PUBLICATIONS
Excerpted from:
Playing the grotto
Installations use the walls as information and context as well as support in "Surroundings."
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The walls do double duty in this show at Safe-T-Gallery. The art uses the wall... changes the wall. And the whole idea of something on the wall... what should that something be? A trophy? An heirloom? A window?
SURROUNDINGS
Exhibition: Surroundings.
Works by: Susan Hamburger; Carol Salmanson.
Luminous Layers 2
It is in the nature of light to be an enveloping ingredient, and Carol Salmanson has created some very special optic effects in her new light sculptures. The installation was a successful foray and marks new ground in all around environmental sculpture. Not tons of people are using light, but another practitioner who might come to mind — who works with light and also with environments — is James Turrell. Both artists have an ability to ritualize space, as if preparing us for some imminent conversion.
Salmanson presents light in stripes made of spots that cast extremely ambient glows. The L.E.D. lights are arranged in vertical strips that hang against the wall like pendants or as clips in a magazine or as regimental bars and awards pinned to a uniform. One can read these postulations of illumination in various ways all of which echo the simple rhythm of the rows of tiny twin lights.
The overall effect of a room full of these almost life-size presences is an effervescent experience in an all around environmental sculpture. It is the ultimate grotto — a rainbow in a cave. Dripping rhythms of turquoise, ruby and amber mimic stalagmites hanging down from the pastel lime walls. Shadows creep into recesses and bounce around the room adding a velvety haze. Jewel tones emanate from the bright bulbs as the light is heightened and simultaneously dispersed. This happens as it is refracted through an acrylic prism rod that runs down the front like a sword. This clear bar adds symmetry and weight and acts as a lens that the light passes through on its journey to our eyes.
Our relationship with the mix-up of yummy colors and the response it evokes is key to these "Luminous Layers," as some of the pieces are called. Las Vegas, fairy tale, pool hall, stained glass. Salmanson knows how to present the emblematic in a choreographed sense that makes sculpture out of color.
Both artists' installations seem to have one direction in common — museums!
NOVEMBER 28, 2004
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