Tag: sculpture

On Top of their Heads

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All artwork by Dustin Farnsworth

Succession, 2014
Basswood, poplar, steel, bendable plywood, human hair, and various polychrome
The King Is Dead, 2015 [detail]
Basswood, poplar, and various polychrome
A More Sophisticated Form of Chaos, 2014 [detail]
Basswood, poplar, steel, resin, human hair, and various polychrome
Succession, 2014 [detail]
Basswood, poplar, steel, bendable plywood, human hair, and various polychrome
Promontory, 2013 [detail]
Pine, basswood, poplar, plywood, veneer, bendable plywood, steel, luan, human hair, and various polychrome
Promontory, 2013 [detail]
Pine, basswood, poplar, plywood, veneer, bendable plywood, steel, luan, human hair, and various polychrome
I Am Man: Revenge, 2011
Basswood, poplar, pine, tree branches, mahogany, medium-density fiberboard, mild steel, aluminum, plywood, fabrics, stain, lacquer, kiln brick, rope, steel screen, high-density polyethylene, elastic, hardware, and various polycoating
A More Sophisticated Form of Chaos, 2014 [detail]
Basswood, poplar, steel, resin, human hair, and various polychrome
The King Is Dead, 2015
Basswood, poplar, and various polychrome
Promontory, 2013 [detail]
Pine, basswood, poplar, plywood, veneer, bendable plywood, steel, luan, human hair, and various polychrome

From ”Disrupting Craft: Renwick Invitational 2018” presenting work from four artists: Tanya Aguiñiga, Sharif Bey, Dustin Farnsworth and Stepanie Syjuco.

March 22nd, 2019

BeHEADed

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by Sharif Bey

Assimilation?
Destruction?
2000
terracotta

”A mass of disembodied ceramic human heads randomly piled onto the floor […]. The viewer is confronted by the bald figures, all with a slightly different physiognomy and in the different shades of human skin—brown and black, and occasionally, white. The assemblage by ceramicist Sharif Bey, titled Assimilation? Destruction? is primarily about globalization and cultural identity. It is also a reference to Bey’s identity as a potter and an artist of color.”

”The piece is never the same in any exhibition—the 1,000 or so pinch pot heads are brought to a gallery in garbage cans and “unceremoniously dumped out,” says Bey, showing a video of the process. The heads break, crack and get pounded into smaller shards. Over time, he says, the piece, which he created for his MFA thesis project in 2000, will become sand. Ultimately, Assimilation? Destruction? signifies that “you’re everything and you’re nothing at the same time.” With its shifting collective and individual shapes, the assemblage is also “a comment on what it means to be a transient person,” he says.” [source: Smithsonian Magazine]

From ”Disrupting Craft: Renwick Invitational 2018” presenting work from four artists: Tanya Aguiñiga, Sharif Bey, Dustin Farnsworth and Stepanie Syjuco.

March 22nd, 2019

SKULLpture

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Dustin Farnsworth – XLIII 2016 – poplar, reclaimed wood, chair, pencil, various polychrome
Dustin Farnsworth X Timothy Maddox : Wake II
2017, Aqua-Resin, Hydro-Stone, various polychrome, canvas, and vinyl acrylic paint

Created as a response to the tragic amount of school shootings in the United States and the Boko Haram abductions of Nigerian schoolgirls in 2014, these skull-like masks represent children’s faces.

Sharif Bey – Louie Bones-Omega, 2017, earthenware, vitreous china and mixed media
Choker with Nineteen Death Heads. Mexico, Mixtec, AD 1200-1500
Library of Congress

This choker’s beads consists of nineteen nearly identical skulls carved from conch shells. The deeply carved eye sockets may have originally held hematite inlays. Young nobles who were being schooled in religion and military arts wore such necklaces throughout the Central Mexican Highlands.

Images from ”Disrupting Craft: Renwick Invitational 2018” presenting work from four artists: Tanya Aguiñiga, Sharif Bey, Dustin Farnsworth and Stepanie Syjuco, paired with a choker with Nineteen Death Heads, from Mexico from the Library of Congress.

March 22nd, 2019

Global

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Artwork:

Schoener’s Celestial Globe:
Among Schoener’s globe gores included in the Sammelband is the first-known set of printed celestial gores that he designed in 1517. These gores annotated by Schoener represent the state of astronomical knowledge in his time and are in improvement over many of the star charts of the period.

Globe from Schoener Terrestrial Gore Fragments:
This globe is recreated from fragments of globe gores that were found in the binding of the Sammelband when it was taken apart in 1903. The fragments are printed on vellum and are the only surviving examples of terrestrial globe gores for the 1515 globe made by Johann Schoener. Schoener used Waldseemueller’s 1507 Universalis cosmographiae as one of his primary geographic sources for the information found on this globe.

The Reconstruction Of Saints, 2018 by Dustin Farnsworth
Aquaresin, fiberglass, foam, plywood, 24k gold

Smithsonian American Art Museum
Renwick Gallery

Washington, D.C.

March 22nd, 2019

Believe Anything

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Then again, don’t.

Barbara Kruger Belief + Doubt [detail] || 2012 || Vinyl
Barbara Kruger Belief + Doubt [detail] || 2012 || Vinyl
Background: Felix Gonzales-Torres || Untitled (For Jeff) || 1992
Foreground: Constantin Brancusi || Torso of a Young Man || 1924

During his relatively brief career, Felix Gonzales-Torres expanded the language of Conceptual art by rethinking the reproduction, circulation, and presentation of artwork. ”Untitled” (For Jeff) belongs to the artist’s Billboard series which consists of works displayed simultaneously in multiple locations around a city. Collectively, the series creates a viewing community that spans several neighbourhoods and demographic groups. Dedicated to Jeff, a healthcare worker who cared for the artist’s dying partner, this particular work publicly addresses the AIDS crisis of the early 1990s.

Robert Barry || Steel Disc Suspended 1/8 in. Above Floor || 1967

Hung from a nearly transparent nylon string, the steel disc becomes a mere tool to demarcate the small, blank space beneath it. The artist’s aim is to make the void palpable, to create a presence from absence, and to overcome the materialization of ideas.

Socket Looking Incredulous || Presence from Absence || Is this art? || I think it’s time to leave the Hirshhorn…

The Hirshhorn, Washington D.C.

March 18th, 2019

SpookArt

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Georg Baselitz || Zero Ende, 2013 || Patinated bronze
Edward Kienholz and Nancy Reddin Kienholz || In The Infield Was Patty Peccavi, 1981
Metal, resin, cloth, wood, glass, paper, photomechanical reproduction, electric lights, stuffed bird, and paint

One of the first collaborations between the two artists, In The Infield Was Patty Peccavi depicts a pregnant woman looking through a window lit by a high-intensity headlamp, which spirals in front of her. Described by Nancy Reddin Kienholz as addressing religious attitudes toward birth control, the woman looking into a void evokes hope, despair, and anxiety, even as she faces a future of limited choices.

The Hirshhorn, Washington D.C.

March 18th, 2019