El Anatsui - Again
Just about a year ago, in June of 2014, I wrote about the glorious experience of discovering the Ghanian artist El Anatsui, first coming upon his exquisite creations in the Brooklyn Museum and then finding them in the Boston Museum of Fine Arts. As I said then and still repeat: I have become a devotee. So, when several weeks ago I saw an announcement of an impending retrospective exhibit of El Anatsui in the upstate New York town of Kinderhook, I was determined to get there; and this past week I did indeed do so.
Kinderhook is about two hours from New York City, a charming town, birthplace of the somewhat obscure President Martin Van Buren whose friendly life size statue in the main square invites you to sit next to him. It is a surprising environment to find a huge, elegant space devoted to contemporary art, and yet, there it is, a block or so from the center of town.
The gallery where the exhibition takes place is called, appropriately, The School. New York gallery owner Jack Shainman, who also happens to own a farm nearby, purchased an abandoned school building from the town, had the Spanish architect Antonio Jimenez Torrecillas renovate it, and thus opened the The School, a well-nigh perfect transformation that retains the interior contours of the original building to provide a variety of spaces for both small and large scale work.
In this instance, it had meant that El Anatsui’s early, smaller scale works coexist with the giant later ones, the ones he is best known for. Woodcarvings, some metal sculpture and a few traditional paintings go back to the early 1980s. But the inspired transformation of El Anatsui’s art arrived before the turn of the century, and all that came since then does require large spaces, room to view the giant tapestry-like creations from far enough away to appreciate the shimmering beauty and close enough to see the astonishing materials he uses to achieve his ends. This the gallery provides to perfection: the proportions of the rooms are perfect, and the vast central space that used to be the gym during the building’s previous reincarnation is large enough to contain three of the works, two on the walls and one taking up nearly the entire floor space. Mr. Shainman and his architect created a spacious, modern gallery while being fully respectful of the history of the building, which continues to blend in to the streetscape of the small town harmoniously. El Anatsui’s unique, monumental works shine in this space, and the space and art do each other justice.
Kinderhook is about two hours from New York City, a charming town, birthplace of the somewhat obscure President Martin Van Buren whose friendly life size statue in the main square invites you to sit next to him. It is a surprising environment to find a huge, elegant space devoted to contemporary art, and yet, there it is, a block or so from the center of town.
The gallery where the exhibition takes place is called, appropriately, The School. New York gallery owner Jack Shainman, who also happens to own a farm nearby, purchased an abandoned school building from the town, had the Spanish architect Antonio Jimenez Torrecillas renovate it, and thus opened the The School, a well-nigh perfect transformation that retains the interior contours of the original building to provide a variety of spaces for both small and large scale work.
In this instance, it had meant that El Anatsui’s early, smaller scale works coexist with the giant later ones, the ones he is best known for. Woodcarvings, some metal sculpture and a few traditional paintings go back to the early 1980s. But the inspired transformation of El Anatsui’s art arrived before the turn of the century, and all that came since then does require large spaces, room to view the giant tapestry-like creations from far enough away to appreciate the shimmering beauty and close enough to see the astonishing materials he uses to achieve his ends. This the gallery provides to perfection: the proportions of the rooms are perfect, and the vast central space that used to be the gym during the building’s previous reincarnation is large enough to contain three of the works, two on the walls and one taking up nearly the entire floor space. Mr. Shainman and his architect created a spacious, modern gallery while being fully respectful of the history of the building, which continues to blend in to the streetscape of the small town harmoniously. El Anatsui’s unique, monumental works shine in this space, and the space and art do each other justice.
No comments have been added yet.
