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Art News:
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Museum of
Art, Rhode Island School of Design,
Presents
Lynda Benglis
More than 50 Works Spanning 40 years of Extraordinary Creative
Output
October 1, 2010 through
January 9, 2011
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Providence, RI--Born in 1941
in Lake Charles, Louisiana, Lynda Benglis lives and works between New York;
Santa Fe; Kastelorizo, Greece; and Ahmedabad, India. In October, The
RISD Museum of Art presents Lynda Benglis in its Chace Center
special-exhibition galleries. Lynda Benglis was initiated by the Irish Museum of
Modern Art, Dublin, in collaboration with Van Abbemuseum, Eindhoven, the
Netherlands; Le Consortium, Dijon, France; Museum of Art, Rhode Island School of
Design, Providence, Rhode Island; and the New Museum, New York.
The RISD Museum is the first of only two North
American venues for this major survey
show.
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Phantom,
1971
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American sculptor Lynda Benglis (b. 1941) has defied
prevailing views on the nature and function of art for more than 40 years. The
exhibition Lynda Benglis, opening at The RISD Museum October 1, is composed of
more than 50 works that represent the breadth of her remarkable output, dating
from the 1960s through today. The RISD Museum is the first of only two North
American venues for this major survey
show.
Benglis's best-known works question the rigors of
Modernism and Minimalism by merging material, form, and content; bringing color
back into sculpture; and taking painting off the wall. These works include her
richly layered wax paintings and poured latex and polyurethane foam sculptures
of the late 1960s and early '70s; innovative videos, installations, and "knots"
from the 1970s; metalized, pleated wall pieces of the 1980s and '90s; and pieces
in a variety of other mediums, such as glass, ceramics, photography, or cast
polyurethane, as in the case of the monumental The Graces (2003-05).
Two
of the more notable works in Lynda Benglis are the gravity-defying cantilevered
phosphorescent sculpture installation titled Phantom (1971) and the 1975
installation Primary Structures (Paula's Props). Because most of Benglis's
poured wall pieces are no longer extant, the reunion of the five parts of
Phantom for the first time since its original presentation at Kansas State
University is of particular importance. This important work will be on view only
at The RISD Museum and, following RISD, at the New Museum. Primary Structures,
which takes its name from the 1966 seminal exhibition of Minimalist sculpture,
is a theatrical tableau of classical columns which plays with and rejects
Minimalist principles, including the Minimalists' rejection of pedestals. "Lynda
Benglis has greatly influenced contemporary sculpture in general and a number of
younger artists in particular, and assembling this many of her most important
works, especially a number that are seldom shown, is very exciting. These are
impressive, thought-provoking pieces, and I'm certain they'll stimulate valuable
dialogues about formal experimentation, as well as the political nature of art,"
explains Judith Tannenbaum, The RISD Museum's Richard Brown Baker Curator of
Contemporary Art.
Taking the body and landscape as starting points, Benglis
creates abstract works which are often distinguished by their physicality and
immediacy, and have been famously described as "frozen gestures." Her interest
in process first manifested itself in early wax reliefs, created by applying one
layer of colored wax on top of another, building up a geological landscape in
works such as Karen (1972). Materials are also the core of Benglis's Fallen
Paintings series, such as Blatt (1969), in which pigmented liquid latex or
polyurethane foam were poured onto the floor and against the
wall.
In the 1970s, Benglis began a series of
"sparkle knots"-made with cotton bunting, plaster, acrylic paint, and glitter
over metal screen-and metalized knots which were sprayed with zinc, aluminum, or
copper. Looping and tying the material, she created bow-like forms that display
tensile energy and subvert the austerity of prevailing Minimalism. Addressing
the issue of taste, Benglis said in 1989, "There will always be a Puritan strain
in society that gets nervous if things are too pleasurable, too beautiful, or
too open. That's the most significant legacy of feminist art; it taught us not
to be afraid to express these
things."
The exhibition features documentary material
that underscores Benglis's interest in exploring and subverting gender roles as
well as pioneering video works which tackle themes of gender politics and
experiment with the formal and performative potential of what was then a new
medium. Videos such as Mumble layer audio and visual elements as they address
the possibilities and limitations of the screen and Benglis's relationship to it
as director and performer, while Female Sensibility (1973) explores feminine
sensuality. Benglis has long used media as a means of controlling her image and
highlighting and challenging gender and power imbalances. Her most famous and
explicit gesture, a two-page spread that appeared in Artforum magazine in
November 1974, cemented her position as a provocateur within the American art
world.
For The RISD Museum exhibition,
some additional artworks of significance will be included. A few of these works
will also be shown at the New Museum in New York, where Lynda Benglis goes on
view February 9, 2011, after closing at RISD the previous month. The additional
works on view at RISD range from grids of Polaroid photographs from the Secrets
series (1974-75), a large fan-shaped wall piece from the Peacock series (1979),
and a group of large paper Vessel Lamps (2009), as well as pieces rendered in
clay and glass and the five-piece Phantom installation. Some of the works in
glass were made at RISD in 1985, when she served as a visiting artist and
critic. "I'm especially pleased that we're able to present these additional
pieces to our visitors," says curator Judith Tannenbaum. "Few people know the
breadth of Lynda's work, and the full extent of her oeuvre reveals how she has
revisited materials and ideas over the years. She's always been very interested
in the surfaces of her works, in their textural qualities, and she has sometimes
described her artmaking process as working from the outside in. And in this
show, we get to see how that dynamic process has changed over four decades."
LYNDA BENGLIS
Born in 1941 in Lake Charles, Louisiana, Lynda Benglis lives and works
between New York; Santa Fe; Kastelorizo, Greece; and Ahmedabad, India. Benglis
studied at Newcomb College, now part of Tulane University, graduating with a BFA
in 1964. She is represented by Cheim & Read, New York.
Her
solo exhibitions include Galerie Hans Müller, Cologne, 1970; Paula Cooper
Gallery, New York, 1970; Hayden Gallery, MIT, Cambridge, Massachusetts, 1971;
Kansas State University, Manhattan, Kansas, 1971; Lynda Benglis: Video Tapes,
curated by Robert Pincus-Witten, Everson Museum of Art, Syracuse, New York,
1973; Sparkle Knots, The Clocktower, New York, 1973; Moving Polaroids, The
Kitchen, New York, 1975; Lynda Benglis-Keith Sonnier, A Ten Year Retrospective,
1977-1987, Alexandria Museum of Art, Alexandria, Louisiana, 1987; Dual Natures,
curated by Susan Krane, High Museum of Art, Atlanta, 1990 (Benglis's last major
retrospective); Lynda Benglis: From the Furnace, Aukland City Art Gallery, 1993;
Margo Leavin Gallery, Los Angeles, 1991; Michael Janssen Gallery, Cologne, 1997;
Lynda Benglis: Sculptures, Bass Museum of Art, Miami, 2003; A Sculpture Survey
1969-2004, Cheim & Read, New York, 2004; Lynda Benglis: Pleated, Knotted,
Poured..., Locks Gallery, Philadelphia, 2006; Lynda Benglis-Louise Bourgeois,
Circa 70, Cheim & Read, New York, 2007; and Shape Shifters, Locks Gallery,
Philadelphia, 2008.
Benglis has also exhibited widely in major
group exhibitions, including the seminal Anti-Illusion: Procedure/Materials,
Whitney Museum of Art, New York, 1969 (catalogue only); Works for New Spaces,
Walker Art Center, Minneapolis, 1971; Biennial, Whitney Museum of American Art,
New York, 1973, 1981; Three-Dimensional Painting, Museum of Contemporary Art,
Chicago; Early Work, The New Museum, New York, 1982; The New Sculpture 1965-75:
Between Geometry & Gesture, Whitney Museum of American Art, New York, 1990;
Fémininmasculin: le sexe dans l'art, Centre Pompidou, Paris, 1995; More Than
Minimal: Feminism and Abstraction in the '70s, Rose Art Museum, Brandeis
University, Waltham, Massachusetts, 1996; and, more recently, Century City: Art
and Culture in the Modern Metropolis, Tate Modern, London, 2001; Summer of Love:
Psychedelic Art from the 60s, Tate Liverpool, 2005; High Times, Hard Times: New
York Painting 1967-1975, Independent Curators International, New York, 2007;
Circa 70: Lynda Benglis and Louise Bourgeois, Cheim & Read, New York, 2007;and
Lynda Benglis/Robert Morris: 1973-1974, Susan Inglett Gallery, New York, 2009.
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Related
Programs and Events
Thursday, September 30, 10am -
5pm
Member Preview
Day
Thursday, September 30,
5:30pm
Members opening
celebration
Wednesday, October 6,
6:15pm
Gail Silver Lecture: Dave
Hickey, American art and cultural critic
Wednesday, October 20, 6:30pm
Lecture:
Richard Meyer, associate professor in the Department of Art History at the
University of Southern California
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Additional
Information
SPONSORSHIP
Lynda Benglis is
organized by the Irish Museum of Modern Art, Dublin, in collaboration with Van
Abbemuseum, Eindhoven; Le Consortium, Dijon; Museum of Art, Rhode Island School
of Design, Providence; and New Museum, New York. The exhibition tour of Lynda
Benglis is made possible by Bank of America Merrill Lynch. The presentation at
The RISD Museum is supported in part by contributions from Agnes Gund, Bank of
America Merrill Lynch, the Bafflin Foundation, Locks Family Foundation, John
Cheim (RISD BFA 1977), and Howard Read (RISD BFA 1976).
ORGANIZATION
Lynda Benglis was initiated by the Irish Museum of Modern Art,
Dublin, in collaboration with Van Abbemuseum, Eindhoven, the Netherlands; Le
Consortium, Dijon, France; Museum of Art, Rhode Island School of Design,
Providence, Rhode Island; and the New Museum, New York.
PUBLICATION
A
450-page fully illustrated hardcover monograph, produced by Les Presses du Réel,
accompanies the exhibition. It comprises texts by Dave Hickey and Elisabeth
Lebovici and exhibition curators Franck Gautherot, Caroline Hancock, Laura
Hoptman, and Judith Tannenbaum; an interview with the artist conducted by
curator Seungduk Kim; and an in-depth chronology compiled by curator Diana
Franssen. Famous and unseen archival material, including magazine articles,
photographs, letters, and installation shots, are reproduced, as well as an
overview of Benglis's work since the mid 1960s. Two seminal articles published
in Artforum magazine are also reproduced: "The Frozen Gesture" by Robert
Pincus-Witten (November 1974) and "Bone of Contention" by Richard Meyer
(November 2004).
Reporters: Please contact Carol Cutler at 401
454-6322 to arrange a visit to the exhibition, interviews, or to request
exhibition images for publication.
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The RISD Museum of Art, a world-class museum in
Providence, RI, was founded as part of Rhode Island School of Design in 1877.
Its permanent collection of more than 84,000 objects includes paintings,
sculpture, decorative arts, costume, furniture, and other works of art from
every part of the world, including objects from Ancient Egypt, Greece, and Rome,
and art of all periods from Asia, Europe, and the Americas, up to the latest in
contemporary art. In addition, the Museum offers a wide array of educational and
public programs.
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Museum of Art, Rhode Island School of
Design
224 Benefit
St.
Providence,
RI
401-454-6793
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Museum of Art, Rhode Island School of Design | 224
Benefit Street | Providence | RI |
02903
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