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Women Sculptors at the Jane Voorhees Zimmerli Museum

    he Jane Voorhees Zimmerli Museum in New Jersey is now exhibiting through March 12, 2000 sculptors done by women artists. The exhibition is a collection of sixteen sculptors from the National Association of Women Artists (N.A.W.A). The show titled The Enduring Figure 1890s-1970s is a comprehensive exposition of sculptures by women artists in a male dominated art world. The sixteen artists range from Doris Caesar to Faith Ringold.

Bronze and stone are mediums that at first does not specifically coincide with femininity. Usually flowers and still life paintings are parallel to women and their daily life. Women painters were stranded to the genre of still life paintings and portrait painting. It wasn’t until Camille Claudel and Harriet Hosmer came into the world of sculptors did the rest of women artist decided to hop on bandwagon. This exhibition shows the range and skill that women achieved through the use of bronze and stone and the emotions and details that were created in the statues in the round. There are fifty sculptures being exhibited which highlights the contributions of women through this period.

I have always been a huge follower of Louise Nevelson (1899-1988). Her use of totemic figure abstractions are ingenious forms derived from the New York School artists (the abstract expressionist). In this exhibition, her Untitled of 1947 is especially totemic in her use of a circular form about tabletop size that has two faces. One face is bigger than the other facing the viewer with a sad expression and the second face is under the bigger face turned ninety degrees. That face is hardly perceived because of the dark bronze stone. The human figure has always been an interest to me, whether drawing them or studying it. Nevelson demonstrates these figures in an abstract configuration rather than blatant normality that I find can be very evident in some of the great sculptors such as Rodin.

Another noteworthy artist is Mary Callery (1903-1977). Two of her works that struck me with such desperation and post war hope were the two sculptures titled Acrobats: Study for a Monument of 1946 and Amity of 1947 both made of bronze. The figures portrayed in these sculptures are connected by each other arms and a theme of continuity and peace is very conspicuous. Another post war artist is Berta Margoulies (1907-1996) who created Strike of 1948 and Mine Disaster of 1942. Strike is definitely a direct assault to America being dominated by industrialization. One sees these black figures holding up and wearing signs of protest. The signs immerse the spaces of the statues and each figure is linked together by their bodies and the signs. It is a very emotional piece and it demonstrated by the lack of figurative detail. There is no definite mouth or eye. There is no detail of clothes or hair. It is a vague and empty expression of the state of the country at that time.

Dorothy Dehner (1901-1994) is another exhibited artist. Her Encounter piece of 1969 consists of five totemic and abstract figures varying in size. Faith Ringold (born 1930) depicts the relation of race and sex in her pieces. One in particular is that of The Waking and Resurrection of the Bicentennial Negro of 1976. This is an installation piece that uses four life-sized dolls standing and looking at two dead figures. This funeral scene is a depiction of what could be the beginning of the end of racism. It is a deeply moving piece that not only engages the viewer to think of the past dilemmas but also what holds in the future for the African-American woman and man.

This exhibition is an appropriate show when the turning of the century is treading behind us. If one read my last article, you can see that women and art and society are in my mind for the coming century. Equality of the sexes has gone through many alterations through the centuries. The variety of the sculptural approaches to the human figure seen in this small collection of women artists is a stepping stone toward the mass use of mediums that are not male dominated. If you are more interested in this genre of women and art, there is a film titled Camille Claudel. A film about the artist and her relationship with the famous Rodin. If you get a chance to come in to Jersey, certainly come and check out this show. There is also a plus when you come to the Zimmerli Museum because it has one of the most profound and expansive collections of Soviet Union Art. Truly a treat!

The themes of depression, post-World War II and abstraction are prominent in these sculptures. It proves that there is no path that women can not conquer. (That’s the feminism in me)

NOTE: There is an exhibition of Naim June Paik at the Guggenheim Museum going on right now through April 26, 2000. And an Exhibition at the Whitney Museum of Bill Viola of selected works from 1972 to 1996.

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