maxine martell: chance, memory, and montage
DESCRIPTION
Brochure to accompany exhibition, January 15-March 4, 1998, at the Jundt Art Museum at Gonzaga University in Spokane, WA. Exhibition Sponsored by the Sahlin Foundation.TRANSCRIPT
CURTAIN
from the Veils series1996
Acrylic and charcoalon canvas70" x 24"
CHANCEr<::::YThesurfaces of my paintings are the result of
my obsession with seeing and process.
r<::::YTheimages I use come to me from directobservation of my daily life and from themedia which I believe is part of the landscapein which we exist.
r<::::YChance.It's a way to overcome my hard-earned skills. At the same time I'd sink withoutthem. I start with a few sketchy lines (occa-sionallyan elaborate charcoal drawing).Feeling the surface of the canvas and taking itsdimensions, so to speak. Next I mix colors inDixie cups. The canvas goes on the floor and Ibegin pouring. The deliberating eye decides ifthe effort has been wasted or not.
CHATELAINES
PLANETS
from the Chatelaine series1994Acrylic and charcoalon canvas56" x 70"
It is a black and white photograph of a young society
woman. There is nothing special about it. She sits with her
hair freshly coifed, surrounded by her things in her presum-
ably expensive rooms, her right hand casually touching a
smiling young man. There is a mirror behind her and a
polished table in front of her. On the table is a tray with
glassware, and two candlesticks with lighted candles.
Beside the tray stand gilded figurines of a lion, an elephant
and a giraffe. At the upper left the lustrous knee and bent arm of a Buddha
intrude into the frame. I've looked at this picture for years, attracted either to the
light embodied in the mirrors, gilt, candles and glassware or to the way the woman
is looking at the camera. She is not just the subject of the gaze, she is gazing back
at the lens with full knowledge of what is going on. She has a wonderful, quizzical
look. I decided to see how many variations I could do on this simple tune.
.-<::::YIam fascinated by the accouterments used tosubdue those fierce birds, falcons: The elegantfeathered hoods, the josses and leather gloves.And the erotic tension between the bird andher tamer. "At night hawks become curiouslydocile, and by candlelight the falconer may doas he will with her, unsealing her eyes, puttingthe hated hood on and off, fondling her headand wings. But this is a candlelight courtship,and in the morning she may well be as wildand coy as ever" (Nan Fairbrother, Men andGardens) .
.-<::::YVeilsand grills obscure and protect. Theyare also devices to deal simultaneously withflatness and the illusion of space.
.-<::::YLookingwhile making. I see paintings thatno one else will ever see. When the canvas isupright things disappear under skiffs of paint.When the canvas is on the floor and paint isflooding over the surface I hover over it watch-ing and pouncing, a veritable Harrier hawk.
.-<::::YRauschenbergraids the media and fine art.DeLillo heads for the arc of history andAmerican culture. I do a little of both withtendencies toward the detritus of ordinary life.(See Norman Bryson, Looking at theOverlooked. )
RAIMENT
When I began the garments I was remembering an Italian wedding. The guests pinned
money on the bride's dress. I thought they ought to pin photographs on her. At the
moment she embodied the generations before her and the ones to follow. The patterns
on the gowns (vetch, willow, rosehips, lace/ice) echo the seasons of a woman's life, the
tilting of the planet. And the seasons bring us food; a banquet if we are lucky.
MEMORYAUTUMN
from the Raiment series1996
Acrylic and charcoalon canvas70" x 24"
MOr::::::,.>Thedividing line, the abrupt edit, the what's
next to what makes montage stimulating. As injazz, it is the rhythm, the time, that gives thework its quality. It's only a few beats fromrhythm to repetition. I repeat images in differ-ent scale, using color or graphic means to get atwhy they haunt me, feeding on them until theyno longer nourish me.
TAGECABINETS OF CURIOSITIES
Look at the tall, narrow paintings. The first one I did
I remember thinking I wanted to make something
that shimmered downward like a mirage. One leads
to two, two leads to four. Working on these paintings
it struck me that they resembled poems: vertical with
stanzas. As the paintings spread across the wall they
began to resemble a huge cabinet of curiosities.
Curios. Curious. Curiosity. The ':..wit of the seven-
teenth century. .. is the creation of a peculiar beauty
by means of curious intellectual conceptions .... It is a
very conscious distortion,
often of things already ,\
beautiful, to create rarer,
more particular, more
intellectual beauty"
(Nan Fairbrother,Men and Gardens).
r::::::,.>I have come to rely on the intrusion of visualcross-referencing. I am always collecting imagesfrom newspapers, magazines and books, ormaking notes and quick sketches from TV orout the car window. When culling, I don't thinkabout what the picture means or why it appealsto me-I just take it. Pictures are memoryimprints held in some secret place until I amready to look at them. When certain picturescome together, they make some sort of sense.Of course, at the same time, the photos, clip-pings and sketches are floating all over the stu-dio. A good analogy for what I'm after in thepaintings. I want the surface of the canvas toread evenly like a desktop of shuffled papers. Isee a large picture made up of many interlock-ing individual pictures. Chuck Close calls it an"all-overness" when the surface is "equalized."
r::::::,.>Ionce had an unexpected sighting in a corri-dor at the Met. Striding along toward somedestination I was stopped by the panels fromPompeii. Elegant little paintings of birds, as ifsome journeyman had been sent over to deco-rate the dining room. My arm lifted in a viscer-al connection with the brush stroke. The markswere so simple and direct. I felt immediatelyakin to the person who had made them. It wasas if there was no time or distance between us.-M.M.
EPIGRAPHS AND ARTIST'S NOTES
SELECTED BY ERIC LA GUARDIA.
HORNfrom the Cabinets ofCuriosities series1997Acrylic and charcoalon canvas70" x 24"
The voluble intentions of the symbols,The ghostly celebrations of the picnic,The secretions of insight.
--WALLACE STEVENS
AMBER
from the Veils series1997Acrylic and charcoalon canvas70" x 24"
A careless shoe-string, in whose tieI see a wild civility,Do more bewitch me than when artIs too precise in every part.
--ROBERT HERRICK
Annihilating all that's madeTo a green thought in a green shade.
--ANDREW MARVELL
Take Crocus ArabicusCalcanthusArabian VerdigrisLithargeRed Calcined TinQuick SulphurCitrine ArsenicRed Sublimated CalxPrepared Sal AmmoniacSaltpetreRed Animal Oil
-- PARACELSUS
LATE SUMMER
1997Acrylic and charcoalon canvas70" x 48"
The attempt to submit chance tothought implies in the first place aninterest in the experience of that whichhappens unexpectedly. --DERRIDA
C H RON 0 LOG Y: MAXINE MARTELL
1937 Born in Muskogee, Oklahoma. Spends childhood in Albuquerque,Washington, D.C., Chicago, and Spokane
1954 Enters Gonzaga University, Spokane, WA
1960 ReceivesB.A. Holy Names College, Spokane
1962 ReceivesM.F.A. in Painting and Printmaking, University of Washington,Seattle
1968-98 Exhibition of work begins with first solo show at Attica Gallery, Seattle
1968 Visiting Artist, Linfield College, McMinnville, OR
1970 One of "Seven Washington Printmakers" (Organized by Western WashingtonUniversity, Bellingham, WA, and circulated in the US. and Iapan.)
1971 Prints included in "West Coast '71" (Curated by the Achenbach Foundation,San Francisco, circulated by the Smithsonian.)
1970-73 Curator of Art, Cheney Cowles Memorial Museum, Spokane
1970-74 Director, Spokane Art School
1971-72 Trustee, Western Association of Art Museums
1973 Member, Washington State Governor's Advisory Committee,Cultural Enrichment Program
1973 Member, Art Advisory Committee, Expo '74, Spokane
1973 Visiting Artist, Western Washington University, Bellingham, WA
1976 First trip to Mexico :.
1976 Establishes studio in Seattle
1978-83 Designer/Photo editor, Photography Northwest
1978 Releases "ELLE,"an animated color Xerox film, screened nationally includingthe Athens Film Festival, Ohio, and the Women's Film Festival, Seattle(First Prize)
1978-79 Staff, and/or, Seattle
1979 Curator, "Suspended Animation", an exhibition of original art fromexperimental films by twenty-one US. film-makers, and/or, Seattle
1981 Glass Windows, St. Joseph's Children's Home, Spokane
1983 Glass Installation, Temple Beth Shalom, Spokane
1984 Artist in Residence, Centrum Foundation, Port Townsend, WA
1984 Prints, Bellevue Arts & Crafts Festival, Bellevue, WA (First Place)
1986 Glass installation, Clover Park High School, Tacoma, WA
1986 Paintings, "VI Northwest Int'l.",Whatcom Museum of History and Art,Bellingham (Best in Show Award)
1987 Glass installation, US. Custom Station, Lynden, WA
1987 Artist in Residence, Pilchuck Glass School, Stanwood, WA
1988-92 Trustee, Pratt Fine Arts Center, Seattle (Vice Pres., '89-91)
1990 Joins Grover/Thurston Gallery, Seattle
1991 Establishes studio on Whidbey Island, WA.
1992 Installs commissioned paintings at SeaTac Int'l. Airport
1992 Travels in France and Italy
1995 Most recent solo show at Grover/Thurston Gallery, Seattle
EXHIBITION SPONSORED BY THE SAHLIN FOUNDATION
SELECTED PUBLIC COLLECTIONS
Cheney Cowles Museum, Spokane
City of Seattle
Evergreen State College, Olympia, WA
Henry Art Gallery, Seattle
Jundt Art Museum, Gonzaga University,Spokane
King County, WA
Kobe Art Museum, Kobe, Japan
Microsoft, Redmond, WA
Nordstrom, Seattle
Port of Seattle
Pratt Graphics Center, New York
Spokane Arts Commission
Washington State Arts Commission
RECENT SELECTEDBIBLIOGRAPHY
Burkman, Greg, "Maxine Martell at Grover!Thurston:' Reflex, Seattle, March, 1995.
Weiss, Peggy, and Rosenthal, Ann T., "Agentsof Change: New Views by NorthwestWomen," Seattle Convention Centercatalogue, 1995.
Brunsman, Laura, and Askey,Ruth, eds.,Modernism and Beyond: Women Artistsof the Pacific Northwest, Midmarch ArtsPress, 1993.
Glowen, Ron, "Northwest Tales:' AnchorageMuseum of Art catalogue, 1992.
Kangas, Matthew, "Maxine Martell atGrover/Thurston:' Art in America,April, 1992.
Carlsson, [ae, "Modernism's Bold Stroke:'Reflex, Seattle, Ian/Peb, 1992.
Glowen, Ron, "Singing With the Voices ofProtest:' Artweek, Nov. 28,1991.
Bryant, Elizabeth, "Interface/Innerface-interpreting the real:' Security PacificGallery catalogue, Seattle, 1991.
Hackett, Regina, "Garcia & MartellDominate Interface/Innerface,"Seattle P-I, Jan. 24, 1991.
Tarzan, Deloris, "Painting a Photo-MeaningFrom Image:' Seattle Times, Jan. 25,1991.
Exhibit Curator: J. Scott Patnode
Design: Phil Kovacevich
Photographs: Richard Nicol
© Jundt Art Museum, Gonzaga UniversitySpokane, Washington 99258-0001
Paintings courtesy of the artistGrover/Thurston Gallery, SeattleLorinda Knight Gallery, Spokane
Cover: Labyrinth, 1997, (detail)