As you can see, Lisa uses materials --including paint-- in a variety of exciting ways. These photos are more of her space; to see the work itself, check out her website, because these snaps don't at all capture the beauty and subtlety of the work. So important are the shadows that the thread-and-paint lines cast, the textures, the positive- and negative- shapes. Since I love poetry, I thought about Wallace Stevens:I do not know which to prefer,
The beauty of inflections
Or the beauty of innuendoes,
The blackbird whistling
Or just after.
We looked at a number of Lisa's pieces that are sort 0f self contained boxes. Painter Mike Dowley wondered what might happen if Lisa joined some of the boxes together, sort of like Louise Nevelson. It was also really great to see the pieces that jump off the wall, off of square supports: Lisa is experimenting with little acrylic and clay balls in bundles and clusters (photos above), as well as some huge, somewhat billowy hanging pieces that are sort of networks of filaments.
Lisa is exploring a variety of projects, in part because she is in the DCAC's Art Decathlon, in which she and three other artists are making work in a variety of media/modes. You can follow the Decathlon here -- each artist has a "commentator" writing about the work in progress. Lisa's commentator, poet and writer Buck Downs, was in the studio for our group's visit. In a recent commentary on one of Lisa's drawing pieces, he writes
"The sense of its beauty is a balance of oversignification and understatement...It is a way of working and a work that seeks to include us in it, to find a space for ourselves, more than it says anything about the artist. And that is what it says about this artist and her work, that making room for others matters. In a time of growing total obsession over the fine lines and filigrees of Intellectual Property, the outcome of Lisa’s handiwork is instead an intellectual hospitality."
I like that! Lisa certainly was very hospitable and generous as she welcomes us to her studio!
So among other projects, I saw a collage idea taking shape -- there's a table in her studio covered with obituary clippings and notes about remembrance. See these added to my feelings about Lisa's work as touching on something not grave but memorial, monumental -- monuments to or meditations on memory, perhaps, but not grandiose, rather the powerful quiet of something like the Vietnam Memorial. Not trying to make a huge stretch here, but you know, a common graceful solemnity. Somewhat spare or stark with the monochrome whiteness, but not minimal or simple.
Well, in addition to talking about the artwork, the recent art fairs in DC, and the weather, we had a conversation about our various paths to art, from those who went right to art school to those who started out in careers in fields like biology and computers. A great visit, looking forward to the next.
