NEW YORK SCULPTORS GUILD EXHIBITS AT HOUSATONIC MUSEUM OF ART
For immediate Release:
Contact:
Robbin Zella (203) 332-5052
Housatonic Museum of Art • 900 Lafayette Blvd. • Bridgeport, CT 06604
Bridgeport, CT—The Housatonic Museum of Art presents Sculpture in the 21st Century featuring work by members of the New York Sculptors Guild. The exhibit will open Thursday, February 23 and continue through March 23, 2012. A reception for the artists will be held Sunday, February 26 from 1 to 3pm in the Burt Chernow Galleries. This event is free and the public is cordially invited to attend.
The Sculptors Guild, founded in 1937, was an important moment for Modern sculpture in America and Guild members have ranked among the most prestigious and significant artists of the past seven decades. David Smith, an influential mid-20th century sculptor and a forerunner of welded steel constructions of expressive geometric abstractions, exhibited regularly with Sculptors Guild along with such renowned figures as Jacques Lipchitz, Louise Bourgeois, Seymour Lipton, lbram Lassaw and Herbert Ferber. In addition, Expressionist figurative sculpture also flourished, most notably exemplified by the work of Paul Manship, Chaim Gross, William Zorach, Jacques Lipchitz, and Jose de Creeft.
With the advent of the new millennium the Sculptors Guild has enjoyed a resurgence of interest by emerging sculptors of various divergent aesthetics. The continuation of the extensive history of prominent sculpture visionaries within Sculptors Guild avant garde has extensively expanded during the past decade to include the notable digital sculptors: Bruce Beasley, Kenneth Snelson, Jon Isherwood, Robert Michael Smith, Michael Rees, Barry X Ball, Dan Collins, Mary Bates Neubauer, David Smalley, Greg Lock, David Morris, Michael Zansky and Dan Henderson.
In 2010, the Housatonic Museum of Art invited Nick Capasso, Senior Curator at the deCordova Sculpture Park and Museum in Lincoln, Massachusetts to select works created by the members for this exhibition. Capasso chose twenty-eight sculptures by fourteen artists, using several criteria.
“First and foremost,” Capasso said, “is my interest in work that is well wrought, and displays a confident, unselfconscious, or experimental attitude toward material, form, subject, and content. I was most attracted to works that look forward to the aesthetic and philosophical concerns of the 21st century, rather than back towards the 20th century.” Capasso selected a diverse body of work that explores architecture, history, art history, science, biology and the complexities of nature, and spirituality.
Sculpture of the 21st Century includes Stephanie Rocknack, June Ahrens, Eve Ingalls, Greg Lock, Lucy Hodgson, Steve Dono, Michael Zansky, Irene Gennaro, Mary Ellen Scherl, Katie Truk, Elizabeth Knowles, Alison Helm, Robert Michael Smith, and Mary Bailey.
The museum is open Monday through Friday from 8:30am until 5:30pm. Thursday evening until 7 pm. Saturday from 9 am to 3 pm and Sunday from 12 pm until 4 pm. For more information and directions to the museum visit our website www.housatonicmuseum.org
Housatonic Community College provides an affordable and accessible education through two-year degrees, transfer preparation, and certificate programs, as well as a wide variety of continuing education and personal/professional enrichment seminars and workshops. In addition, HCC offers employee and occupational training for businesses, municipalities, government agencies, and professional associations to help develop the educated and skilled workforce required to meet regional business and industry needs. HCC is nationally recognized as an “Achieving the Dream” institution. To learn more, visit the college’s website at: www.hcc.commnet.edu.
HCC is located at 900 Lafayette Blvd. in downtown Bridgeport, less than 150 yards off I-95 (Exit 27) and Rte. 8 (Exit 1), a block from the Webster Bank Arena at Harbor Yard. Free parking is available in the Housatonic garage.