriskie Gallery, New Yorl<, NY, 1979.

Tape Sculptures: Wright State University Gallery, Cayton,

OH, 1978.

Reviews, Publications, Catalogs:

Fonns OfChaos:Drawings byAthena Tacha, 1974·86,Oberlin,

OH.

"Athena Tacha's Public Sculpture," by Lucy Lippard, Arts

Magazine, October, 1988.

"Athena Tacha's Sculpture: Outdoor Sites Transformed," by

Joan Marter, Sculpture, July-August 1987.

Athena Tacha: Public Sculpture, Oberlin, OH, 1982.

"Nature as Source in Athena Tacha'sArt," by Ellen H.Johnson,

Artforum, January 1981.

Education:

Ph.D. (Aesthetics), University of Paris (Sorbonne), France,

1963.

M.A. (Art History), Oberlin College, Oberlin, OH, 1961. M.A. (Sculpture), National Academy of Fine Arts, Athens, Greece, 1959.

Athena Tacha, detail from "Eighteen Years of Aging" project ongoing till death of artist, black and white photographs and phototape, 28 X 135 inches and 28 3/4 X63 inches.

•

Athena Tacha, Installation view of ÂˇSeventeen Years of Aging" project ongoing till death of artist, black and white photographs and photolape, 28 X 127 1/2 inches and 28 3/4 X59 1/2 inches. Photo by Ellen H. Johnson.

â&#x20AC;˘

THE PROCESS OF AGING (Fragment of an ongoing thorough self analysis and description to be completed by the end of my life) BY ATHENA TACHA OBERLIN, OHIO 1974 I have been watching for the first signs of aging since I was in high school. I used to read at the time a lot of popular magazines with "women's columns," advising how to take care of one's figure and complexion. I remember massaging my knees to prevent flabbiness and occasionally pasting egg yolk on my face to tighten up the skin. I suppose most teen-agers go through that stage. My body matured rather suddenly upon closing sixteen. My breasts and hips rounded up, my arms and thighs filled, and I reached my maximum height and adult weight. I remember measuring myself a lot in those days, to compare my proportions with the "ideal star's." My lower hips were invariably a bit too fat, my breasts rather small. I am now tllirty-eight and I have pretty much the same weight and proportions. I have fluctu ated a little between 110 and 120 pounds, with the heaviest in my mid-twenties, when I moved to America and changed diet. But I have kept mostly between 112 and 115 pounds. My breasts are perhaps fuller the last five or ten years, my waist alittle wider But I can still wear dresses that I had as a student, although I cannot tolerate much anymore tight belts. (In my teens and twen ties I liked to squeeze my waist to achoking pOint; but then it may have also been a matter of fashion). Not counting corns or callouses on my small toes and heels, which I got from tight shoes in late childhood, my teeth bore the first signs of irretrievable deterioration during the early teens. By my twenty-first year all my wisdom teeth were fully grown, but Ihad already had numerous fillings and a few

•

nerve removals. Cavities kept increasing at the same rate until my mid-twenties, when I had my first (and only) extractions:the two left wisdom teeth. In the last ten years the situation has become much more stabi lized, due to either age or better diet and dental care. I hardly got any new cavities. But it was quite a shock when, some years ago, I broke half of a molar by biting inad vertently into a fruit pit, and a little later I chipped a top incisor through excessive cracking of pumpkin seeds. Although both damages were decently repaired, I felt the beginnings of physical disintegration. How awful it will be when some day I lose my front teeth - or all of my teeth. I continued watching for signs of aging throughout my college years. I kept search ing for wrinkles under the eyes or pores on the nose which women are supposed to have cleaned, and Iwas surprised not to find them. (They did come in my thirties).Already in my late teens I had observed, in the flesh of my thighs and buttocks, the lumpy tex ture symptom of mild cellulite - acommon infliction among Mediterranean women. By the early twenties, through standing agreat deal for my job, I also developed on my thighs a network of purplish blood-vessels which keep becoming more visible with the years. In the mid-twenties, I believe after some weight fluctuations, another common skin disfiguration made its first appearance: anetwork of whitish "vein," lighter than my skin, on either side of my belly. They now have appeared on the inner parts of my thighs as well. My body changed very little and slowly after the mid-twenties. My belly must have accu mulated some fat, since my navel, which was protruding like anipple in my childhood, gradually sunk and got transformed into a thimble-like recess. I keep watching my breasts: they have not sagged. They still hold their rounded shape, with no crease underneath, and the nipples are hardly any

larger or browner (which may be due to the fact that I never had children). My elbows are considerably more crinkly (and more pointed when folded) - one of the first signs of aging in awoman's body.Also the skin of my knees has lately become somewhat looser and wrinklier, my thighs a bit flab bier, my hands drier and more bony, with the relief of veins and wrinkles more pro nounced. The corns and callouses on my feet are slowly getting harder and bigger and the bunions of my large toes are becom ing more prominent, probably destined to bulge into grotesque arthritic deformities in myoid age. If my flesh and its surface have in general sagged or faded slightly, it is too little to be noticeable. Only my stomach and belly area seems to pucker more than before when I bend forward . Where the changes of aging have been relatively drastic is my face and neck. Since my early teens I have had aset of horizontal wrinkles on my forehead and a couple of vertical creases between the brows. I re member an aunt of mine scolding me as a girl for frowning when reading and wrin kling my forehead upwards when talking. ("If you make grimaces, you'll get older sooner ") All these wrinkles have deepened, but not too much. I still have not developed serious lines from nostrils to edges of mouth, or any at all around my lips. But the skin under my eyes and chin has aged consider ably. I swear that I have often felt it shrink and sag during long hours of work, reading or typing at the office. I have also sensed the same effect when drinking alcohol - even the moderate amount of a glass or two of wine. ~

I believe the first radiating wrinkles on the side of my eyes appeared in the late twenties and got noticeably worse by the mid-thirties. Overwork, extra responsibilities and ten Sions,scarce sleep, plus an increasing habit of sleeping on my stomach (pressing creases under my eyes and neCk), all contributed to

peared (soon too many to pluck out), and in speeding up the process. Ahorizontal com REACHING FIFTY the past few years they have spread from pound line of small wrinkles appeared un THE PROCESS OF AGING, II around the ears to over the forehead and der each lower lid (most visible when I even to the top of my head. But while they smile) and the dark area around the eyes BY ATHENA TACHA are quite visible on the temples, they still (always present) became particularly OBERLIN OHIO 1986-87 have not affected at all the general brown stressed. The skin over the upper lids has tonality (my hair does not yet look mousy only bagged atiny bit. Ijust became fifty years old,which is looked grey) . At age forty-two, I noticed the first upon as advanced middle-age by ouryouth My other most aged part is the front of my white hair in my pubic area (and still the glorifying Western society, but was con neck. I have no double chin yet and the single one). At the end of my 39th year, I sidered to be the peak of life (at least for change is not always visible. But the skin in broke a large part of an upper molar and men!) by many ancient cultures that re that area has faded considerably, and I was needed agolden half-crown (I have had one spected age and associated it with wisdom. horrified to notice a few years ago that, in more since). But the really traumatic expe There is good reason for this difference in certain positions or under certain motions, rience, two years later, was breaking off a attitude: when changes occurred at a slow the tendons on the front of my neck pro middle upper tooth (by biting inadvertently pace, the young could only profit from the trude like taut strings under flaccid skin. into adry prune pit).The helpless fragility of experience of their elders,and tradition was my teeth and the first "toothless" smile gave Other minor changes on my face have altered venerated; in a fast-changing, technology me aglimpse of what it will feel like to lose its general appearance to a certain degree: dominated culture, old knowledge soon be all my teeth and have to cope with dentures. the flesh of my cheeks has become a bit comes obsolete, and young minds can flabby; my nose a little wider and lumpier, master fresh information quicker-and move A part of my body that has aged most with abundant pores spreading on either on faster Personally, Itend to agree with the noticeably is my hands. Already in my late side over the cheeks; the skin on the AnCients, and am quite impressed that I thirties they had started having afew brown cheekbones develops occasional light stains. have managed to live half acentury! Although spots that turned gradually darker At age On the whole I would say that my face has the decline is fully in Sight, I feel almost as forty-two, a painful little lump appeared on become slightly coarser, heavier, with its youthful as when I was twenty-five. I can the second jOint of my left middle finger, the outlines and surface less smooth, its asym climb up steps with no more loss of breath; first sign of arthritiS, I thought. Ayear later metries accentuated and its profile a bit I can dance as well (even though I am out of it was gone, but in the following six or seven sagging. Ithink thatthe shape and texture of practice for lack of time); I can make love as years most of my finger joints became swol my lips has not changed much, except that well (although less frequently, for being too len and painful,and Icould hardly put on any I got into the habit of biting them inward busy and constantly exhausted); I can swim of my rings. Similar pains appeared, on and when under tension, or of drawing down and dive considerably better The few clear off, in a hip joint, a knee or a shoulder, their ends by pulling my chin upward when handicaps (loss of close sight, more usually on the left side, and ache has be preoccupied - both habits which may con wrinkles, occasional joint or muscle pains) come almost permanent in both of my bun tribute eventually in deforming the lip area. are fully compensated for by a wonderful ions the last couple of years, even though I I have the feeling that my lips will shrivel maturity of thinking, a confidence in per wear comfortable huaraches most of the inwards with age. sonal direction in my work, and above all a time. Strangely enough, my finger joints tremendous increase in sensitivity - in be don't hurt anymore during the past year, the Ihad not noticed any white hairs on my head ing able to absorb and enjoy sensations, knuckle swelling has subsided , and X-rays until this past year Just a couple or three with much greater depth and complexity, in show only traces of past "cysts." So it hairs on each temple, hardly distinguish all areas, from visual beauty, to music, to seems that this was occupational (due to able, but it was a shock and it took me a tasting wine or food. The forties has been a heavy work with a portable jig-saw) rather while to believe their existence. Half of my glorious decade for me, and the only one I than permanent arthritis, and it may be life gone, this is the point of reaching ma would love to relive. likewise with my bunions (because I stand turity, I guess.The other half will be the way too much in my work). Nevertheless, my to old age and death . Naturally, many changes have occurred fingers have gotten more shrivelled, the gradually since my late thirties. Already - Reprinted Irom the original · pocket·book" 01 this tilled. skin of my hands much drier looking, and before reaching forty, more white hairs ap pubtished in 1974. when the artist was 38 years old.

•

most visible when I wake up, prove that, early forties, the middle area of the eye their veins stick out a lot, almost perma too) . Worse still, starting at the same age nently. socket over the upper lid started getting more baggy, especially when I am tired (I but intensified the last year or months, the Altogether,the skinof my body looks saggier can almost feel it making an extra crinkle). flesh of the cheekS on either side of my chin and wrinklier, and the flesh flabbier This has sagged, creating two distinctly baggy Most noticeable of all, the radiating wrinkles really started in the late thirties, with my at the outer corners of my eyes ("crow's areas that spoil the formerly smooth oval knees and the skin over my belly-button (the shape of my face. I almost feel the weight of feet") are now much more numerous,longer elbows,of course,had become crinkly much the flesh (or excess of droopy flesh!) when and deeper, especially when Ismile or laugh; earlier). In the very early forties, my thighs and (since the early forties) several thinner I talk, as if my mouth has lost its earlier got a little flaccid on their inner side, my mobility and flexibility,and the effort it takes wrinkles have developed vertically across lower arms skinnier and my chest sparer to move the lips, in order to articulate or eat, them, as well as diagonally downward from While my breasts still do not really hang under the outer corners of the eyes - all causes them to form unwanted grooves on (there is hardly awrinkle under them, even the surrounding skin. Indeed,so far as I can much more intensely there when I wake up at my thinnest), the bones of the sternum see myself in the mirror during daily activi in the morning. I am sure that these wrinkles and adjoining ribs begin to stick out a bit ties, I think that grimaces which used to look (among others) were created by the folding under the skin. Also, my entire flesh and cute, such as pouting, now look unpleasant of my flesh as I sleep three-quarters on my skin respond to gravity considerably,which front, a habit that became necessary in because of skin coarsening; and even my is most visible when I am doing yoga in smile has lost its sweetness due to the order to avoid snoring (which happens al upside-down positions. All this may be partly ways when I sleep on my back and my increased wrinkles under and around the the result of having lost weight: since my eyes. Strangely enough, when I laugh with mouth drops open) . I also think that my mid-forties, I have tried to stick to 106-08 genuine amusement, my face seems to look eyes became generally more tired and Ibs., to keep the belly down, instead of my wrinkled when, in my fortieth year, after a as pleasant as before. earlier 110-12 Ibs. One has to look more period of working until 2 or 3 at night and I am sure that all of the above effects are ~ried-up, if one wants to avoid the matronly trying to get away with five or six hours of more marked when I am under tension,and figure. However on the whole, keeping trim sleep, I developed an eye-and-nose allergy they certainly are grotesquely visible under has further advantages. I feel more agile, (constantly running nose, and tearful, red, deformation from gravity: when I bend my more comfortable in my clothes (I can even puffy eyes), which pestered me and ran me head down, with face reversed or facing the endure my student age belts!), and I have down for several years. (Even though I got much less cellulite and "culottes de cheval" floor, my cheeks droop forward , creating basically cured of it, I still have allergy in on the hips. deep baggy wrinkles underthe eyes;adouble later summer-early fall, during the ragweed chin hangs around my chin all the way up to "I seem to be aging by the day this year " I pollen season.) each cheek;and the skin ofthe neck crinkles recorded in my journal when I was forty Most disturbing to me, both because they in front in multiple loose folds. I also feel two. Well! That was perhaps exaggerated that all age marks on my face are more worsened recently and I find them more then, but has certainly been true the past disfiguring, are the changes that occurred pronounced under the influence of alcohol. couple of years. Special disaster areas are In fact, I am quite sure that drinking wine, around my mouth. The lips are still substan my neck, eyes, and lately the lower parts of tially unaltered (although usually feeling dry which I now enjoy having with almost every my cheeks. Since the early forties, my from exhaustion), and I have no radiating dinner, is responsible for much of my skin underchin has permanently acquired two little wrinkles around their perimeter yet; fading (together with tension, overwork, thin wedges of loose skin hanging from the but two rather deep grooves have formed and steady lack of sleep). They say that an chin to the top of the neck; and in the last aglhg face shows how one has lived. If one fr.om nose to chin along the mouth (in a years the front of my neck looks faded and different way on each side!). These lines, chooses to abuse one's body and nervous saggy almost in all positions. Under the quite visible since my forty-first year, are system, one causes differential aging of eyes, already in my late thirties, the delicate greatly due to pillow-pressure during sleep, facial parts - and the resulting deformation. skin at their inner corners had become more I am sure, because they are much more faded and puckered, and the compound Even though much of aging is due to geneti present every morning (and tiny vertical horizontal wrinkles have gradually gotten cally regulated, natural changes ofthe body,

crinkles between nose and cheeks, also much deeper (but I have no bags yet). In my . there is no doubt in my mind that a great

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deal is triggered , or at least compoun~ed, by environmental stresses. All my described changes have been more or less gradual, yet I feel that I have aged in the last year or two more than in an entire decade: my forty eighth and -ninth years have b~en the hard est of my life. Aside from heavier than ever work, which was rewarding but extremely demanding, anumber of personal catastro phes occurred within about a year and a half. My mother became totally paralyz.ed for months and finally died; my father-In law died after a sad period of near decrepi tude; my best friend (having survived can cer of the uterus and, at the age of 72, two operations for artificial hips) fell down twice, in the autumn and the following spring, and broke her right hand each time; my second best friend died after prolonged cancer; our country house almost got burned in aforest fire; and I damaged both of my wri~ts in a taxi accident and, after months of pain, had to have two consecutive operations (to mention only the main items!). So, it is not that one's body gets older and weaker. as one approaches fifty. More to the po~nt, one's relatives and close friends start dYing or getting incapacitated, and one fa.ces for the first time seriously (because It feels nearer to home) real old age and death. In fact much of the fear of aging is due to fear off~ture suffering, decrepitude, loss of one's normal capacities, and resulting useless ness and loneliness. One cannot know how much control of self one will have, and how much dependence on others, if there are. any others who will care enough (let alone the threat of economic insecurity that most people feel about their ~I~ .age). I certai.nly am terrified of the possibility of becomln.g totally incapable of tending to m~ basIc physical needs; I consider such eXistence below human dignity and unworthy of pro longing. Yet, nobody seems to want to die at that stage, judging from my mother and from her sister who, at the age of 86, was totally bedridden from slow-developing

cancer for her last eight months. It looks as if one's expectations from and perception of life change accordingly, when one becomes almost a vegetable. Anyway, at the age of fifty, I feel in pretty good command of my capaci.ties and, ~~ far as I know, in decent phYSical conditIOn, except for not being able to sle~p well and having gotten somewhat far-sighted ..For the moment, the latter is my only tangible handicap, having appeared at th~ age ?f forty-five. It has become more serious thiS past year (I cannot read with pleasu~e any longer, even typewritten pages, wl~ho~t glasses, except in bright sunlight), but It st~1I is more of a nuisance than a problem. It IS quite irritating to have to hunt for your glasses to look up atelephone number or a street name on the map, let alone to need them for reading the menu in subdued res taurant lighting (yet I'd rather wear gla~ses permanently than having them ha~g with a string around my neck!). My sleeping. pro.b lem may be due to the e~tr~ordlnarlly stressful conditions of my life In the last years. However it may also be due to meno pause. As I had my uterus (though not my ovaries) removed at age forty-four I do not know when I entered menopause. I started having occasional periods of hot flashes at night (neversevere) when Iwas forty-seven, the summer afavorite uncle died unexpect edly from cancer - and they since have recurred at times of strain. I have not per ceived any other effects of menopa~s~, unless poor sleeping is one (because It IS often accompanied by anxiety when I wake up at night), and slight depression or g~n eral bad mood during the past year (which I never experienced before, but which could also be the result of the recent emotional strains). In any case, my sexual dri.ve has not changed much, other than being af fected, as always, by hard work and worry. Most of the problems of middle-age are in fact related to sexuality and the fear of loss

of it. Men are afraid of losing their virility, which is not only a source of pleasure, ~ut also of power and prestige. In pa~t societ ies, when reproduction of the species was a matter of survival and more sons were needed for more warriors (defenders of home as well as conquerors of goods), a male ~eeded to preserve as long as possible the ability to inseminate. For the same rea son females were outcast after fifty, as worthless reproductive machines. Women do not fear the loss of sexual drive, since they do not need acrucial mechanical event (such as erecti~n) for ~ex to occur; but t.hey are afraid of lOSing their power of attraction, and, indirectly, the pleasure of sex and any control over males thatthey can have through it. Indeed, it is my belief that standards of female beauty and attractiveness have been ingrained in humankind through the n~turally reproductive function of sex and the Impor tance of female youthfulness in it. The ~ro?f of this is that we do not use the same criteria for aging and beauty regarding men and women (even though women live longer): radiating wrinkles at the corners of the eyes in a man are "humor lines"; in a woman, "tell-tale age marks." Grey temples in a ~an are often an addition to "mature attractive ness;" in awoman, they are usuall~ signs of "past the prime." In general: wrl~kles or sagging cheeks are hardly noticed In men and the coarseness of their skin due to the beard helps (baldness is m pri~cipal specter at middle-age). I am not trying to reverse standards of beauty related to youthfulness in order to comfort ~y~elf. I am trying to examine the matter obJectl~ely, because I (and others) have often perceived beauty in middle-aged and even very old faces. If we disassociate ourselves from the worry of aging and remove the personal element, it may be easier to judg~: amatu.re elephant or lion is the prime ~peclm~n of ItS species; amature elk or bull IS more Impos ing than its equivalent you~gster: and old plane trees or olive trees, With their convo

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luted branches and gnarled barks, are more satisfying formally to the human eye than immature trees of the same kind. So, if I manage to remove the stigma of age, then perhaps I can look at the present changes on my face as structural alterations ("rearranging of features," to an extent), which have produced a different face. One can try to look at one's new face as if one was a stranger who had never met the earlier self. Then perhaps one would not perceive it as "ravaged by time." However, even if accepted standards of beauty and youthfulness, or fear of future aging are set aside, the new face that looks at me out of the mirror is still very unsettling. Not only because it keeps changing quite fast, but mainly because I am not really aware of the changes (they are barely felt through touch). If I did not have a mirror, I probably would not know my new physiognomy. I noticed recently that I was wrinkling my forehead much more often than I had observed in the past, either raising the eyebrows (parallel horizontal wrinkles), appearing to question or wonder (which in fact I wasn't), or frowning when thinking or reading (vertical wrinkles between the brows) - both giving me either a worried or forbidding expres sion, way beyond my actual feelings. I also noticed my mouth turning downwards at the ends, "grimly," when I work tensely, exaggerating the pouches on either side of it (although Icannot feel it). Are my muscles acting beyond my control and without my knowledge of the face they present to the world? This is an upsetting idea that in creases the insecurity one may feel anyway at this age. Generally, I liken middle-age, with its changes and anxieties, to.. adolescence, which is equally accompanied by achemical and physical evolution with psychological repercussions. Even though we may not have altered much internally from our thir

•

ties or even twenties, upon nearing fifty we have to confront our familiar environment with a new facade - atraumatic experience that requires a period of adjustment. The only difference is that an adolescent can look forward to young adulthood (be it with naivete and impatience), whereas at middle age you need much equanimity and matu rity of spirit to face without despair the prospect of approaching old age and death. -Reprinted from the original "pocket-book" of this titled, published by the artist in 1987.

JOYCE TENNESON Weston

Massachusetts

"I think people are initially attracted to the beauty of my artwork. Looking deeper they become absorbed with it. I often get letters from people after my lectures saying things like: 'I couldn't sleep all night, the images made me thinkaboutthings I hadn'tthought about in years..:'"

-Joyce Tenneson, excerpted from an interview pub lished by the Boca Raton Museum of Art,Boca Raton, FL.

• Untitled (Young man holding old man), 1988, Cibachrome photographic print, 24 X20 inches. Cour tesy of Fendrick Ga"ery,Washington, DC,and New York, NY. • Untitled (Young man and old man back-to-back), 1988, cibachrome photographiC print, 24 X20 inches. Courtesy of Fendrick Gallery, Washington. DC, and New York, NY.

Selected Exhibitions:

Solo exhibition, Kinsey Ga"ery, Seattle University, Se attle, WA, 1990.

Solo exhibition,Fendrick Ga"ery, Washington,DC, 1989.

Solo exhibition, Marcuse Pfeifer Ga"ery, New York, NY

1988.

Solo exhibition, Musee d'Art Moderne, Paris, France,

1987

Solo exhibition, Martin Ga"ery, Washington, DC, 1986.

Solo exhibHion,Canon Municipale Du Chateau,Toulouse,

France, 1985.

Solo exhibition, Recontres Internationales De La

Photographie, Aries, France, 1984.

Solo exhibition, Martin Ga"ery, Washington, DC, 1983.

Joyce Tenneson, ·Untltled" (young man holding old man), 1988, Clbachrome photographic print, 24 X 20 Inches. Photo, © 1989, by Joyce Tenneson, courtesy of Fendrick Ga"ery, Washington, DC, and New York, NY

Reviews, Publications, Catalogs:

"Personal Clues/Private Associations," by Nancy Ha"

Duncan, Center Quarterly, Catskill Center of Photogra phy, Winter 1986-87.

"Photographs by Joyce Tenneson," by Campbell Geeslin,

People Magazine, February 11. 1985.

"Le Monde della Photo," by Michael Kempf, Le Monde,

May 16, 1981 .

Joyce Tenneson, catalog with essay by David Tannous,

The Phillips Collection, Washington, DC, 1980.

Education:

Ph.D., Union Graduate School, Antioch College, Yellow

Springs, OH, 1978).

M.A., George Washington University, Washington, DC,

1969.

BA, Regis College, Boston, MA, 1967

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MARY LOU UTTERMOHLEN Columbus

h i 0

"Who was Elnora Simms?" Does anyone really care? That's a question Elnora asked herself everyday. ''I'm anobody," she often said. But I disagree. Imet Elnora in 1985 when Imoved to Columbus, Ohio, to go to graduate school. I soon found myself involved (in) dOing photography for an arthritis photo contest and during the project I had the good fortune to make a new friend, Elnora Simms. Elnora had ahard life, but in spite of it all, she always maintained a positive, upbeat attitude, she was agreat listener, very caring, outgoing, and told some pretty good jokes.

necessarily see eye-to-eye, I realize that she was amaster teacher as well as afriend. I welcome you to share in my knowledge of her. ... -MLU • Arthritis doesn't kill anybody.. .from the series "Who Is Elnora Simms?" 1987 photograph and text. 20 X 16 inches. • 1couldn't live without my touch lamp.. Jrom the series "Who Is Elnora Simms?" 1987 photograph and text. 20 X 16 inches. • I had a kind of hectic lIIe.. .from the series "Who Is Elnora Simms?" 1987 photograph and text, 20 X 16 inches. • I sit at the window and watch the traHic go by...from the series "Who Is Elnora Simms?" 1987 photograph and text, 20 X 16 inches.

Selected Exhibitions: "Columbus Art League's 80th Annual Exhibition." RiHe Gallery, Vern RiHe Center, Columbus, OH, 1990. "Who Was Elnora Simms?" Silver Image Gallery, Ohio The images I have of Mrs. Simms show her as I State University, Columbus, OH, 1987 and Methodist saw her. The statements with the photographs Theological School Gallery, Delaware, OH, 1987 are quotes of things I heard her say and will "New Photographs ," Shepherd College Gallery, always remember. Elnora had pretty handwrit Shepherdstown, WV, 1987 "Hands Across Columbus," Franklin County Public li ing, but like everything else, writing was rather brary, Columbus, OH, 1987 painful for her. The handwriting with the artwork "Metro Art," Scarsdale. NY, 1987 is mine.The quotes were transcribed from taped "16th Annual East Texas International Photographic conversations Ihad with her. She often taped her Contest. Commerce, TX, 1987 "Crosscurrents," Stifel Fine Arts Center, Wheeling, WV, conversations with hervisitors so that she (could) 1986. continue enjoying their company after they left. Reviews, Publications, Calalogs:

It is my hope that these photographs will pre 1989 ThreeRiversArtsFestival(catalog) , Pittsburgh,PA, serve the memory of awoman that few people 1989. Arthritis Today, Arthritis Foundation, Inc. Atlanta, GA, had the privilege of knowing. Elnora wanted to June 1987 help others and helping others was all she had to "Painful Life Presented ...." by Barbara Carmen, The live for. Perhaps these photographs will bring up Columbus Dispatch, Columbus, OH, 1987 the issues of arthritis and how it feels to live with "Photos Capture Life of Disabled Woman," by Katy Delaney, The Lantern, Columbus, OH, 1987 such a disease. Or maybe (through the work). some of the viewers will have the opportunity to Education: M.A. (Photography). Ohio State University. Columbus.

experience how it feels to be over 65 and to have OH, 1987

outlived their resources ... B.A. (Photography),Shepherd College,Shepherdstown,

WV,1984.

... I do not think that Elnora Simms lived in vain. AA (Photography),Shepherd College, Shepherdstown,

Elnora often made the same statements over WV.1984.

and-over. One question she always asked was A.A. (Graphic Design) , Shepherd College .

why she had certain experiences. Ibelieve her life Shepherdstown, WV. 1982.

was for us to learn from. Remembering all my experiences with her, and at times we didn't

•

Mary Lou Uttermohlen, "I couldn't live without my touch lamp..." from the series "Who Is Elnora Simms?" 1987, photograph and text, 20 X 16 inches.

â&#x20AC;˘

• Seura Chaya , 4, 1978-89, photograph and water Reviews, Publications, Catalogs:

color on board. 59 X 63 inches. Courtesy of Ronald "Hannah Wilke at Ronald Feldman, by Ken Johnson, Art·

New York New York Feldman Fine Arts, New York, NY forum, January, 1990.

"Hannah Wilke," by Catherine Liu, Artfarum. December.

Selected Exhibitions:

1989. . 'The images Imade of myself and my mother Solo exhibition, Genovese Graphics Gallery, Boston,

"Hannah Wilke," by Peler von Ziegesar, NewAn Examin·

kept me alive. Art is adistraction, so is life. MA. 1990.

er, December, 1989.

"Image World : Art and Media Culture," curated by Lisa

To distract my mother Iwould often rub her "Hannah Wilke," by Terry Myers, Flash An, November!

Phillips, The Whitney Museum, New York, NY 1989.

December. 1989. head, to soothe her, to feel the softness of "About Face," solo exhibition at Ronald Feldman Fine

her bald head from chemotherapy ... An Arts, New York, NY, 1989.

other kin,d oftherapy ... touch. But she died "Hannah Wilke: A Retrospective, " curated by Thomas

Kochheiser, Gallery 210, University of Missouri, Sl.

anyway. The meals to the hospital didn't Louis, MO, 1989 (also at Gallery of Art. University of

cure her, washing her teeth didn't cure her, Missouri, Kansas City, MO, 1989).

capturing her image didn't cure her But I "Marcel Duchamp and the Avant Garde Since 1950,"

loved her ... and so I buried her and went to Museum Ludwig, Cologne, West Germany. 1988.

"The Artist's Mother: Portraits and Hommage," National

synagogue to pray for her And when Icame Portrait Gallery, Washington. DC. 1988.

home, Donald, my friend whom Selma Solo exhibition at Gross Gallery, curated by Joanne

[mother] adored, had captured alittle love Frueh, University of Arizona at Tucson, Tucson, fJ;z.,

bird that flew into the window in SoHo while 1984.

HANNAH

WILKE

I was praying in synagogue. "Hi-ya little bird" became "Chaya," my mother's middle name and the word for "animal" in Hebrew." -Hannah Wilke, excerpted from a piece published in New Observations, 1988.

Hannah Wilke, "Seura Chaya 14 ," 1978-89, photograph and watercolor on board, 59 X 63 inches. Photo by Jennifer Kotter, courtesy of Ronald Feldman Fine Arts. New York, NY

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REJECTED AT 60

THE TROUBLE WITH GROWING OLD

So what is true and what not true I have no more to know.

You still want to worship but all the dusty idoltoes have turned up and gone into that dark night.

The unquestioned illusions of yesterday Lie crumpled like a cast-off garment And I, that garment's very form, Must somehow make today's illusions Fit and keep me warm. Do they print a size 14 pattern For half-a-body? Are there still wearable truths? Changing in degree but constant? Do I now know some that fit? This faithful cat watching my moods Those feeding, fliHing birds A child's trust and busy living Eternal music and unread books Untraveled places, nature's prizes, Afriend's care, a friend's need, God's timely answer to my cry for help. But after 40 years! Now the believed-in verities of marriage Are like faded, threadbare clothes; And I have no more to know... So late, so difficult, to design a new costume And fashion a whole new show. --Betty Hall Cobb, 1978

It's too late to buy

lilies and bonnets

for your mother· to kiss

her widow cheek

and reassure her you

won't let her die in

the Dewittville poorhouse.

Reassure and reassure

until exhausted you

think the unthinkable,

"I wish you were dead."

Believe, me, that

comes back to haunt you

all the fires of retribution

are not in the far future

that makes you cower in obeisance

to children and grandchildren:

the last you have to worship;

those you want to worship you.

That's the trouble with growing old.

There's no second chance;

and only a rare night

when you dream of being held.

That's why your eyes slide pagt

bed after bed of those

curled-up white cocoons

in nursing homes.

IN RESPONSE TO AFELLOW POET (on my 72nd birthday!) Silly old woman clothes spotted, hair awry, proud, stubborn, outspoken

old woman not 45, 57 or 65;

no more slaps on her behind, no

sly reaching to cup a 36 breast,

no whistles from scaffolded workmen,

no married men tapping at the back door.

Silly old woman

too enervated for others' pep or woes,

yet hurt if not included (the irony of

feeling useless if not able to help).

Silly old woman

can't even measure condiments,

remember her pills, climb the

dentist's stairs, control her body odors.

Silly old woman

longing, but not asking, for

her children's and friends' attention;

Always thanking God for their survival

because each loss cracks her heart,

turning it to that red stone, but

remembering, remembering, remembering.

Silly old woman

refusing denial, pity, gold, liquor, drugs,

learning each day about the inexorable need

to let go of all she has cherished.

How sweet it isn't. Oh, yeah!

--Betty Hall Cobb, 1/30/90 --Betty Hall Cobb, 2117/89 Betty Hall Cobb lives in Dunkirk, New York where she received a Bachelor of Science in education from State University of New York College at Fre donia in 1963. In 1988, at age 70, she finished an advanced course in creative writing, joined a lo cal women's writing group (Penelope), and sent out some 300 poems she had been writing for the past 50 years. Her poems have been published in World of Poetty, Sacramento, CA, The Buffalo News, and The Fig, published by State University of New York College at Fredonia.

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