alison reintjes DoubleColumn
alison reintjes acknowledgements I would like to thank the following institutions and people who have helped make this installation and book possible: Beaudette Consulting Engineers, Inc. Brad Allen Broadway Splicing & Supply Jobe Bernier Julia Galloway Logan Photography Mike Neilsen Missoula Art Museum Missoula Community Access Television Montana Arts Council Nancy Reintjes Paul G. Allen Family Foundation Robin & Mark Kratzer
DoubleColumn
March - July 2014
introduction
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he Missoula Art Museum (MAM) is thrilled to host Alison Reintjes’ site specific installation that currently graces our three-story foyer and lobby. MAM is particularly honored when artists create artwork for our spaces as Alison has so skillfully and beautifully done with her sculpture DoubleColumn and wall relief Sounding. MAM shares in the sense of pride that Montanans have in the regional strength of the ceramic arts, symbolized by the respected Archie Bray Foundation in Helena, MT. Since the 1950’s the Archie Bray has had a tremendous impact on the ceramic arts not only in our state, but nationally and internationally. Reintjes, with an artistic background in ceramics, first moved to Montana in 2001 to attend a residency
at the Archie Bray Foundation immersing herself in this rich history. However, her innovative approach to ceramics, so clearly on display in these new works, leaps beyond the traditional clay vocabulary into the purely sculptural. Reintjes has participated in several group exhibitions at MAM over the years including the Montana Triennial: 2012 and Persistence in Clay: Contemporary Ceramics in Montana. Her attention to detail, spirit of experimentation, scrupulous attention to composition, and consistently professional technique have convinced us to celebrate this innovative artist. Laura J. Millin Executive Director
artist statement
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he newly renovated and expanded MAM opened on September 16, 2006, just as I was leaving Montana. When I returned to the state in 2009, I became enthralled with the towering space in MAM’s atrium. Since returning, I have witnessed a dedicated program of great installations by a variety of talented artists, such as Marie Watt and Gerri Sayler. Each time I enter the museum, my eyes are drawn to the vaulting, three-story expanse. Art installed in this environment unfolds as the viewer walks up the staircase or looks down from one of the upper balconies and sky bridges. Some time back, I vowed to create an artwork that would challenge me as an artist while taking advantage of the possibilities such a space affords. DoubleColumn is my first foray into using aluminum as a material and, at over 25 feet in height, my largest scale sculpture to date. For this exhibition, I have limited myself to a vocabulary of three simple polygons—an equilateral triangle, a square, and a regular hexagon. These three shapes have angles that can be combined to add up to 360 degrees, forming a continuous spatial field. The resulting work is similar in concept to many of my previous and current ceramic installations that use slipcast porcelain canes, such as the series titled Crystallography. In these works, I combine canes together to make a network of geometric shapes, which I think of as ‘wall drawings’. The repeated, interlaced shapes suggest architectural screens and windows found in Islamic and Asian architecture and the geodesic
designs of Buckminster Fuller. In a gallery adjacent to DoubleColumn, a ceramic installation titled Sounding careens across a 20-foot expanse of wall. In many ways this ceramic work acts as a two-dimensional blueprint for the larger three-dimensional DoubleColumn. In both works, a single, repeated element engages a space through an economy of means to create a clarity or honesty of form. The intent is to envelope the viewer in an experience that gradually unfolds over a large area. The repetition of shapes creates an effect that is stimulating and peaceful. To create DoubleColumn, I worked within the same parameters—using a set unit of predetermined length. In this case, 250 hollow aluminum tubes are joined together with steel cable, rubber stoppers and fasteners to create a three-dimensional matrix. To experience volume, the viewer is invited to look through the sculpture instead of at it, seeing the potential capacity suggested by each shape. The end result is a series of interlocking globes that shift from subtle whites and creams into vibrant yellows, finally concluding in a somber ochre. I selected a similar palette for both works because it is earthy, organic, and contrasts the industrial processes of extruded aluminum and slipcast porcelain. Rather than telling a story or evoking a place, it is important to me that the work is both nonrepresentational and non-narrative. Instead, it is an exercise in the basics of visual abstraction, using a reduced vocabulary of line, form, shape, and volume to create a sensation that viewers can experience.
visual eloquence stephen glueckert
MAM is honored to host a solo exhibition of two large sculptural works designed specifically for the atrium by artist Alison Reintjes. These recently completed works demonstrate her discipline, vision, and spirit of experimentation. In these new works, she remains intensely focused on the colors, shapes, and patterns that define her mature aesthetic language. The result, DoubleColumn, hanging in the entry of the museum, projects a dominant presence. It takes on the lofty three-story Travel Montana Lobby in the Andrew Precht Addition, and reflects months of diligent work from the initial model proposal through the execution and installation. Reintjes departs from her familiar ceramic medium and creates a large-scale, hanging, site-specific work out of powdercoated aluminum. In addition to DoubleColumn, Reintjes has included a ceramic work in the front lobby gallery entitled Sounding. Sounding is rooted in the same sensibility and aesthetic, but executed in her
familiar material of ceramic. “In many ways the ceramic work acts as a two-dimensional blueprint for the larger three-dimensional DoubleColumn,” she says. “In both pieces, I use a single, repeated element joined in a way that allows for openness while engaging an entire space through spare means. The intent is to envelope the viewer in an experience that gradually unfolds over a large area. Pattern is created and repeated to affect a feeling that is simultaneously stimulating and peaceful.” Two over-arching concepts inform these works, supported by a rich connection to art history. First, many non-Western cultures have
embraced pattern and decoration as a vital aesthetic language and are often associated with cultural identity itself. By the midtwentieth century the adjective decorative was firmly established as a pejorative in Western contemporary art parlance. In reaction to this marginalization, many artists rose up to celebrate their attraction to patterns and decorations and established a movement in the mid-1970s. This movement was referred to as Pattern and Decoration, and reflects Reintjes’ interest in erasing the distinction between art and craft, as well as the influence of global cultures on her work. As the viewer absorbs Reintjes’
attention to repetition and the elements of design, one can clearly see that the work has grown out of the foundations of Pattern and Decoration.. Secondly, many aesthetic movements are rooted in the abstract. In this case, the term abstract is used synonymously with nonobjective and nonrepresentational. In fact, abstraction comes in two basic variations. Many abstract artists have worked in a loose and personal language that is stylistically referred to as organic. Another variation of abstraction is geometric and hard-edged. This more rational approach is often associated with the modern movements of Constructivism or Concrete Art. Reintjes clearly has been influenced by this latter approach. “It is important to me that the work is both non-representational and nonnarrative,” she says. “Instead it is an exercise in visual abstraction, using a reduced vocabulary of line, form, shape, and volume to create sensation that viewers can experience.” Reintjes’ work challenges the rules of the old academy. By remaining staunchly nonrepresentational, she emancipates herself to make art purely about making art. Although Reintjes discards the conventions and
confines of the picture plane, she has remained faithful to a different set of rules and has structured her creative activity within selfimposed parameters. In her work, there is never a question about a loose end or an unresolved compositional element. Her attention to detail is obvious, but nothing reads as overtly obsessive, nor is there anything in the work that becomes a problematic design challenge. Her work is formally resolved, but it solicits an emotional response and each piece radiates a comfort and a joy. Life can be complex, and as a matter of survival we must be able to work with our hands as well our minds. The acts of repeating an activity over and over again to create
an artwork is a universal instinct. It is this same instinct that Reintjes has practiced in creating these two works. Her sculptures urge us not just to look, but to go beyond and seek a deeper experience. They inspire us to contemplate our own experience of seeing and creating. In the ceramic work Sounding, Reintjes captures that complex concept in what seems like a simple exercise yet demonstrates a profound understanding for different experiences. Reintjes places colors next to each other in a very calculated fashion. Characteristically, she pays close attention to the edges created by the geometric positioning of individual elements within her sculptures. Her works
are an assemblage of parts, all working together, so that in the end there is a oneness. In this way Reintjes brings us to the same concept over and over again in a ritual of looking. The only story that exists in the sculptures is about art itself, and the result is a tight, consistent body of work. In both DoubleColumn and Sounding a philosophy emerges, bolstering the notion that art itself is at once ritual and spiritual.
Reintjes’ sculptures are visually eloquent in a way that reaches far beyond this place and time, for the internal relationships in them are both ancient and challenging. She is an artist who continues to reflect upon the place of art in her life and in the world around her. Fortunately for us, through Reintjes’ sculptures we find an appreciation of the purity of creativity, a search for the innocence that it represents, and an equally disciplined longing
simply to discover. Although there is immediacy in this new work, there is also a quietude, which whispers to us of the human ability to slow down, to look, to appreciate, and to share. While Reintjes’ sculptures are immediately gratifying, they are also filled with content. It is clear that she has neither abandoned nor exhausted the exploration and fascination with the groundwork laid by previous generations of artists. The intermixing and layering speak to deeper and more spiritual attitudes. Reintjes reminds us that artists will continue to explore in unique ways and practices. These works are avenues of individual exploration. Her journey has been a long one, but it’s comforting to know that it is just beginning, with many more joyful moments ahead. Stephen Glueckert was born in Missoula, Montana and received a BFA from the University of Idaho and an M.Ed. in Art Education from Western Washington University. He has taught throughout the Northwest, the University of Papua New Guinea, and the University of Montana. He has been a recipient of a Montana Individual Artist’s Fellowship. In addition to being a practicing studio artist, he has written extensively about contemporary artists of Montana. He has been Curator at the Missoula Art Museum since 1992.
Reintjes
studied at Kent State University, the Canberra School of Art in Australia, and Northern Michigan University. In addition to her time at the Archie Bray Foundation, Alison has held artist residencies at Greenwich House Pottery in New York, Jentel in Wyoming, Mount St. Francis in southern Indiana, and the Clay Studio of Missoula in Montana. Reintjes has worked as an instructor in many places,
including the Kentucky Museum of Art & Craft and the Missoula Art Museum. She has exhibited at the Oregon College of Arts & Crafts in Portland, AKAR Gallery in Iowa City, Museu de Ceramica de l'Alcora in Spain, ASU Ceramic Research Center in Tempe, Lill Street Art Center in Chicago, and the Northern Clay Center in Minneapolis, among others. Reintjes has been featured in MAM’s Montana Triennial: 2012 and the Persistence in Clay exhibitions.
2014 MAM Board of Directors
Published by the Missoula Art Museum 335 N. Pattee, Missoula, MT 59802 The Missoula Art Museum is an accredited member of the American Alliance of Museums. Copyright Š 2014 by the Missoula Art Museum This book is funded in part by a grant from the Montana Arts Council, an agency of the State Government. This exhibition is generously supported by Book Design: Yogesh Simpson Photography: Logan Castor Parson of Logan Photography. MAM serves the public by engaging audiences and artists in the exploration of contemporary art relevant to the community, state and region.
Betsy Bach, President John Paoli, Vice President Leslie Ann Jensen, Treasurer Brian Sippy, Secretary Liz Dye Ed Eck Dustin Hoon Joe Nickell Bobby Tilton Paul Tripp Janet Whaley
Missoula Art Museum Staff:
Laura Millin, Executive Director Anna Buxton, Membership, Volunteer & Event Manager John Calsbeek, Assistant Curator & Preparator Tracy Cosgrove, Internal Operations Manager Alison Dillon, Visitor Services Assistant Stephen Glueckert, Exhibitions Curator Charney Gonnerman, Visitor Services Associate Kay Grissom-Kiely, Grant Writer Ted Hughes, Registrar Katie Stanton, Marketing & Communications Director Renee Taaffe, Education Curator