February 20, 2011

“Material Girls” is a truly exceptional show of the work of eight female artists who tease profound emotional resonance from the likes of newspaper, hair combs, rubber tires and plastic bags. The exhibition opened Thursday night at the Reginald Lewis Museum of African American History and Culture in Baltimore; this is a show that any museum in the country would be proud to mount. Let me say this firmly, folks: get yourselves to Baltimore before October 16 to see it because it is not often that an exhibit of contemporary art so remarkable can be seen within driving distance.

The artists include three who are very well known in our area: Renee Stout, the multi-dimensional painter/sculptor/installation artist and speaker to the spirits; Martha Jackson Jarvis, who makes large biomorphic sculptural work from stones, wood and ceramics (and is currently also part of a three-person show at the Gateway Arts Center in Brentwood, MD); and Joyce Scott of Baltimore, who has long made achingly haunting figurative sculptures from beads and fiber and has expanded into glass and ceramic. Also included is one certified international art star, Chakaia Booker, who has here contributed stunning monumental work made from cut and shredded discarded rubber tires. Booker, who is also known for her distinctive clothing, glided through the galleries like a spectre in a headdress of notable proportions.

Any exhibition of representative contemporary art mounted these days would certainly include work in “non-traditional” materials, Everything from fire to dung is fair game and the visual effects achieved through these materials are sometimes dazzling. What makes this show so strong is that the materials are almost without exception used in the service of the artist’s meaning and intent. You won’t find a gimmick among them. These women work in the traditions of their craftswomen make-do ancestors, who used the unwanted and discarded bits and pieces, and they use the materials to achieve levels of power that would make their ancestors proud.

One could write about any number of individual pieces, so this selection is by necessity too short and too arbitrary, I confess. But, nonetheless…As usual, Renee Stout’s work blows me away. Here she has assembled “The Thinking Room”, filled with archaic objects of sacred power and totems of memory. It could well be the room where Stout’s alter-ego, herbalist and spiritual adviser Fatimah Mayfield, dispenses wisdom and cures. Martha Jackson Jarvis’s giant seed pods attached to twisting roots, seem to come from another universe; they call on us to treat nature with reverence.

Joyce Scott

Chakaia Booker has made a  mural-sized construction of twisted and entwined tire bits that truly leaves me astonished. I stand in awe of the strength and planning required to execute this work. Its absolute matte blackness is relieved and given visual density by the changes in texture and the word that best describes its effect is “power”. At the other end of the materials spectrum is Maren Hassenger’s sculpture, assembled from anklet-sized twists of the New York Times. For me, they evoke heads of exuberant dreadlocked hair. Exuberance is also the word that comes to mind to describe Maya Freelon Asante's explosion of colored tissue paper. Sonya Clark weaves combs into a shimmering simalacrum of kente cloth that is a marvel.

 

Finally, I can’t end without mentioning Joyce Scott’s work. Of the eight artists, her work is probably the most traditional, in the sense that the line can be traced clearly from her figurative sculptures back to the craft work of the generations of women who preceded her, making beautiful objects from materials that had been discarded and forgotten. The clarity of her vision and the elegance of her execution combine to create objects that vibrate with spirit.

The Reginald Lewis museum is easy to find – it’s just a few blocks down Pratt Street from the bustle of the inner harbor and there is a public parking lot across the street.  The museum itself is a treat and they’ve made this easy for you, so don’t miss it.