REBECCA HUTCHINSON
Who Makes Beauty?
Rebecca Hutchinson is an installation artist and Associate Professor of Ceramics at the University of Massachusetts Dartmouth. Her site specific works have been influenced by the tradition of vessel and her interest in environmental concerns.
Design and Construction Process-
Hutchinson's work is often conceived for specific architectural spaces. Clay is a material that challenges many artists both because of its unique material properties as well as its century old traditions. Differing from most other sculptural materials due to its amorphous nature, when it arrives at the artist's studio clay has no pre-determined dimension, mass or volume. It is therefore somewhat ironic that such minimally pre-defined material is so bound with cultural traditions and expectations. While one often takes for granted that ceramic materials are analogous to specific generations-old manipulative processes-- pinching, pressing, coiling, throwing-- Hutchinson typically subverts such traditional expectations of ceramic construction. Working with a process that more closely resembles those associated with fibers and textiles, Hutchinson often creates woven structures that enable her to suspend sometimes massive though air-filled forms from ceilings and walls.
The construction methods Hutchinson has used for her installation in Manchester Craftsmen's Guild's Connie Kerr Gallery combine handmade paper, natural fibers, gauze, sticks and unfired clay. Relying on simple weaving and wrapping techniques, Hutchinson dips fiber and gauze into a liquid clay mixture or slip, which is fortified with paper pulp to construct her forms. In such site specific works, while durable, the clay used is almost always unfired. The addition of paper and other natural fibers in her clay gives it a tensile strength in the wet and dry state.
Hutchinson created many of the elements in her installation for MCG at her studio in Massachusetts. To complete her work she also brought raw materials including sticks, gauze, abaca fiber linters and clay here to Pittsburgh. Staff and volunteers created many of the small cones used in the installation by dipping gauze into a liquid paper clay mixture and wrapping them around a small stick armature. Over 1000 of these cones are used in the installation.
Sources and Inspirations-
Rebecca Hutchinson's ideas are influenced by the instinctual building habits of the animal kingdom… most often insects, bees and birds, species of which are often involved in complex symbiotic relationships. On a recent field study, Hutchinson had an opportunity to spend some time observing the Oropendola bird in the rain forests of Costa Rica. Some of the ideas for the piece here at MCG came from this experience. To learn more about the Oropendola, it's habits and biosystem you can visit
http://itotd.com/articles/361/
http://www.enchantedlearning.com/subjects/birds/printouts/Oropendola.shtml
http://webserv.nhl.nl/~ribot/english/psde_ng.htm Metaphors and Ideas-
Hutchinson is interested in where aesthetic sensibilities come from. Many of us may think of aesthetics not only as an exclusively human endeavor, but also one that is strictly for high brow intellectuals. Artists are almost universally influenced by their observations of nature. Hutchinson has a keen interest not just in the appearance of things in nature, but also in the fact that design and construction behaviors appear throughout the animal kingdom. While aesthetic judgment is most often culturally derived, it follows that it is taught and learned within communities over specific time periods. In the animal kingdom, design decisions are based on survival, and the slow changes that take place over 100's-of-thousands of years of evolutionary and genetic information. When a bird or insect builds a nest, it is often constructed not just out of the materials within reach, it is also located and designed so that predators can't get to it. This can be seen as an even more complex phenomenon when one considers that other sympathetic species of the animal kingdom must have access to the biome inorder to support the survival of the builder. This is how Rebecca Hutchinson's fascination with the phenomenon of symbiosis develops in her work. Seen metaphorically in the work here at Manchester Craftsmen's Guild, Hutchinson hopes that peoples' different interactions with the work forms a kind of idealized image of community in which different behaviors and perspectives are tolerated, shared and celebrated within the confines of the gallery. Beyond creating forms and filling an environment, she is engaged in the construction of a space for social interaction. While we often consider aesthetics as a problem of idealized formal, auditory or kinesthetic orchestration, Hutchinson's work suggests we should move beyond this notion. Without abandoning traditional approaches to design, construction and craftsmanship, Hutchinson also asks us to consider social interaction as a central consideration within her work.
It then follows that each time Hutchinson creates an installation, she is interested in how the audience will interact with her work. While her previous installations often filled a gallery space with a dense arrangement of hanging, womb-like structures, Hutchinson found that while this created interesting visual impact, it often forced viewers to observe her work through a door way or window. In more recent pieces, including the one here at MCG, the arrangement of elements is more varied and sparse. She hopes that people will walk through the gallery space and stand under some of the pieces, looking up into the internal structures. People's different physical types and predilections for viewing will enable them to encounter the piece in a variety of ways. Their physical presence and movement through the piece creates a fleeting record of the vast array of aesthetic experiences available through a singular work.
Vocabulary-
Symbiosis- A close, prolonged association between two or more different organisms of different species that may, but does not necessarily, benefit each member. A relationship of mutual benefit or dependence.
aesthetic experience or æsthetic experience - Experience of features, things or events traditionally recognized as worthy of attention and reflection, such as literal, visual, and expressive qualities, which are studied during the art criticism process. Also spelled esthetic.
Installation- Art made for a specific space, exploiting certain qualities of that space, more often indoors than out. The term became widely used in the 1970s and 1980s, largely replacing the term "site-specific," which means the same thing. Installations may be temporary or permanent, but most will be known to posterity through documentation.
Linter- A word used to describe the short fibers left in a cotton gin that are not typically spun into fiber for textiles. Cotton paper has two sources: linter and rag. Cotton linter has shorter fibers left after the ginning process which are not used in the thread spinning operation. Linters are used as blotter or drying sheets in the papermaking process.
Abaca- A fiber also known as Manila Hemp, is versatile and flexible in it's use. It's principal use ranges from industrial cordage, handicraft, fashion products such as hats and accessories, home and houseware and decorative products. Specialty use includes the manufacturing of specialty paper in Japan. Hygienic applications include the production of coffee and tea bags, sausage casing and textile dye filters.
Paper Clay- A blend of clay and paper fibers. The paper is soaked in water and then blunged (forcefully mixed with a blade) to break down the paper into its fiber. This wet fibrous material is then mixed into a clay of either a slip (liquid) or plastic consistency. Ceramic artists have been experimenting with paper clay since the 1990's. It has many interesting properties in both the raw and fired states.
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