Ann Hamilton: "The Event of a Thread"

I came across an article in the NYTimes a few months ago about the opening of Ann Hamilton's instillation piece, "The Event of a Thread," at the Park Avenue Armory in NYC. This piece has remained in my imagination over the intervening months, awakening a deep desire to participate in similar spaces of invitation and play.

There is something about how people come into this space and lose their inhibitions about acting childlike in public. All ages and all manner folks find themselves swinging or lying under the moving curtain. People wander, talk, laugh, swing, take pictures, investigate, ponder, etc. There is something very communal about this piece, yet it is very much about inviting the individual to come play and explore as they will.

It is this intersection of the social and the individual in collaborative play that most intrigues me. I wonder what it would be like if the church were more like this. Could we do theology and worship from a space like this? I don't mean literally go to this instillation, but to have a social space like this that invites collaboration, exploration, and investigation. In the video below, Ann Hamilton describes the piece as a whole as having "a kind of intimacy in a large volumetric space." I like that.

In addition to the swings and the curtain (which let's be honest, as the curtain flows, it is so emblematic of the Holy Spirit blowing, moving, and remaining in the middle of the space), there are two tables on either end. One table contains two readers reciting from texts that change daily (there are also a lot of pigeons in cages on this table, not sure exactly why...). These voices can be hear through radios in paper bags that can be carried through the exhibit. At the table on the other side of the room sits a writer who is "penning letters to emotions and places far away." The letter writer has a mirror above her head through which she can observe what is happening in the room.

These two tables, and the persons who inhabit them, represent something of the content of the work as a whole, yet this content is not overwhelming but intimate. Hamilton describes the experience of listening to the voices on the radio as "being read to" (another joy that is often left behind in childhood). The role of the text in pulling us into the intimacy of the experience is a very fascinating yet divergent example of the role of preaching and teaching. The table of the letter writer reminds me of the vital role of one who observes, leads worship, and prays.

In all of this, the core action of wonder, amazement, and participation is never lost, regardless of how one moves in and through the room. The invitation of this work is to come, swing, wander, listen, hear, feel, and lie beneath the dynamic and multifaceted moving curtain at the center.

This is what I desire when I think of the community of the people of God. For what do you desire?

Here is a video of this amazing work found on ArtInfo:

Tim Hawkinson: Sculptor

I heard a paper recently about the artist, Tim Hawkinson. I really enjoyed hearing about his playful imagination. The paper was given by Biola art prof., Jonathan Anderson. He talked about Hawkinson's football field sized instillation piece, Überorgan. In Hawkinson's interview for Art21, he refers to this instillation as giant bagpipes. These giant bagpipes are made from ordinary materials, such as plastic tubular ducts, fish nets, mylar sheeting, and duct-tape. Hawkinson wanted these bagpipes to really sounds, so he rigged up something of a cross between a light organ (I can't help but think of Scriabin!) and a player piano. He then attached a musical scroll to the "bagpipes" and metal tubing with reeds (similar to organ pipes, hence the name of the piece). This is how the MASS MoCA (who commissioned this wonder piece) website explains how the "light organ" works:

Each sensor gives commands to a reed assembly attached to one of the bags. When a dab on the Mylar roll passes over a photocell, a valve in the corresponding reed assembly opens, forcing air through a 25'-long resonator pipe and producing a fog-horn like blast.

The whole work is a fun play on balloons, bladders, breath, organ pipes, reeds, and music. The music was chosen from familiar songs (e.g., hymns, Swan Lake, pop songs, etc.) and plays very slowly; the music is barely recognizable. Anderson referred to this selection of music as a kind of "Social Imaginary" (from Charles Taylor). It reminded me of a kind of musical score to our social lives, the songs that form us in church, in the concert hall, and at the mall. If you want to hear this "organ," watch the Art21 documentary or  take a listen to the NPR story below to hear this musical sculpture in action.

The Art21 documentary shows children and adults playing and exploring in the middle of this bizarre work. People are laughing, sticking their heads in front of the pipes. I can't help but think that his work invites interaction and a silly kind of participation. It is surreal and otherworldly, yet it evokes something of the everyday because of the music and the material utilized. I love this kind of playful art! I hope to see it someday.

Another of his works that is very theologically playful and provocative is his 2006 work, Pentecost. There are twelve full-sized robotic sculptures (self images of the artist) that are attached to a kind of tree and branches. When people walk up to the work, a light sensor causes the whole piece to go into action. Each of the sculptures starts to tap with various body parts, creating synchronized percussive music. Again, take a listen to the NPR story below to hear this musical sculpture in action.



For more info about Tim Hawkinson's work, please visit these web resources:

Ace Gallery

MASS MoCA

"Tim Hawkinson," Art21, PBS

M.A. Greenstein, "Ecstatic Uselessness: The Weird Tools of Tim Hawkinson," Image Magazine, Vol. 46 

"Tim Hawkinson: Creating Art With Moving Parts," All Things Considered, NPR, August 16, 2005:

Ballet For Martha: Appalachian Spring by Aaron Copland

My orchestra recently played Copland's Appalachian Spring. It is such a beautiful piece. It was originally written for Martha Graham and, evidently, Copland only referred to this work as Ballet for Martha.

I love that the original ballet, choreographed by and starring Martha Graham, is up on youtube. Here are the four parts of this beautiful ballet. If I were more sophisticated, I would link them all together but, alas, I am not!

Inventing Abstraction

I love the arts coverage on the NYTimes. Every once in a while I find myself lost in an exhibit or performance that I could never see, since I am on the "other coast." They often have commentary and videos for all of us non-New Yorkers to explore. I thought, over the next few weeks, I would share a few of my favorite finds here on my extremely neglected blog.

I'll begin with today's find...

Today when I opened up my link to the NYTimes, a video by David Carr and A. O. Scott was in the featured article/video spot. They went to the MoMA to explore a current exhibition, Inventing Abstraction. I am slightly obsessed with this period of European arts history, mostly because of my ongoing obsession with Arnold Schoenberg and Wassily Kandinsky. For example, there was a point in their video which showed Kandinsky's painting that was inspired by a concert of Schoenberg's 2nd String Quartet. Schoenberg's music not only inspired Kandinsky to paint, but also to correspond with the composer. This was the beginning of a friendship of likeminded artists, where they shared ideas, philosophies, and even vacations.

Kandinsky & Schoenberg with their wives in Murnau (1927)
I love the swimsuits!!

And this gets us to the focus of the MoMA exhibition, networks and connections. The curators of the exhibition wanted to show that move toward abstraction in the arts was not the invention of a single or solitary genius. Instead, it was the result of a large and interconnected network of artists - poets, musicians, composers, painters, sculptors, dancers, etc. In the video, they show a wall with a map of this interconnectivity across Europe. On the MoMA site, this map is interactive. It is amazing. The names in red are the artists that are included in the exhibit, but you can click on any of the names, linking you to a specific page for that artist. You'll see a short biography, along with their connections and holdings by MoMA. This gets you into images of the art as well as original musical manuscripts, etc.

• Connections: Inventing Abstraction

I think that I could play with this wonderful resource for days! This is not an overly detailed resource, but it does show off the art and the connections well. Be careful, you might find yourself motivated to read the correspondence between these fascinating and innovative artists (and not just Schoenberg & Kandinsky). In many ways, this map destroys the myth that I was taught in my music history classes that there was a specific French and German aesthetic. It is true that there are distinctions, but the connections show that there was a commonality of mind in the artistic community all over Europe. Imagination and creativity transcended national boundaries.

Of course, politics and power sometimes destroyed these creative friendships as well, as shown with Kandinsky and Schoenberg. Schoenberg was told by Alma Malher (another fascinating character that should be included in the interactive map) that Kandinsky was anti-Semitic, thus ending their friendship. They did correspond later in life, after Schoenberg had learned that her accusation was false, but by then, the toll of war, distance, and age were against any substantive renewal of their friendship. But between the years of 1910 and 1925, these creative Europeans did not know anything of the political and genocidal turmoil of WWII. How could any war be worse that WWI?

Overall, the point of the exhibit (or so said one of the curators on the NYTimes video) was to wonder and explore how such a change of mind in the arts could have occurred culturally. Imagination and interconnectivity can change the world... even in times of war.

“there has never been a time when the arts approached each other more nearly than they do today… In each manifestation is the seed of a striving towards the abstract, the non-material. Consciously or unconsciously [the arts] are obeying Socrates’ command—Know thyself. Consciously or unconsciously artists are studying and proving their material, setting in the balance the spiritual value of those elements…A painter, who finds no satisfaction in mere representation, however artistic, in his longing to express his inner life, cannot but envy the ease with which music, the most non-material of the arts today, achieves this end.“

Wassily Kandinsky in Concerning the Spiritual in Art