The Labor of Remembrance: Print and Textile Works by Louise Bourgeois
The Don Russell Clayton Gallery at the Bernard A. Zuckerman Museum of Art presents
The Labor of Remembrance: Print and Textile Works by Louise Bourgeois
August 28 – December 11, 2021
Curated by Cynthia Nourse Thompson
Louise Bourgeois calls upon both subtle and obvious metaphors associated with textiles within her work: the spider, the needle, clothing, and flax. She has stated, “I always had the fear of being separated and abandoned. The sewing is my attempt to keep things together and make things whole.” This art of making, specifically a return to the physicalness of creating, is wholly present in Bourgeois’ needlework. She poignantly renders the construction of a diary, through entries realized in strands of thread and layered fabrics, as dimensional compositions. The careful presentation of a select grouping of her works, in association with those comprising This Mortal Coil, further establishes the relationship of craft with contemporary artistic practice while also rendering an impactful narrative.
The Labor of Remembrance features twenty-one works by renowned artist Louise Bourgeois [b. 1911, paris; d. 2010, new york], ranging from to 1998 to 2005. This careful presentation of a select grouping of her prints and textiles, in association with those comprising the exhibition This Mortal Coil, renders an impactful emotional narrative and elicits personal narratives of suffering, trauma, isolation, and fear. Bourgeois struggled fiercely with both anxiety and affliction throughout her life. Although she is most recognized for her large-scale sculptures, her prints and fabric works courageously explore the traumas of her childhood best through her intense depiction of the body and the amputated body. Most notable are the nine drypoint and aquatint etchings comprising the portfolio titled Topiary: The Art of Improving Nature. As Beatriz Colomina states in her essay The Architecture of Trauma, “Bourgeois reconstructs not only the scenes of the childhood traumas that she says are at the root of the work, but the trauma of the creative act itself, which she feels in her own body, as amputation; that is, as physical, as well as psychological, trauma.” Thus, the works selected are presented through this illuminated lens addressing empathy, grief, and loss as universal themes.
A unique selection of works by artist Ruth Zuckerman [b. 1923; d. 1996] is featured in association with the work of Louise Bourgeois, as both artists explore the fluidity of the human condition through depictions of the body and its extreme vulnerability. Acclaimed for her organic sculptures, which often reference the figurative, Ruth Zuckerman’s sculptures explore themes of the familial such as devotion, refuge, and stability. The union of organic abstraction in combination with the “hardness” of stone has been noted as a significant aesthetic of her sculptures, as is evident in the works
on view. Likewise, the work of Louise Bourgeois exhibits a fondness for familial and shared histories, which allow anxiety, fear, helplessness, and insecurity to be fully articulated.
This Mortal Coil and The Labor of Remembrance are two interrelated exhibitions in dialogue, seeking to mitigate emotional suffering, corporeal pain, and women’s toil as producers. The ideology of craft collectively employs active and investigative methodologies, alongside devout and obsessive tendencies to facilitate one’s redemption. This impassioned approach to making by hand, with the inherent connection of ritual and process to that of materiality and craft, draws one to consider the ability of compulsive labor to serve as a remedy for grief. Conceptions of anguish, memory, and extreme vulnerability are displayed in extravagant and brutal force to reveal how histories, both shared and individual, articulate the human condition.
Image credits: to follow
The Labor of Remembrance: Print and Textile Works by Louise Bourgeois
August 28 – December 11, 2021
Curated by Cynthia Nourse Thompson
Louise Bourgeois calls upon both subtle and obvious metaphors associated with textiles within her work: the spider, the needle, clothing, and flax. She has stated, “I always had the fear of being separated and abandoned. The sewing is my attempt to keep things together and make things whole.” This art of making, specifically a return to the physicalness of creating, is wholly present in Bourgeois’ needlework. She poignantly renders the construction of a diary, through entries realized in strands of thread and layered fabrics, as dimensional compositions. The careful presentation of a select grouping of her works, in association with those comprising This Mortal Coil, further establishes the relationship of craft with contemporary artistic practice while also rendering an impactful narrative.
The Labor of Remembrance features twenty-one works by renowned artist Louise Bourgeois [b. 1911, paris; d. 2010, new york], ranging from to 1998 to 2005. This careful presentation of a select grouping of her prints and textiles, in association with those comprising the exhibition This Mortal Coil, renders an impactful emotional narrative and elicits personal narratives of suffering, trauma, isolation, and fear. Bourgeois struggled fiercely with both anxiety and affliction throughout her life. Although she is most recognized for her large-scale sculptures, her prints and fabric works courageously explore the traumas of her childhood best through her intense depiction of the body and the amputated body. Most notable are the nine drypoint and aquatint etchings comprising the portfolio titled Topiary: The Art of Improving Nature. As Beatriz Colomina states in her essay The Architecture of Trauma, “Bourgeois reconstructs not only the scenes of the childhood traumas that she says are at the root of the work, but the trauma of the creative act itself, which she feels in her own body, as amputation; that is, as physical, as well as psychological, trauma.” Thus, the works selected are presented through this illuminated lens addressing empathy, grief, and loss as universal themes.
A unique selection of works by artist Ruth Zuckerman [b. 1923; d. 1996] is featured in association with the work of Louise Bourgeois, as both artists explore the fluidity of the human condition through depictions of the body and its extreme vulnerability. Acclaimed for her organic sculptures, which often reference the figurative, Ruth Zuckerman’s sculptures explore themes of the familial such as devotion, refuge, and stability. The union of organic abstraction in combination with the “hardness” of stone has been noted as a significant aesthetic of her sculptures, as is evident in the works
on view. Likewise, the work of Louise Bourgeois exhibits a fondness for familial and shared histories, which allow anxiety, fear, helplessness, and insecurity to be fully articulated.
This Mortal Coil and The Labor of Remembrance are two interrelated exhibitions in dialogue, seeking to mitigate emotional suffering, corporeal pain, and women’s toil as producers. The ideology of craft collectively employs active and investigative methodologies, alongside devout and obsessive tendencies to facilitate one’s redemption. This impassioned approach to making by hand, with the inherent connection of ritual and process to that of materiality and craft, draws one to consider the ability of compulsive labor to serve as a remedy for grief. Conceptions of anguish, memory, and extreme vulnerability are displayed in extravagant and brutal force to reveal how histories, both shared and individual, articulate the human condition.
Image credits: to follow