Nancy Agati, 7:15, two installation views
Philadelphia
Introductions:
Nancy Agati
by
Andrea Kirsh
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Philadelphia
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January 8, 2007 The first piece I saw of Agati’s was the wall-sized Imprint, commissioned for the exhibition OUTsideIN, held at the Philadelphia Art Alliance (organized jointly with the Mural Arts Program, June 15 - August 20, 2006). It was a whorl of multiple layers of quivering lines painted directly on the wall; it suggested cosmic imagery but actually derived its pattern from a single, enlarged fingerprint. This didn’t prepare me for the forms or materials of her current work but it signaled her fascination with manipulating patterns found in nature and her interest in the connection between vision and touch. When I visited her house the first thing I saw, hung in the hall, was a piece made of silk stretched over a circular hoop, 24" in diameter, with vellum behind it. It was mounted perpendicular to the wall, approximately six feet off the ground, and was figured with organic patterns that Agati had burnt into the fabric. It was hung so that a specific light from the window behind it would activate the work, the light at 7:15 pm, in August. But even in the afternoon’s soft light, the patterned orb suspended above eye level spoke both of the irregular, organic patterns of natural growth and the perfection of the ideal, circular form. It had a slightly magical quality about it; perhaps it was the beauty of the pattern, that resembled the bark of a tree; or the fine-ness of the silk, stretched, as over a large tambourine; or the sense of anticipation implied by its location. I can imagine it glowing at the specified time, with the setting sun behind it. 7:15 is characteristic of much of Agati’s work, which grows out of the process of its making and is meant to function in time. We entered her studio, which is filled with a varied assemblage of dried plants, seeds, and cones. Her art involves an investigation of these natural patterns that reminds me of D’Arcy Wentworth Thompson’s classic book, On Growth and Form. Thompson thought that mathematics was a single tool that could explain all the patterns of biological development. Agati has no such totalizing aim, but an equally serious interest in natural forms. She is drawn to texture, and the patterning in much of her work derives from rubbings, through which she translates the tactile to the visual. On the floor of her studio was a large piece in progress: a circle of brown paper, five feet in diameter, with dense black and white patterning. She began with a wedge-shaped piece of marble, into which she sand-blasted a design derived from the ribbing of a large leaf. She then made rubbings from the marble, using black and white touche stick, as she rotated the figured marble beneath the paper. The circular form with repeat patterning would read as a mandala, an image of the cosmos made for contemplation. She showed me several earlier bodies of work: serial and multi-part drawings and paintings. The Helix series of 2004 were tiny squares either 1.5, 2, or 3 inches. The imagery came from the landscape, particularly flowing and surging water. They were painted and drawn in graphite, colored ink and acrylic on Mylar, mounted on board and then on thick, white acrylic blocks. Mounted as they were, they became object-like rather than merely planar, and despite their minute size, each read as a satisfying and complete work. A trip to New Mexico prompted another series, Messages, with the same technique but on larger scale (8 or 10 inches square). This series was mounted on thinner pieces of acrylic which resemble tiles in format. The imagery of Messages was derived from wood which had been deeply marked with bark beetle tracks. Agati made rubbings from pieces of the wood she collected and translated the designs onto the Mylar multiple times, in different-colored inks. They became all-over but slightly irregular patternings that would read as abstract if one didn’t know their origin. The inks produce crisp lines which sit on the surface of the Mylar. In another series she would combine inks with fluid paint, producing an effect closer to watercolor. The beetles had attacked all of the piñon trees in the area because of a drought, so the pattern was a record of a specific environmental disaster. Agati suggests that the pattern of the beetle infestation is a form of communication; so much beauty from such destruction. She is aware of the irony, but the works are about beauty, not irony. Agati said that working on the wall at the Philadelphia
Art Alliance changed her work. She liked the experience, and became interested
in the work as a performance; she even documented the stages of its production
and then its obliteration. Several pieces in the studio related to this
experience. There were large drawings done on transparent Mylar that are
intended to hang free, so the drawing is seen in relation to whatever
is behind it. She was also working on her studio wall, to which she had
affixed a six foot tall piece of linoleum. She was carving an image in
the linoleum; the design was derived from tree bark. She is saving the
bits of linoleum that are removed; they may become another work and she
expects to make rubbings from the carving once it is finished. The carving
and the rubbings will equally be finished works; one is not merely a step
towards the other. The work is both the positive and the negative. Her
working and thinking parallels the organic material that she studies,
the remains of a piece becoming a sort of compost that will produce something
else. I look forward to seeing it. © 2007 Andrea Kirsh and InLiquid.com; images copyright © Nancy Agati |
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