Kelly Reemtsen
Paper and Chalk

September 8 - October 6, 2012

Opening reception:
Saturday, September 8th
5-7pm

Kelly Reemtsen, Bow Study, 2012, pastel on paper, 26.5" x 30"

Skidmore Contemporary Art is delighted to present the very first exhibition of Kelly Reemtsen's pastels on paper and the debut of works in a new medium for her – woodcut.

The pastels and two woodcuts incorporate Reemtsen's signature image – that of a solitary female figure in a vintage party dress carrying a tool that is traditionally associated with physical tasks performed by men. The fact that the women are depicted from the shoulders down renders them both mysterious and anonymous. The hands that grasp on their tools are clenched in obvious determination, but the women's intent remains ambiguous and provocative.

Reemtsen has always done sketches and color studies as part of her preparations for paintings, but it was beginning to work in pastel last year that changed her approach to the drawings. The vivid colors and range of painterly effects possible inspired her to begin to push the works to a finished state. The fourteen pastels in this exhibition are the result.

Kelly Reemtsen, Bolt Cutter Study, 2012, pastel on paper, 18.5" x 26.5"

If finished drawings are a recent development in her work, printmaking is not. Reemtsen worked on two etchings at a workshop at Crown Point Press in 2008. Though the works were not editioned, two of the six resultant proofs are included in this exhibition. These etchings marked the beginning of Reemtsen's interest in the figure and the development of her iconic image of a woman with a tool.

Residency this spring at the Venice Printmaking Studio in Venice, Italy gave Reemtsen the opportunity to learn the craftsmanship of creating woodcuts, the oldest of all printmaking techniques.

Rather than begin with a woodcut in a traditional size, Reemtsen ambitiously chose to work as huge as was possible at the studio and created two blocks that were each a meter square (39.37”). One depicted a female figure with an axe, the other a female figure with a chainsaw. Since the time involved in conceiving and cutting blocks on that scale left insufficient time to print the editions, Reemtsen shipped the blocks back to LA.

Kelly Reemtsen, Axe, 2012, woodcut in 9 colors, edition of 10, 39" x 39"

To her surprise, she was unable to find a press large enough to print blocks of that size locally. Undaunted Reemtsen printed each edition by hand the process of reduction. Reduction printing entails cutting away each successive layer from the block after each color is applied. At the completion of an edition printed using the process, nothing of the block remains. In addition to scale and printing technique, Reemtsen's use of color is no less ambitious. Though woodcuts traditionally employ a limited number of colors, Reemtsen's Axe contains ten colors and the Chainsaw twelve. They are every bit as colorful as her paintings and pastels.

The grain of the wood block imbues the works with texture and nuance that alludes to the exuberant brushwork of her paintings, but does not attempt to mimic it. Layers of color shimmer beneath color, and the rich white backgrounds are flecked with the same distinctive orange one sees in her paintings. As witty punctuation to the 'masculine' physical effort involved in the princess process, she has applied glints of silver nail polish to the jewelry adorning the figures.

In addition to Reemtsen's iconic women, she has also created compositions of pills which delight the eye with their resemblance to candy and at the same time elicit a double-take as one can't help but try to identify the pharmaceuticals. Though most are benign remedies found in any medicine cabinet, there is the occasional Xanax, Valium, and Prozac. We are not only what we wear, and the type of tool we brandish, but what we take.

Arrays of pills are the subject of several pastels, and a floor sculpture comprised of a hundred hand-cast plaster larger than life 'pills.' The plaster pills range from 3” to 5” in diameter. Too big to be imbibed and of no use for a headache or depression, they are poignant placebos that poke fun at the ubiquity of pills of all varieties in our lives.

Paper and Chalk will be on exhibition through October 6th.

Kelly Reemtsen, Coat Study, 2012, pastel on paper, 26.5" x 30"