An Interview with Timothy Horn Pt. 5

In the fourth part of our five-part interview, Dread & Delight Artist Timothy Horn, creator of “Mother-Lode” discusses what it was like working with sugar as an artistic medium.

Another dramatic work included in the exhibit is “Mother-Load,” created by the artist Timothy Horn. The sculpture is a child-sized, Cinderella-like carriage that was created using a variety of materials, but most notably it is coated in a layer of rock sugar and shellac.

The piece was created originally for a show at the de Young Museum in San Francisco. It was inspired by the “rags-to-riches story” of Alma Spreckels, the collector whose sugar fortune was used to found what is now part of the museum. She came from modest beginnings and rose to great wealth. She was never fully accepted by San Francisco society and had distant relationships with all of her children. This piece is Horn’s take on a gilded 18th-century Neapolitan sedan chair that Spreckels used as a phone booth in her home. Spreckels had a less-than-perfect life though she achieved great wealth. Horn’s sculpture explores and highlights the temporary nature of our existence while at the same time calling into question the values in a society that helped to shape the life of a person like Alma Spreckels.

ANDERSON TURNER / ABJ/OHIO.COM CORRESPONDENT

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An Interview with Timothy Horn Pt. 4

Timothy Horn – “Mother-Load”

In the fourth part of our five-part interview, Dread & Delight Artist Timothy Horn, creator of “Mother-Lode” discusses what it was like working with sugar as an artistic medium.

Another dramatic work included in the exhibit is “Mother-Load,” created by the artist Timothy Horn. The sculpture is a child-sized, Cinderella-like carriage that was created using a variety of materials, but most notably it is coated in a layer of rock sugar and shellac.

The piece was created originally for a show at the de Young Museum in San Francisco. It was inspired by the “rags-to-riches story” of Alma Spreckels, the collector whose sugar fortune was used to found what is now part of the museum. She came from modest beginnings and rose to great wealth. She was never fully accepted by San Francisco society and had distant relationships with all of her children. This piece is Horn’s take on a gilded 18th-century Neapolitan sedan chair that Spreckels used as a phone booth in her home. Spreckels had a less-than-perfect life though she achieved great wealth. Horn’s sculpture explores and highlights the temporary nature of our existence while at the same time calling into question the values in a society that helped to shape the life of a person like Alma Spreckels.

ANDERSON TURNER / ABJ/OHIO.COM CORRESPONDENT

An Interview with Mernet Larsen Pt. 5

In the final part of our interview, Mernet Larsen discusses how she translates reality into geometry.

“Larsen’s statement says she is working ‘to offer a new perspective unto life.’ Certainly this exhibit offers a look at an artist who is doing contemplative and deeply investigative work, and gives us a chance to better know a unique voice.”—Anderson Turner, Akron Beacon Journal 

Mernet Larsen (b. 1940) makes intriguing, humor- and tension-infused paintings featuring geometric figures that inhabit space in ways that defy gravity and conventional viewpoints. The artist stages ordinary scenes—people playing cards or eating dinner, a faculty meeting, reading in bed—but constructs them with vertiginous, skewed spatial relationships that convey a sense of precariousness. The disorienting treatment of perspective places the viewer inside and outside of the paintings at the same time, “as if they’re wearing the situation,” the artist describes. Along with the figures’ deadpan facial expressions and subtle body language, Larsen’s puzzling compositions reveal the essence of everyday human interaction. Wry, anxious and awkward, the paintings are frozen monuments that are simultaneously alien and familiar.

Mernet Larsen: The Ordinary, Reoriented is organized by the Akron Art Museum with support from the John S. and James L. Knight Foundation and the Ohio Arts Council.

An Interview with Mernet Larsen Pt. 3

In part 3, Mernet Larsen discusses her use of ordinary settings for her unconventional paintings.

“Larsen’s statement says she is working ‘to offer a new perspective unto life.’ Certainly this exhibit offers a look at an artist who is doing contemplative and deeply investigative work, and gives us a chance to better know a unique voice.”—Anderson Turner, Akron Beacon Journal 

Mernet Larsen (b. 1940) makes intriguing, humor- and tension-infused paintings featuring geometric figures that inhabit space in ways that defy gravity and conventional viewpoints. The artist stages ordinary scenes—people playing cards or eating dinner, a faculty meeting, reading in bed—but constructs them with vertiginous, skewed spatial relationships that convey a sense of precariousness. The disorienting treatment of perspective places the viewer inside and outside of the paintings at the same time, “as if they’re wearing the situation,” the artist describes. Along with the figures’ deadpan facial expressions and subtle body language, Larsen’s puzzling compositions reveal the essence of everyday human interaction. Wry, anxious and awkward, the paintings are frozen monuments that are simultaneously alien and familiar.

Mernet Larsen: The Ordinary, Reoriented is organized by the Akron Art Museum with support from the John S. and James L. Knight Foundation and the Ohio Arts Council.

An Interview with Mernet Larsen Pt. 1

In part one of our interview, Mernet discusses her artistic inspiration.

“Larsen’s statement says she is working ‘to offer a new perspective unto life.’ Certainly this exhibit offers a look at an artist who is doing contemplative and deeply investigative work, and gives us a chance to better know a unique voice.”—Anderson Turner, Akron Beacon Journal 

Mernet Larsen (b. 1940) makes intriguing, humor- and tension-infused paintings featuring geometric figures that inhabit space in ways that defy gravity and conventional viewpoints. The artist stages ordinary scenes—people playing cards or eating dinner, a faculty meeting, reading in bed—but constructs them with vertiginous, skewed spatial relationships that convey a sense of precariousness. The disorienting treatment of perspective places the viewer inside and outside of the paintings at the same time, “as if they’re wearing the situation,” the artist describes. Along with the figures’ deadpan facial expressions and subtle body language, Larsen’s puzzling compositions reveal an essence of everyday human interaction. Wry, anxious and awkward, the paintings are frozen monuments that are simultaneously alien and familiar.

Mernet Larsen: The Ordinary, Reoriented is organized by the Akron Art Museum with support from the John S. and James L. Knight Foundation and the Ohio Arts Council.

An Interview with Brian Bress Pt. 3 & 4

In the third part of our interview, Brian discusses what makes his characters funny and the last thing he watched on TV.

In our final installment, Brian tells us about his funniest moment making art and how he deals with claustrophobia.

An Interview with Brian Bress Pt. 2

In part two of our interview, Brian Bress talks about planning his work and the basis of his characters.

An Interview with Allison Zuckerman Pt. 3

Allison Zuckerman: Pirate and Muse

October 27, 2018 – January 21, 2019

Go behind the scenes with Allison Zuckerman at the Akron Art Museum in part three of our interview. Allison talks about her use of technology and painting in the 21st century.

 

Last Look Tour!

Saturday, January 19, 2019 • 10:30 am

Catch the works of Jeff Donaldson and Allison Zuckerman before the exhibitions close! Chief Curator Ellen Rudolph and Associate Curator Theresa Bembnister will discuss the ways in which both artists reference art history in their work.

Free for members. Registration required. Click the event about to register.

 

And take home a catalog of Pirate and Muse, available signed by the artist or unsigned from the Museum Shop. 

An Interview with Allison Zuckerman Pt. 2

Allison Zuckerman: Pirate and Muse

October 27, 2018 – January 21, 2019

Go behind the scenes with Allison Zuckerman at the Akron Art Museum in part two of our interview. Allison talks about feminist recontextualization of the female body in her work.

Join us for two Allison Zuckerman inspired events in January 2019:

Girls to the Front: Women Artists in the Akron Art Museum and Beyond

Famed art historian Linda Nochlin once pondered, “Why have there been no great women artists?” That is simply no longer the case. From Alma Thomas’ colorful Pond – Spring Awakening to Viola Frey’s massive sculpture The World and the Woman, the Akron Art Museum collection is full of great women artists. Explore female identifying artists in the collection on this hour-long tour that will culminate in an exploration of Allison Zuckerman: Pirate and Muse.

Get Zucked: An Allison Zuckerman Inspired Tour Experience

Explore feminism, art history and digital art in an interactive scavenger hunt inspired by Allison Zuckerman: Pirate and Muse. Make a Zuckerman-inspired selfie, answer trivia questions and create an artwork ripped from the pages of an art history textbook.

 

And take home a catalog of Pirate and Muse, available signed or unsigned from the Museum Shop. 

An Interview with Allison Zuckerman Pt. 1

Allison Zuckerman: Pirate and Muse

October 27, 2018 – January 21, 2019

Go behind the scenes with Allison Zuckerman at the Akron Art Museum and learn about her creative process, how she chooses her subject matter and more.

Join us for two Allison Zuckerman inspired events in January 2019:

Girls to the Front: Women Artists in the Akron Art Museum and Beyond

Famed art historian Linda Nochlin once pondered, “Why have there been no great women artists?” That is simply no longer the case. From Alma Thomas’ colorful Pond – Spring Awakening to Viola Frey’s massive sculpture The World and the Woman, the Akron Art Museum collection is full of great women artists. Explore female identifying artists in the collection on this hour-long tour that will culminate in an exploration of Allison Zuckerman: Pirate and Muse.

Get Zucked: An Allison Zuckerman Inspired Tour Experience

Explore feminism, art history and digital art in an interactive scavenger hunt inspired by Allison Zuckerman: Pirate and Muse. Make a Zuckerman-inspired selfie, answer trivia questions and create an artwork ripped from the pages of an art history textbook.

 

And take home a catalog of Pirate and Muse, available signed or unsigned from the Museum Shop.