Landscapes Seen and Imagined:
Sense of Place, Part II
Dewey Family Gallery
Ongoing Exhibition
Thomas Lyon Mills, Spell in the Legs, 1997–2000, watercolor, acrylic, oil, ink, charcoal, relief prints, collage on pieced paper, 49 ½" x 34 ½", Gift of Bill and Susan Newkirk and the Artist
Sense of Place, Part II is a continuing exhibition selected from the DeCordova Museum's rich collection of landscapes, with many new works added to those displayed last year in Sense of Place, Part I. The artworks have been grouped with the following categories in mind: abstracted landscapes, observed reality, fantasy and symbolism, environmental and cosmic concerns, cultural landscapes, and point of view. While each of these categories represents one way of looking at and interpreting the artworks, they are meant to be very fluid, as many works defy strict classification.
Numerous recent acquisitions to DeCordova's Permanent Collection are included in this exhibition. For example, two very different paintings in the abstract landscape category explore nautical themes: Willy Heeks's lyrical painting Bell (to Dylan), and Tony Vevers's Buoy #1. In the observed reality category, Steve Hawley's Ponte Sant' Angelo is a fascinating painting within a painting that is both observed and imagined. Two recent acquisitions in the fantasy and symbolism category are a quilt by celebration artist Clara Wainwright—The Song of the Birds in the Garden That Morning, The Whisper of the Worms in the Earth Below—which is a reference to the artist's garden; and Thomas Lyon Mills's Spell in the Legs, an invented landscape that combines elements of the artist's dreams with observed places in Italy and the Adirondacks. The photographs in the exhibition also include several recent acquisitions, among them Scott Peterman's Trickey Lake, a luminous color photograph of an ice-fishing shack on a lake in Maine, and Mary Lang's black and white photographs of water and air, in which the emphasis is on the sensate nature of the elements.
Steve Hawley, Ponte Sant'Angelo, 2001, oil, wax, alkyd on linen, 72" x 78 ½", Anonymous Gift 2001.77
Landscapes Seen and Imagined: Sense of Place, Part II, organized by Director of Curatorial Affairs Rachel Rosenfield Lafo, includes 60 paintings, works on paper, photographs, a sculptural relief, and a quilt. It corresponds with an installation in the Dr. Kenneth Germeshausen Art ExperienCenter organized by Manager of Outreach Programs Laura Howick, providing activities for all ages on the theme of landscape.
