Save and Retrieve, "Arlene Stamp: 1983+30 " reviewed

Detail of:  Arlene Stamp, Now Won’t You Listen Dearie, 1998, woven laminated inkjet prints
58.4 x 58.4 cm, Collection of Nickle Galleries, gift of the artist, photo: John Hails

Arlene Stamp 1983 + 30
18 October, 2013 - 4 January, 2014
Organized from the collection of the Nickle Galleries,
curated by Christine Sowiak with assistance from Katie Green and catalogue essay by Chris Cran.
Nickle Galleries Floor, Taylor Family Digital Library, University of Calgary

Save and Retrieve, "Arlene Stamp: 1983+30 "

Arlene Stamp, painter (b at London, Ont 4 June 1938). Stamp studied art at the Alberta College of Art and Design (1974-76) and the UNIVERSITY OF CALGARY (BFA, 1979, and post-graduate studies from 1979-80). Previously she had studied mathematics at the UNIVERSITY OF WESTERN ONTARIO (BA, 1960). *1

While people that know Calgary based Arlene Stamp's work would argue that it has nothing to do with textiles they would be ignoring the obvious in her body of woven strips of laminated InkJet prints not to mention her manipulation of the grid. With “Arlene Stamp 1983 + 30” the Nickle Galleries at the University of Calgary has organized a retrospective of this artist work that, while inclusive of the different approaches to materials and methods of creating as is representative of their collection, for me this exhibition provides a small glimpse into her wide reaching conceptual thinking. Stamp came of age as an artist when there were many shifts in attitudes towards and in art making. It was an exciting, volatile and confusing time. Feminism was gaining ground. Many female artist were claiming that handicrafts : such as needle work, china painting and other “Decorative” arts along with weaving and quilting which were assumed /assigned to be woman's work, whether it was traditionally or not as an avenue of explorations. Just as many female artist where rejecting these handicrafts /mediums and expanding ways of approaching the pictorial surface and codify painting in order to reassert its position in a new hierarchy where conceptual work held primacy. Arlene Stamp's work is concerned with that pictorial plane/ surface.

Arlene Stamp, Plaza, 1991, vinyl tile on Masonite, 365.76 x 731.52 cm
Collection of Nickle Galleries, gift of the artist, photo: courtesy of Arlene Stamp

 I first came across Arlene Stamps work in Toronto's corridor of power in one of the bank towers at Bay and King. “Binary Frieze (Squeeze)” and “Bianary Frieze (Stretch)” are 1993 pieces installed in the Ernst & Young Lobby, Toronto Dominion Centre, Toronto, Ontario. They are made of  vinyl tile on aluminum. While many of the bank towers in this neighbourhood have had tapestries hanging in their lobbies (as was the fashion of the era in which these buildings where constructed), following the postwar “modern” architectural movement which followed La Corbusier’s clarion call for “tapestries to decorate the walls of the new architecture” (*2)  Not wanting to be thought none modern Toronto designers followed suit. Unfortunately with the renovations which  the buildings in this neighbourhood  have had in recent years many of the  emblematic modern era tapestries have disappeared from street level, public view including Binary Frieze (Stretch and Squeeze). The retrospective includes two pieces constructed with vinyl tiles: JumpShift 1993, (wall piece) 152.76 X 248.92, vinyl tile, mahogany veneer, gator board and aluminum stripping, and “Plaza” 1991, a floor piece 365.76 X 731.52, Vinyl tile on Masonite which Stamp describes as

“ This series represents my first attempts to picture a non-periodic pattern using real materials, in this case a line of standard vinyl floor tiles. Two overlapping grids of tile patterns were set at an angle of 13 degrees with respect to one another. Because this angle cuts the grids into shapes with sides of an irrational * length, I thought the resulting pattern could never repeat. While it does create a a complex and interesting pattern, I now think I was wrong about it being non-periodic. (* an irrational number in mathematics is represented by a decimal that goes on forever) “ (*3)

Arlene Stamp, Plato and My Garden II, 1990
oil and egg medium acryloid and graphite on canvas
24 panels each 45.7 x 45.7 cm
Collection of Nickle Galleries, gift of the artist
photo: John Hails

Her interest in mathematics naturally/organically led to working with digital technologies however there is work in the show that explores none fine art reproduction technologies such as carbon paper, photo copies and early/simple computerized graphic design software. These explorations seem to be used in a counter intuitive manner which is very interesting. Chris Cran in his catalogue essay writes about her use of Xeroxes “...as a way of removing herself from the choices that a painter might always be confronted with: subject matter, composition, colour etc. In this process these formal components would be predetermined.” (*4)  I see more going on then just what Chris Cran describes above as these exploration continued  over time and will look at what I see as her attempts to remove herself from the making process., while still having her work occur. The “Gladys M Johnson” series which is based of Xerox images of a collection of paintings Chris Cran own are copied in paint onto canvas by Stamp in the early 1980s  In the beginning of 2000 she is revisiting these images in the “lost Paintings” series by using a scanned slide of the early work. In the first series I see her attempting to remove her hand (unsuccessfully) from the making of these drawings and paintings as well as the decision making process, in the latter series which were presented as “Paint By Number” kits enabling/ allowing others to complete the works and possibly secede in removing her hand from the finishing of what she calls “Impossible Paintings.” 

Interestingly in following this line of investigation she was the curator of a show called “Painting Machines” (5*) for the New Gallery in Calgary in 1997 where she presented the work a number of younger artist who were making paintings through automated processes. They had each created or modified machinery that place paint on the surface through the means of a brush or spray. I had the luck to see the show and attend a panel discussion during which they discussed their processes and the reasons behind them.

Arlene Stamp,
left,:Now Won’t You Listen Dearie, 1998, woven laminated inkjet prints, 58.4 x 58.4 cm.,
right:“A” You’re Adorable, 1998,woven laminated inkjet prints,58.4 x 58.4 cm

Collection of Nickle Galleries, gift of the artist,photo: John Hails

This way of using reproduction or information storage technologies led to another thread of work which situated the hand implicitly into the digital process. In some ways it is a very simplistic process where she has transcribed interviews from audio tape, set the text over a multicoloured background and then printed these texts with an inkjet printer, laminated them, cut them into strips, and then wove them in plain weave structure. “The Mum Tapes” 1998 are part a body of work build on the relationship between her mother and herself. The source material is archival (old home movies and photographs) and collaboratively created audio recordings of her mother reminiscences . Thinking about “The Mum Tapes” and its various components and iterations the processes become part of the works, not in an obvious way but in a subtle ways in which the deterioration of stored materials not retrieved invalidate or perhaps fictionalize the information making it more accessible.  As her mother's voice is recorded and played back the tapes themselves distort. The flow of the lamented printed text ( Now You Won't Listen Dearie” and “A' You'er adorable” are in the exhibition) is interrupted/ distorted by the interlacing of these strips. The film strip “Real Life 58 Frames”  an enlarged 8 mm “home movies” backed with a electroluminescent light are safely presented while the originals have suffered deterioration by being shown and, like the audio tapes, will crumble. The web presentation of this material along with images of lyrics of songs popular in her mother's youth in the work “Modern Mother” (*6), all the original materials have been digitized / stored in a “binary” format that is retrievable by current computer technologies but their security depends on this technology which will be obsolete one day.

These steps through different storage and retrieval systems are in many ways constantly in play throughout out all her works as is the fact of this exhibition:

·                 . As photocopies of source material (the Gladys Johnson Series) and computer graphic design system enabled

·                 the CMYK colour layers (The Red Paintings and Plato and My Garden) removed decisions making from her painting process,

·                 and audio visual recording and website creation provided a way of  moving captured/ created information (memory and object) from a physical to a “non-physical” space.

·                 And as lost photocopies led to the Impossible Paintings series this exhibition is a result of accessing/ retrieving a whole body of stored work. 

Having stopped her studio practice in 2003,  the organizing/ creating an inventory of her entire body of work is a major achievement, as is finding a home (Storage and Retrieval mechanism) for it through donating it to  three  institutions in Alberta: the Nickle Galleries at the University of Calgary, ( where Arlene Stamp 1983 +30 is on display)The Glenbow Museum in Calgary and  the Art Gallery of Alberta. In so doing, she has “created” a  final work in which she has successfully removed her hand from the creation process. Like the “impossible Painting" series,  it is some on else who has completed the work.  In this case, it is , curator Christine Sowiak with assistance from Katie Green.

Joe Lewis January 5 2014

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Notes

*1, the Canadian Encyclopedia http://www.thecanadianencyclopedia.com/en/article/arlene-stamp/

*2 “who Made That : a question about Public (Textile) Art in Canada? By joe Lewis FQ Volume 3, Issue 1/ Winter 2007  and “Time and Line: brief history of Modern Tapestry “ by Joe Lewis fQ Volume 5 Issue 3/ Fall 2009

*3 “Arlene Stamp 1983 +30' catalogue p.13

*4  “Arlene Stamp” Chris Cran, “Arlene Stamp 1983 +30' catalogue p.4

*5 Painting Machine” New Gallery, Calgary Alberta 1997, Heather Raymont, Jason Dufresne, Roy Meuwissen, Chris Bennett, Brian White, Ayad Sinawi, John Eisler

*6 Modern Mother http://vanitygallery.com/stamp/

Live from Montreal "En Arvil" Quebec's fibre celebration

Almost a month to the day after my visit to Fiber Philadelphia I am on another Mega Bus destine for Montreal and the opening of their month long province wide celebration of textiles. I have been here four, days, have been to three openings and seen eight exhibitions. (Four of which were not part of the festival line up but easily fall in with textile themes as well as actual textiles)

Concordia University student piece "Hobby Horse 1" by  Emily Kathleen McIntyre, Digitally printed silk organza, wood, glitter, double-faced satin ribbon, 

As with most multi venue events you will run into student work, and in the past year I have seen student work from the Baltic countries, Philadelphia's many textile classrooms, Kooteny School of the Arts (and Crafts) in Nelson British Columbia and now Montreal and if I go back another six months you can thrown in several more America schools and almost all of Canada. I do make it a point; students are a litmus test for fibre health so to speak. The prognosis is complex, riddled with regional differences and institutional stances generating a displaced population of would be "something-s" Makers: yes maybe? Artist: yes no definitely Maybe "it is art, isn't". The indecision is just as much age as influence, trying to fit in and bucking the status quo. It is the lament of the Gen Xers being relived by their younger siblings and looking at opposites of the age spectrum, their children. (almost) At this juncture I feel like providing some visual evidence since the next opening isn't until Wednesday night. Let me take you through a sampling of pieces using the dress as subject: and as object. Be it wearable, hang-able (a wall piece), installation or concept.

The Dress by Eva Muston, 2010 tapestry Tartu  Art College Estonia, part of  The International Textile Students’ Exhibition STATE OF EXCEPTION, organized by the Vilnius Academy of Arts, Kaunas Faculty of Art

Chantal Traub: regional perspectives:
Silk and Various fabrics, silk screened and painted

ACAD University Class of 2011

"What you Take off isn't always gone"2012  Sandra Chirico, Silicone, Forton moulds, and Video, Concordia fibre program.

Sugar Childhood by Gertuda Zillute, 2011,VAA Kaunas Campus, part of  The International Textile Students’ Exhibition STATE OF EXCEPTION, organized by the Vilnius Academy of Arts, Kaunas Faculty of Art

Seathra Bell ACAD University 2011 Birdcage dress 2011, Menho Wool, silk, metal.

Fabrication Lauren Osmond, Concordia University 2012,  fermented tea bags, ivory buttons on light table (with video of the garment being worn by dancer Kim Flurry Bertrand

Diana Perez , Concordia, " Lloror, Sentir, Vivir -Cry Feel Live" wire, cotton and polyester fabric Chains Plastic Beads thread, dye

At the opening of the student show By Hook or By Crock, I asked Sandra Chirico maker of the silicone dress if she had heard of Eva Hesse or "The Meat Dress" ( I was referring to "Vanitas: Flesh Dress for an Albino Anorectic" (1987) by Canadian Jana Sterbak not the one Lady Gaga wore) she told me Eva Hesse sounded familiar. Granted Silicone isn't latex but for me it was a given that this piece even with its title "What you Take off isn't always gone" was referencing an entire genre with a large feminist context. Even the photographic and performance work of Martha Wilson came to mind. Give that Concordia students had the amazing opportunity to see Wilson's work last year at the Leonard & Bina Ellen Art Gallery I. You might want to throw Karen Finley into the mix and her Chocolate smeared body that cause such a scandal in the early 1980s and think of this pieces with its accompanying video with in it fits and comes out even if the maker doesn't know any of these other pioneering feminist artist. I was a bit interested by this total lack interest in my question. Granted it was the opening and she had just been explaining her work to her parents. You might think it is unfair of me to bring this up, but one of the things about openings that young makers need to realize is every stranger has possibilities. Its great to party but dealers curators and collectors or heaven forbid "bloggers" may be lurking in the shadows and you need to be able to provide and intelligent sound bite. 
 

Diana Perez , Concordia, " Lloror, Sentir, Vivir -Cry Feel Live" wire, cotton and polyester fabric Chains Plastic Beads thread, dye

The next day while talking with one of the instructors from Concordia about obvious references and students awareness of if not textile history (Hessa and meat dress are recent history) then at least what is happening else where. She commented that they seem to be very insular and have no interest in what is happening outside the walls of Concordia. Considering Diana Perez's “Lloror, Sentir, Vivir -Cry Feel Live" direct riff on Jean Paul Gaultier corset come to life as a party girl. I saw The Fashion World of Jean Paul Gaultier at the Montreal Museum of Fine Arts this past September a student or two must have stumbled upon it and got the class mates to go and look I would hope. I overwhelmed but determined to see the work rather then the elaborated 'decor" of it all. One of the things that has fascinated me (and thousands others no doubt) are his corset that photograph well and I was amazed by the number of years the corset was part of his vocabulary and how there was a twenty years between the next innovation or refinement to the making of these objects. Diana Perez's is at that point now. The finish may be a bit rough but impact and gesture of both confinement and support with all its social political intransigence are there. I want to see this piece displayed to its best advantage, which it wasn't. I won't say it was a student show there for the bad install, bad lighting and general haphazardness of the show should be excused. It shouldn't, this show have been presented just as well as the other student show "Out Of Place" at the Yellow Fish Gallery.

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Geodev#1, by Sophie Jaillet, 2012 wax, beads, leather felt and polyurethane foam. at Yellow Fish Gallery

 

"Out of Place" featuring the work of Sabrina Dufour, Florence Boivin, Sophie Jaillet and Stéphanie Coleman had some intriguing things and some disappointing things. I seem to be drawn to the things I am disappointed with, which may seem odd or just contrary. There is a Toile de Jou, in this show, and with all Toile old or contemporary you can anticipate what subtle frolics are happening in there bucolic settings. Renée Green's "Mise-en-Scène: Commemorative Toile" easily comes to mind since I was just at the Fabric Workshop and Museum in Philadelphia where created this work. I saw that work in 1997 at the Harbourfront Centre in Toronto and its gentile drawing room staging of upholstered furniture, wallpaper and drapery the harshness of its imagery and "highly-charged yet surprisingly subtle commentary on social class, race, and aestheticism,"  This piece installed in such a way as to look like a scarp of wall paper remain on a wall that has been striped this bring to mind the subversive Toile wall coverings the Scottish design firm "Timorous Beasties" which have images of boys peeing behind brushes near a bench were a couple is making out, to work with Toile as a concept could have had a more surprising result then this piece has.

Stéphanie Coleman Toile de Jou

Installation shot from Yellow Fish Gallery east elevation Sabria Dufour's work is the black piece in the back corner,  knitted sack by Florence Boivin 

looking west the knitted sacks are "Lift Me If You Can," Florence Boivin

detail of Sky #2 by Sophia Jaillet, thread on printed polyester

This a close up of In the Corner of My Head by Sabrina Dufour, 2012 papier et panneau secge / folded paper

 Since the two Concordia Student exhibitions are only up for a limited time and they are having their crits this week I felt like chiming in on a few things, and encourage everyone to see where they are now so a few years from now.. who knows? I have to say that I keep running into misidentified techniques such as burn out labeled Devore' so when I run into actual  Devore' imagine my disappointment when it is ripped to shreds and used in an vague installation with other really nice printed textiles that have also been thrown into the heap. I will end hear with a few heaps I have seen this year.

 

Live Wire, Selina Doroshenko, mixed media,

Barbara Worden ACAD University, Quantum Soup, 2011, Weaving: wool, bamboo

Part of Master program art project exhibited at “Kaunas biennial textile 11” called “Artificial River”

Vilnius Art Academy’s Master student, Kristijonas Bakas, Vilnius2011

See piles of stuff can work if you bring them together well. and speaking of well put together I had a sneak preview of "Traverser sans la voir" embroidery by Chistine Peyret at Centre des textiles contemporains de Montréal / TRAMES la galerie. it opens Wednesday, with a talk from the maker at 4 pm and the opening reception at 5pm. if you are in Montreal you must see this show. Its incredibility rich imagery and the stories they evoke is some breath taking, this is one of the best solo exhibitions I have seen, to say this stitcher is a master is to under appreciate her work. So Students go and see where textile work can take you even if your instructors won't hold your hands on the way .

 Montreal April 3 2012

To see more Images and get more information what is happening during this first week of "en avril" see my facebook album En avril.in Montreal
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Links to Makers referenced in this blog

Eva Hessa http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eva_Hesse

meat dress according to wikipedia Vanitas:_Flesh_Dress_for_an_Albino_Anorecti

MARTHA WILSON: STAGING THE SELF at Lenard and Bina Ellen Art Gallery Concordia University

Karen Finley http://karenfinley.com/

Renee Green/ Fabric Workshop

"Timorous Beasties" http://www.timorousbeasties.com/

 Kristijonas Bakas  The Back Page: “Artificial River” Master program art project by Kristijonas Bakas

Finishing School

The phrase "Finishing School" conjures up images of Chateaus in France or Switzerland where the daughters of the untitled upper class merchants are dumped, like rough stones into a rock tumbler, to acquire the polish and veneer required for marriage, ideally to the son of a titled European

Lindsay Joy, ACAD University, "Dread". appliqué and embroidered cotton and wool on linen. 2010. 38cm x 36cm.

Photo by Melinda Topilko

Not today. Finishing school is when you start racing the clock to a way to start paying off your student loan. It might be a time to look back at the 3, 4 or more years you have spent in school studying something that might gain you employment

Shanell B. Papp, B.F.A., M.F.A. University of Lethbridge, Bone book and Blood Pools, 2007-2009
Materials: Canvas, Velvet, Thread Techniques: Sewing, Embrodery, Pattern Making

Leanne Shea Rhem, OCAD University "Target" Suit weight silk, pleated silk organza, zipper, red permanent marker writing, thread
photo: Christine Lim
Model: Leanne Shea Rhem

The new Issue of fibreQUARTERLY is now on line. Volume 7 Issue 2 Summer 2011 is our Finishing School issue and that is what it is all about. Ten students representing 5 different school, ACAD University, Capilano University, University of Lethbridge, OCAD University and Sheridan College.

fibreQUARTERLY has since 2005 showcased the work of 30 young makers just as they have left school for the "real" world or the Harbourfront Centre Craft Studio in Toronto or which some may think delays entering real life but it doesn't make the stress of paying your student loans off any different then anybody else's. This is a moment for them to pause and reflect on where they were and where they see themselves going in terms of a future working with fibre.

Enjoy the enthusiasm and bravado and hopefully pride they are experiencing right now and the ways in which they are expressing it.

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Joe Lewis wearing Keiley Stewart 's Lion's Head
Size: 60cm x 40cm Medium: Felted; coopeworth, camel, 2011. Photo take at the opening of Shape of Things, Sheridan College 2011 Graduate exhibition