COOL ASCENT

Comment

Comment by DENNIS A. DEZMAIN on November 23, 2019 at 3:17pm

Hi, Kristen. Just to thank you again for your time to critique Cool Ascent. I want to wish you a wonderful Thanking Giving holiday. I know you are super busy and I certainly appreciate what you say. My next project
is to dismantle Moon Dance and build something else as I can not keep moving a 400lb. sculpture. I never thought about the implications for exhibition, especially if it was not sold. Please enjoy your family holiday!! Dennis

Comment by Resident Curator on November 22, 2019 at 8:56pm

Curator's Comment:

Thank you for bringing this new piece to my attention.  I appreciate your steady and prolific artistic output, and desire to push your forms in new directions. Cool Ascent employs an unusual amount of repetition and stacking of forms when compared to your now familiar signature construction style.  Rather than asymmetrical and cantilevered appendages, this sculpture has a solid and central core of similar crisscrossing pieces. The opposing variable directions of the aluminum bars, or spokes, ultimately cancel each-other out and result in a visual stabilization.  Because  there isn't a predominant trajectory counterbalanced by an opposing force, this new piece has less connection to mechanical or aeronautic design, frequently evidenced in your other work. I'm also intrigued by the manner in which the metal sculpture meets its stone base. The small architectural anchor at the base of the piece echoes the crossing of linear elements, but does so in a vertical-horizontal orientation. Rather than meeting the slate base perpendicularly, the diagonal cross activates this final connection. Sometimes your titles offer a context for these tectonic plates and bars, but the title here simply reinforces the strong vertical movement of the sculpture.  While the repeated diagonals create a dynamic tension, there's nothing undirected or erratic about Cool Ascent. While the "coolness" can be intimated in the low chroma gray hues, it can also be viewed as orchestrated containment of energy. It's as if your work is becoming more concentrated.