LAST CHANCE TO SEE VIDEO EXHIBITION OF WORKS BY JENNIFER STEINKAMP AT CLARK ART INSTITUTE

September 24, 2018
[Digital images available upon request]

Williamstown, Massachusetts—The Clark Art Institute’s inaugural video installation, Jennifer Steinkamp: Blind Eye remains on view through Monday, October 8. The “mesmerizing, mobile phenomena” (Wall Street Journal, August 20, 2018) in the exhibition include Blind Eye, conceived by Los Angeles-based media and installation artist Jennifer Steinkamp as a specific response to the Clark’s 140-acre setting and the architecture of the Lunder Center at Stone Hill.

By deconstructing and re-engineering computer code, the artist utilizes the abstract language of technology to create vibrant images rooted in the natural world. Branches, leaves, and flowers intertwine and overlap in her animations, transfixing viewers with twisting and changing color.

In addition to Blind Eye, the installation includes five additional projections: Diaspore, Premature, Rapunzel, and two variations of Fly to Mars.

The Clark’s exhibition is the debut of Blind Eye, which depicts the seasonal phases of a birch grove. A dizzying perspective, with no forest floor or way out, creates an unsettling tension between the beauty of the fluttering branches and the anthropomorphic, almost ghoulish tree trunks.

Diaspore consists of a collection of tumbleweeds self-propelled through a landscape, while Premature explores the phenomena of life and death. Rapunzel—based on the Grimm Brothers’ nineteenth-century fairytale—illuminates gently swaying vines, creating an enchanted virtual space that evokes Gothel’s garden. Fly to Mars presents trees that come to life with movement as they cycle through the four seasons of the year.

Jennifer Steinkamp’s work has been featured in exhibitions across the United States, Europe, and Asia, and is in numerous public and private collections. She is a professor in the department of Design Media Arts at UCLA. Her recent solo exhibitions include Winter Fountains (Benjamin Franklin Parkway, Philadelphia), Digital Nature (Espacio Fundación Telefónica, Madrid), and Jennifer Steinkamp (Portland Art Museum, Portland).

Generous contributors to Jennifer Steinkamp: Blind Eye include Maureen Fennessy Bousa and Edward P. Bousa and Amy and Charlie Scharf.

ABOUT THE CLARK

The Clark Art Institute, located in the Berkshires of western Massachusetts, is one of a small number of institutions globally that is both an art museum and a center for research, critical discussion, and higher education in the visual arts. Opened in 1955, the Clark houses exceptional European and American paintings and sculpture, extensive collections of master prints and drawings, English silver, and early photography. Acting as convener through its Research and Academic Program, the Clark gathers an international community of scholars to participate in a lively program of conferences, colloquia, and workshops on topics of vital importance to the visual arts. The Institute’s library, consisting of more than 275,000 volumes, is one of the nation’s premier art history libraries. The Clark, which also houses and co-sponsors the Williams College Graduate Program in the History of Art, has a three-star rating in the Michelin Green Guide.

The Clark is located at 225 South Street in Williamstown, Massachusetts. Galleries are open Tuesday through Sunday, 10 am to 5 pm. Admission is $20; free year-round for Clark members, children 18 and younger, and students with valid ID. Free admission is available through several programs, including First Sundays Free; a local library pass program; EBT Card to Culture; Bank of America Museums on Us; and Blue Star Museums. For more information on these programs and more, visit clarkart.edu or call 413 458 2303.

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