what’s good? passages of perception
Posted on 12. May, 2011 by Carrie in muse
words > LINDSEY HERKOMMER
To say that recent MFA graduates Phillip Baumer and Joe Leonard “are burgeoning talents” or “show great promise” would be complete understatements. These two artists of distinction are leaving WSU with mature visual vocabularies and well-defined conceptual underpinnings. Both Baumer and Leonard bring several years of experience to their respective mediums. Their proficiency is evident in the aesthetic enjoyment and intellectual challenges gifted to the viewer in each artwork presented in Passages of Perception.
Phillip Baumer (a familiar face to the Fisch Haus crew) displayed Confluence #8 – a two part installation consisting of a floor-to-ceiling metal rod construction, and projectors casting light through the metalwork. Welded in situ, the large-scale structure extends almost the entire length of the gallery. The projection casts a long rectangle of white light with web-like shadows behind the sculpture. If anybody out there is a fan of Sol LeWitt’s wall drawings or Gego’s wire sculptures, this installation is right up your ally.
Baumer treats the metal rods as gestural lines bending each metallic stroke to the end of the next. The knobby welded vertices, from which the next line leaps, create an elegant tangle of line and form. With the addition of projected light, the two-dimensional shadows feed into the commotion of the three-dimensional work, and vice versa. Baumer’s convergence of 2-D and 3-D (re)unites form and shadow in a mutually dependent, phenomenological union. The aptly titled Confluence #8 moves the viewer through the gallery, offering new and dynamic geometries at every step.
Lifting to the pedestal, Joe Leonard provokes intrigue and defies expectations with his host of clay works. The bittersweet dialectics of his ceramics renegotiate the legacy of the vessel and its spatial configuration. Undoubtedly, the far-reaching history of ceramics is indelibly entwined with utility and function. Yet, Leonard’s works, such as Under and In, refocuses the viewer’s eye to new possibilities of spatial relations.
Under and In is an upright, ovular “receptacle” resting upon several short legs which rhythmically undulating like the gait of a centipede. While the legs structurally support the weighty container, the negative spaces underneath subvert its visual stability (think: Doge’s Place in Venice with its lace-like loggia on bottom and heavy masonry on top). Held in a similar tension, an oval slab of clay is placed on evenly spaced buttresses just inside of the slightly tapered opening. The slab is not a lid nor the top of an internal column, but a sustained barrier hovering above – and blocking – the internal space. With its directional title, Under and In boasts a balanced composition of the internal and external spaces that articulate the features of a conventional ceramic vessel while frustrating standard notions of functionality.
Indeed, Passages of Perception was an attractive exhibition and Shift Space showcased the art well. Though ultimately too short lived, it was nice to be jolted out of the passive gallery go-er routine with an intellectually engaging, object-based show. I encourage anyone interested in Baumer’s interrogation of line or Leonard’s challenging volumes to view their work (though in an abbreviated form) in the MFA Thesis Exhibition at the Ulrich Museum. Hearty congratulations are most certainly due to Phillip Baumer and Joe Leonard for a successful show, and to all of WSU’s MFA graduates for their extraordinary accomplishments!
Passages of Perception: 2011 MFA Thesis Exhibition at Shift Space April 25-30, 2011; MFA Thesis Exhibition at Ulrich Museum Now-June 5. A special thanks to The Labor Party for providing the ideal work environment in which this review was written. To request an exhibition review, please send an email to: lindsey.herkommer@gmail.com
