Sculpture at Evergreen 6: Simultaneous Presence

Ronit Eisenbach and Jennie Flemming are wise to use vague language in the catalog for Sculpture at Evergreen 6, Simultaneous Presence, since no work's content can ever be fully circumscribed by hermeneutics. While the catalog posits a thesis- "artists and architects developed site-specific installations which embrace and challenge the historical and cultural grounds of Evergreen as well as the physical grounds."- the list of abstract nouns that follows creates such ample berth that any work might eek by without threatening the show's thesis: "abundance and absence, sustenance and sustainability, fantasy and pleasure..."

I used to want themed shows to work like an essay- a singular thesis is advanced and specific works are selected to support and elaborate on that thesis. Perhaps this is because it was through reading and discussion that I learned about art. And both writing and conversation typically work toward a thesis, or some kind of conclusion. In general, I want a reason for an artwork's existence, whether it is the latest reply to an existing academic dialog or else as a kind of activism or consciousness raising. Susan Sontag touches on this idea in her 1966 essay "Against Interpretation". She claims that while the first experience of art probably related to magic (the cave paintings at Lascaux and Altimira), ever since Plato and Aristotle took it upon themselves to explain what art is, what its worth is, art has constantly had to defend its right to exist. Perhaps the question of "Why art?" is even more pressing today, in capitalist society where all time and energy spent undergo a cost-benefit analysis.

A few of the works in Simultaneous Presence do indeed satisfy such analysis. Evergreen Commons, a collaboration between several artists, is a didactic tableau- Baltimore's urban recreational space distilled down to a claustrophobic patch of concrete and a basketball hoop, imprisoned in chainlink with the Baltimore Crime Watch 24-7 Believe surveillance camera watching from above. And some graffiti, too. I understood immediately that the artists were using the Evergreen estate itself as the symbol of wealth and privacy it provides while the tableau works to illustrate how the other half of Baltimore live, at the mercy of state funding, under constant surveillance. Evergreen Commons effectively brings the viewer into a more challenging and more urgent dialog with sculpture than she might have planned for.

Joel Lamere and Cynthia Gunadi's piece 25-Arch Folium has a less obvious substantiation. We could talk about architectural frontiers to meet the demands of a new economic and social climate where we'll look for stripped-down functionality and portability in our dwellings. But before we identify its capacity as an instructive work, we are struck visually by this large and luminous form swooping from up inside the retaining wall's grotto. It looks like a dress or a ghost or even a tornado. My encounter with this object is more about intrigue and awe, especially when I approach and realize I can climb inside, sit down and look up, through the inside of the chute to the sky above.

I am grateful for work like Evergreen Commons because it says outright what is already on the tip everyone's tongue as they tour this vestige of the Baltimorean aristocracy's heyday. However, I am glad to be reminded that such well-aimed activist gestures are not the only way to work. I am unable at this point to forcibly demonstrate why these less instructive works are of a distinct value, but it has something to do with two of those nouns listed in the catalog: fantasy and pleasure. Art created out of fantasy, art that gives pleasure, is valuable in a way that work which is meant to address specific concerns may not be.

A few weekends ago I attended the NAMI (National Alliance on Mental Illness) in Druid Hill Park. I hadn't yet seen Simultaneous Presense, but I'd read the catalog, and I was already thinking about these once-private estates that have been handed over to the public (until 1860 most of Druid Hill Park was a private estate). I think the spring is getting to me because despite the decidedly unsexy occasion for the walk, I couldn't stop wondering about what kind of cruising Druid Hill Park offers. In discussing Evergreen Commons and its commentary on urban parks in general, the catalog claims that "In their ideal form, urban parks foster community through play and recreation, but when used for illegal activity they can destroy community and become perceived as dangerous places after dusk." I'd gone to Druid Hill Park that day to participate in a charity walk, but being there I felt unlooked-for possibilities open up before me and the exhilarating anticipation of adventure, something that would rip my day off its predictable course and point me in a new direction.

Sculpture at Evergreen 6: Simultaneous Presence
Evergreen Museum Library
4545 N. Charles Street
Baltimore, MD 21210
410.516.0341
evergreenmuseum@jhu.edu
May 2nd - September 26th