Jane Hammond 'No Assembly Required'

JANE HAMMOND NO ASSEMBLY REQUIRED EXHIBITION 16TH OCTOBER – 14TH NOVEMBER 2014

Sims Reed Gallery The Economist Building 30 Bury Street London SW1Y 6AU T +44 (0)20 7930 5111 F +44 (0)20 7930 1555 E gallery@simsreed.com www.gallery.simsreed.com Exhibition produced in cooperation with Galerie Lelong, New York

FOREWORD It is hard to believe that until now, there has never been a show in the UK devoted to Jane Hammond’s work. Over the course of her thirty-year career, she has had numerous solo shows in America and abroad. She is represented in every major American museum, and there is a substantial body of literature written on her work.

Certainly, there are very few artists who can boast an equally impressive resumé. Our one challenge in presenting her first UK solo exhibition was to find a coherent way to show an artist whose vision is infinitely broad and whose working practice is so diverse.

Although the techniques vary widely, from watercolour and drawing, to etching, digital printing, and photography, the use of paper is consistent throughout the exhibition and is a major component of Hammond’s work generally. Another aspect all the works here have in common is the use of collage and assemblage, which is how we arrived at our title ‘No Assembly Required’. Although the pieces may appear quite different at first glance, they all share Hammond’s eccentric, more-is-more character. In each case, she has taken varied and seemingly incongruent elements, which she then tirelessly remakes, reworks and recombines into something dazzling and wholly new.

Hammond is by nature a collector and is constantly exploring the world around her looking for material to incorporate into her pictures. At its core, this work is fundamentally about information and its relationship to consciousness, and Hammond has always used found images to create layers of meaning and new narratives.

The foundation of her visual vocabulary is a lexicon of 276 images, which she assembled in 1988. These come from every manner of printed material including books, manuals, scientific texts, cartoons, stamps, tarot cards, and even tattoos. The subjects cover all disciplines and range from a pair of dice to a portrait of Frida Kahlo.

They are remade each time they are used – their medium, colour, scale, and relationship to each other change constantly – but

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fundamentally these are the building blocks for all of Hammond’s work.

Most clearly delineated in the matchbook works and gampi piece, a selection of these images are transformed into rubber stamps, printed in etching ink, watercoloured by the artist and assembled three-dimensionally. They are given notational titles (each named after the image in the upper left corner), and it is left to us to make our own associations and connections. Although some characters appear in all three works, their purpose in each can be completely different. Picasso for instance may be in one because he is an artist, in another because he is yellow, and in another because of his round head.

The centrepiece of this show is the stunning ‘All Souls (Canterbury)’.

This is the newest work in a series of butterfly maps that have become an important part of Hammond’s oeuvre and exemplify her ingenious approach to working with paper. The idea came to her in a dream, following an auspicious event on the afternoon of September 11, 2001. Amidst the horror and chaos, a flock of Monarch butterflies appeared on the flower boxes outside the windows of her south-facing Soho loft. This had never happened before or since.

The delicate butterflies and the fragility of life clearly resonate and these maps are a metaphor for the endless cycles of human life in ancient lands. Butterflies are also a good example of how a subject can be molded and changed – while featuring prominently in ‘All Souls (Canterbury)’, they also appear as a singular collage element in ‘Scrapbook’, as a printed swarm amongst the layers in ‘Bulletin Board (Water Tulip)’, and as likely characters in the botanical collages.

In other works, Hammond’s lexicon is still present, but the images are combined in a more layered, almost frenzied, fashion. The two glittering ‘Tapestry of Daily Life’ pieces present a contrast between the everyday objects depicted and their opulent, golden hues.

Interspersed amongst the cacophony of colour in ‘Bulletin Board’,

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are pairs of similar objects that our eye wanders between. All newly conceived for this exhibition, these present a maze of familiar objects, painstakingly remade in paper, that call upon the viewer to sift through and make their own associations.

Collage is also fundamental to the botanical works. In these, the apparent randomness seen elsewhere is given structure in the form of traditional flower arrangements, which are bursting with flowers gathered from her bountiful supply of source material. Though of course, nothing by Hammond is as it seems and closer inspection uncovers animals, insects, and every manner of unlikely creature amidst the foliage. These at first may seem quite straight-forward, but soon reveal a much more complicated, ambiguous character.

Another prominent feature of this show is printmaking. In some cases, it may be how individual elements of a work were created.

But in other cases, it is the work itself. ‘Tabula Rosa’, a life sized self-portrait seen from behind and covered in tattoo images from her original lexicon, is a very personal and poetic use of digital printmaking. As we would expect from Hammond, most of her editioned works employ several different techniques - ‘From the Goose to Girl’ and ‘Snapshot Odyssey’, both combine pochoir, relief printing, hand colouring, and lithography among others. These prints are also the most literal references to game playing and the notions of rules and chance, important ideas that occur throughout her work.

Most recently, Hammond has turned her foraging and remaking instincts to photography, which she began working with in 2004.

Inherent in the nature of photography is the assumption of fact; Hammond intentionally uses a traditional silver gelatin process and keeps the image a familiar size, reinforcing their initial sense of verisimilitude. However, one soon realises that these pictures and their odd, implausible scenarios are not what they seem. Using her collection of over 15,000 vernacular photographs, along with both documentary and set-up photographs she takes herself, she

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excavates and creates the necessary components for her new vision. After painstakingly searching for the right details, they are manipulated, reassembled, re-scaled, shadowed, blurred, etc. A negative is made from the collaged, digital image, which is then printed as a silver gelatin print and finally presented as a new photograph. As in all her work, found facts are transformed into new fictions.

This is a show that defies easy categorisation, but Hammond is an artist that cannot be explained or defined with ease – she is at once systemic and chaotic, humorous and mysterious; full of endless possibilities. Engaging with her work is being invited to play her visual game, with infinite layers, ever shifting meanings, and the constant reward of surprise and wonder. – Lyndsey Ingram, Sims Reed Gallery.

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Untitled (White Swan) Ink and watercolour on gampi paper, 2002.

45.7 x 50.8 cm

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Rally Selenium toned silver gelatin print, 2011.

From the edition of 5.

27.9 x 35.6 cm

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Blythe Selenium toned silver gelatin print, 2011.

From the edition of 5.

27.9 x 35.6 cm

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Snapshot Odyssey Twelve colour lithograph and pochoir with digital printing, chine colle and collage, 2014.

From the edition of 40.

Printed on Rives BFK paper, Thai Mulberry, Mokume and metallic papers.

Printed and published by Shark’s Ink, Lyons, CO. 76.2 x 100.3 cm

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Spiral Vase with Oriental Poppy and Pitcher Plant Unique botanical collage with lithography, linocut, relief printing, digital printing, coloured pencil, watercolour and gouache, hand cut and assembled on painted Spanish rag paper, 2014.

64.8 x 49.5 cm

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Spiral Vase with Zinnia, Crocus and Spider Mum Unique botanical collage with lithography, linocut, relief printing, digital printing, coloured pencil, watercolour and gouache, hand cut and assembled on painted Spanish rag paper, 2014.

63.5 x 49.5 cm

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Chai Wan Five Selenium toned silver gelatin print, 2011.

From the edition of 5.

27.9 x 35.6 cm

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All Souls (Canterbury) Gouache, acrylic paint, metal leaf on assorted handmade papers with graphite, coloured pencil and archival digital prints, 2014.

162.6 x 139.7 x 8.9 cm

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Matchbooks (Yellow Picasso) Ink and watercolour on rag paper, 2014.

49.5 x 62.2 x 4.4 cm

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Fish Vase with Japanese Chrysanthemum and Squash Blossom Unique botanical collage with lithography, linocut, relief printing, digital printing, coloured pencil, watercolour and gouache, hand cut and assembled on painted Spanish rag paper, 2014.

54 x 40 cm

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Self-Portrait with Twin Selenium toned silver gelatin print, 2011.

From the edition of 5.

27.9 x 35.6 cm

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Serpentario Selenium toned silver gelatin print, 2011.

From the edition of 5.

27.9 x 35.6 cm

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Greek Vase with Yellow Plums and Carolina Parrot Unique botanical collage with lithography, linocut, relief printing, digital printing, coloured pencil, watercolour and gouache, hand cut and assembled on collaged wood grain papers, 2014.

127 x 96.5 cm

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Bulletin Board (Water Tulip) Archival foam core, cork paper, archival digital pints, various papers, gouache, watercolour, coloured pencil, rubber stamp, Mylar, various fabrics, cotton thread, silver leaf, glitter, found holographic postcard and Teddy Bear eyes, 2014.

58.4 x 68.6 x 7.6 cm

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Tabula Rosa Six-colour inkjet print, 2001.

From the edition of 43.

Printed on handmade Japanese paper.

Published by ULAE. 190.5 x 81.3 cm

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Park Selenium toned silver gelatin print, 2014.

From the edition of 5.

27.9 x 35.6 cm

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Flock Selenium toned silver gelatin print, 2013.

From the edition of 5.

27.9 x 35.6 cm

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Greek Vase with Christmas Cactus Heliconia and Fuchsia Unique botanical collage with lithography, linocut, relief printing, digital printing, coloured pencil, watercolour and gouache, hand cut and assembled on collaged wood grain papers, 2014.

127 x 96.5 cm

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Loose Tapestry of Daily Life (Rotary Phone) Sumi ink and gold leaf on assorted archival papers, 2014.

91.4 x 77.5 x 3.8 cm

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Matchbooks (Blue Snowman) Ink and watercolour on rag paper, 2014.

60.3 x 61.6 x 4.4 cm

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Gold Vase with Allium, Kingfisher and Pitcher Plant Unique botanical collage with lithography, linocut, relief printing, digital printing, coloured pencil, watercolour and gouache, hand cut and assembled on collaged Japanese papers, 2014.

127 x 96.5 cm

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A Hundred Eyes Selenium toned silver gelatin print, 2009.

From the edition of 5.

35.6 x 27.9 cm

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Can You Draw This?

Selenium toned silver gelatin print, 2008.

From the edition of 5.

27.9 x 35.6 cm

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Scrapbook Three dimensional collage including pigmented ink jet and woodcut with hand colouring by the artist, 2003.

From the edition of 43.

Printed on Somerset Photo Enhanced and handmade Japanese paper.

Published by ULAE. 83.8 x 123.2 x 5.1 cm

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From the Goose to the Girl Iris print, pochoir, and relief with hand colouring by the artist, 1999.

From the edition of 25.

Published by Pace Editions.

68.6 x 67.3 cm

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Loose Tapestry of Daily Life (Pocket Watch) Sumi ink and gold leaf on assorted archival papers, 2014.

91.4 x 77.5 x 3.8 cm

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BIOGRAPHY Jane Hammond was born in Bridgeport, Connecticut, in 1950, and was educated at Mt. Holyoke College and the University of Wisconsin at Madison. She moved to New York City in 1980. In 1989 the first solo show of her paintings was mounted at Exit Art in New York. Since then she has had eighteen solo exhibitions in New York and other solo exhibitions in Paris, Stockholm, Amsterdam, Barcelona, Bilbao, Milan, Detroit, Chicago, Seattle, St. Louis, San Antonio, San Diego, Columbus and Kansas City. Her work is included in over fifty public collections including Museum of Modern Art; Whitney Museum of American Art; Metropolitan Museum of Art; MFA, Boston; National Gallery of Art, Washington, DC; Art Institute of Chicago; San Francisco Museum of Modern Art; J.Paul Getty Museum, Los Angeles and Yale University Art Gallery.

Solo museum exhibitions have been organised at the Honolulu Academy of Art (1990); the Cincinnati Museum of Art (1993); the Orlando Museum of Art (1994); the Whitney Museum of American Art at Philip Morris (2002); and ‘Jane Hammond: The Rebus Paintings’, at the Weatherspoon Art Museum (2003).

In 2001 the Cleveland Center for Contemporary Art organised a solo show, ‘Jane Hammond: the John Ashbery Collaboration 1993-2001’, which then traveled to the Contemporary Museum in Honolulu, HI, the Madison Art Center, Madison, WI and the Blaffer Gallery at the University of Houston, Houston, TX. A catalogue accompanied the exhibition with an essay by Ingrid Schaffner.

In 2006 the Mt. Holyoke College Art Museum organised and debuted ‘Jane Hammond: Paper Work’, containing all manner of works on paper from 1989 through 2006. This show traveled through 2009 with exhibitions at the Tucson Museum of Art, Tucson, AZ; the Chazen Museum of Art, Madison, WI; the Arkansas Arts Center, Little Rock, AR; the Herbert F. Johnson Museum, Cornell University, Ithaca, NY; the Achenbach Foundation at the DeYoung Museum,

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San Francisco, CA and the Detroit Institute of Art, Detroit, MI. A catalogue accompanied the exhibition with essays by Faye Hirsch and Nancy Princenthal and an interview with Douglas Dreishpoon.

From 2004 to 2012 the artist worked on ‘Fallen’, a large sculptural installation memorialising U.S. soldiers killed in Iraq. The piece was acquired by the Whitney Museum of American Art, and was shown there as well as several other institutions including the Wexner Center for the Arts, Ohio; the MCA, San Diego, and the FLAG Art Foundation, New York City.

Since 2004, the artist has been engaged in the creation of a unique vision in photography. Her photographs have been shown in solo exhibitions at the Jaffe-Friede and Strauss Galleries, Dartmouth College, NH; MCA Denver, CO and McNay Museum, San Antonio, TX. Her work has been written about in the New York Times, Aperture, Art in America, The New Yorker, Artforum, Art on Paper, Modern Painters, Art News, Art & Antiques, BOMB Magazine, Art in Print, Los Angeles Times, The Village Voice, FlashArt, Arts Magazine and many other publications. She is the recipient of the Louis Comfort Tiffany Foundation Grant, the Ludwig Vogelstein Foundation Grant in Painting, two New York State Council on the Arts Grants, the National Endowment for the Arts Fellowship, the Joan Mitchell Foundation Grant Award and the 2012 Anonymous Was A Woman Grant. Ms. Hammond lives and works in New York City where she is represented by Galerie Lelong.

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SELECTED PUBLIC COLLECTIONS Addison Gallery of American Art, Andover, MA Albertina, Vienna, Austria

Albright Knox Art Gallery, Buffalo, NY

Aldrich Museum of Contemporary Art, Ridgefield, CT

Amon Carter Museum of American Art, Fort Worth, TX Arkansas Arts Center, Little Rock, AR Art Institute of Chicago, IL

Baltimore Museum of Art, MD

Biblioteque Nationale, Paris, France

Brooklyn Museum of Art, New York City, NY

Chazen Museum of Art, University of Wisconsin, Madison, WI Cincinnati Art Museum, OH

Colorado Collection, University of Colorado, Boulder, CO Contemporary Art Museum St. Louis, MO Corcoran Gallery of Art, Washington, DC Detroit Institute of Arts, MI

DeYoung Museum, San Francisco, CA

Fogg Art Museum, Harvard University, Cambridge, MA Fort Wayne Museum of Art, Ft. Wayne, IN

Grand Valley State University, Grand Rapids, MI

Grunewald Center for Graphic Arts, Los Angeles, CA

Herbert F. Johnson Museum, Cornell University, Ithaca, NY Honolulu Academy of Art, Honolulu, HI

Hood Museum of Art, Dartmouth College, Hanover, NH Joslyn Art Museum, Omaha, NB

J. Paul Getty Museum, Los Angeles, CA

The Library of Congress, Washington, DC

Maryland Institute College of Art, Baltimore, MD

Madison Museum of Contemporary Art, Madison, WI

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Mead Art Museum, Amherst College, Amherst, MA Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York City, NY Milwaukee Art Museum, Milwaukee, WI

Mount Holyoke College Art Museum, South Hadley, MA Museo Tamayo, Mexico City, Mexico

Museum of Contemporary Art, Chicago, IL

Museum of Contemporary Art San Diego, CA Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, MA

Museum of Modern Art, New York City, NY National Gallery of Art, Washington, DC

National Museum of Women in the Arts, Washington, DC New York Public Library, New York City, NY Orlando Museum of Art, Orlando, FL Portland Art Museum, Portland, OR

Princeton University Art Museum, Princeton, NJ Saint Louis Art Museum, Saint Louis, MO

San Francisco Museum of Modern Art, San Francisco, CA San Jose Museum of Art, CA Seattle Art Museum, WA

Smith College Museum of Art, Northampton, MA

Smithsonian American Art Museum, Washington, DC

Spencer Museum of Art, University of Kansas, Lawrence, KS Toledo Museum of Art, OH

Tucson Museum of Art, AZ

Walker Art Center, Minneapolis, MN

Weatherspoon Art Museum, University of North Carolina, Greensboro, NC

Wellesley College Davis Museum and Cultural Center, Wellesley, MA Whitney Museum of American Art, New York City, NY Yale University Art Museum, New Haven, CT

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Published by Sims Reed Gallery on the occasion of the exhibition ‘Jane Hammond: No Assembly Required’ 16th October – 14th November 2014.

All Images © Jane Hammond, Courtesy Galerie Lelong, New York. © All rights reserved. No part of the contents of this catalogue may be reproduced in whole or in part, without the permission from the publisher Sims Reed Gallery.

Designed by Lucy Harbut.

Printed by Dayfold.