May 3 - June 13, 2004 at Tenri Cultural Institute of New York
by Thalia Vrachopoulos
“When I abandon time I am myself eternity / and enclose myself in God, and God enclose in me”
Angelus Silesius
Churchill’s paradisiac imagery relates both to her Italian rearing and to her desire for reclaiming this early environment after many decades of accomplishment in the United States. For the majority of her life as a creator she constructed eidetic images relating to the garden or that allude to her childhood experiences with giardinos and serras (Hothouses), the delightful abides, where fresh brown earth smells dominate.
Throughout her productive career Churchill came into contact with such modernist masters as Hillay Rebay, Hans Hoffman and the Abstract Expressionist, and English Street Schools. However , Churchill’s monumental works have more in common with the minimalist aesthetic of Richard Serra or the sculptures of the Finnish artist Kari Huhtamo. Serra’s site-specific sculptures although more about solidity and confrontation than Churchill’s soft ephemeral forms, nevertheless share her economy and monumentality. Kari Huhtamo’s pieces are made of steel but due to their lacy fretwork worked with the laser saw, and delicate appearance, they can be associated to Churchill’s ethereal forms. Churchill’s close relationship to nature is akin to Serra’s love for the poetic aspect of the sea and she conceives of her installations for particular spaces, which also relates them to his site specificity.
The artist felt the power of symmetry and centrality in the sixties when she broke away from previous rectilinear Cubist forms of structure in order to engage with images inspired by natural forms and foliage. Churchill adopts hand-made techniques that allow for the presence of the artist’s hand yet, rather than becoming signifiers of labor, her designs appear as abundance and bounty like that one the Ara Pacis bas-reliefs. Churchill’s chosen material is paper, which is a natural fiber and her iconography alludes to vegetal forms. She has been devoted to the use paper since 1973 to create rich and delicate patterns in undulating rhythms whose transparent qualities are reminiscent of Venetian light. This results in an ambience of rapture recalling a Lombardian jasminn-scented evening.
Churchill’s engagement with modularity gas become a leitmotif as seen in Brambles, 2004. This work consists of layers upon layers of transparent glassine paper overlain with brambles drawn with brown oil stick. While this work’s modularity cab be associated with Minimalism in its superimposition, and due to its transparency it creates a palimpsest effect of abounding forms. The brown shapes on these delicate surfaces are vegetal alluding to twigs or branches while the layering of the paper one sheet on top of another like the time rings of an old tree develop as a synthesis. In taking up an entire wall space they become site-specific constructions that transport the viewer into an environment that rather confronting due to its large size, is inviting to the touch.
Churchill’s consistent use of line, shapes and composition led her to create proliferating natural forms in biomorphic configurations as seen in Seeds, 2004 a window installation. Hung in free flowing sections trailing to the gallery floor its medium, a delicate glassine paper, subverts the notion of permanence through its light transparency. These sections hung at a 45-degree angle also appear in layers so that their organic motifs change both with the breeze and with the viewer’s movement. This constantly altering artwork breaks with outdated concepts about the durability if art as well as overcoming the static limitations of the painted idiom. Churchill maintains the use of white as metaphor for purity and for its ability to offset the subtle relations of the Seed’s soft browns, greens, and grays.
Two related works entitled Stream, 2003 and Lake 2003 are a series of silkscreen prints on wooden panels. This method of printing is created through stencils that require forcing paint squeegee-like with instrument through fine silk stretched over a frame. By alternating blocked and open areas Churchill has created very complex compositions through the use of stencils and paint. Also called serigraphy the process became popular with American artists in the thirties and is still widely used. It is especially suitable for vivid colors and strong shapes like Churchill’s crystalline configurations. The background upon which she’s attached these prints, reflects the shapes of the triangular facet motifs creating a wedge that gracefully meets the gallery wall on one of its sides while rising about two inches on the other. Because her Stream series is white on white, on the process becomes more complicated as the shapes can only be differentiated through the use of texture rather than color. Churchill has masterfully dealt with this by orchestrating her moves so that she repeat the stenciling many times over whole varying the amount of paint to create textures without compromising her work’s overall design. The other pieces in this series entitled Lake contain the same motifs but differ coloristically having a dark background. Through its background color and its triangular rectilinear forms Lake suggests meting snow crystals while Stream’s white on white facets recall broken ice shards.
The artist uses paper as a direct medium of expression in yet another work Waterfall, 2004 composed of strips of white paper that in their verticality allude to the natural phenomenon of cascading water. Churchill has hand twisted and manipulated thousands of papers formulate her Waterfall whose tassels trail onto the parquet like a carpet of rain. Paper dates back to 105 C.E. China and has been used extensively by artists to construct works of unsurpassed beauty both in the West and in Asia. In recent history the most prominent example of a sculpture working with paper is Isamu Noguchi who often used this material to order to combine it with western sculpture. Churchill uses paper to recreate the diffuse light of the giarinos and serras of her early years in Italy. However, her site-specific installations are much more than a desire to visit familiar territory they are also physical expressions of the metaphysical as well as a manifestation of her creative impulse.