| |
  |
South Bend Tribune, March 2, 2001 Julie York Coppens In 1994, video artist Seth Kramer tried to count 6 million grains of rice in an attempt to understand the vastness of the Holocaust -- to get some hold on the overwhelming reality of the deaths of 6 million Jews. Friends warned him that it would take weeks to count that high. In fact, after 10 months of continuous counting, he'd only reached 1 million. Kramer's untitled, 15-minute video, included in the traveling exhibition "Witness & Legacy: Contemporary Art About the Holocaust," might have served as a warning to the South Bend Regional Museum of Art. Two years ago, prompted by the Kurt and Tessye Simon Fund for Holocaust Remembrance of Temple Beth-El, the Regional Museum decided it would play host to "Witness & Legacy," a grouping of five large installations, two works of sculpture, four textile pieces and more than 40 paintings, drawings, prints and photographs first displayed at the Minnesota Museum of American Art. In addition, the Regional Museum would invite the city's cultural and educational institutions to plan their own Holocaust-related events for the spring of 2001. But as the museum's staff quickly discovered, contemplating a project of this size was one thing; actually making it happen would be quite another. "It's absolutely enormous," said Susan Visser, SBRMA's executive director, speaking about "Witness & Legacy" the art exhibition as well as the greater, communitywide effort. "This is the largest show we've ever had. It required almost completely rebuilding the galleries -- there were several floor-to-ceiling rooms that had to be created for the installations," Visser explained. The construction took several months, with many more days devoted to the careful unpacking of 55 giant crates of artwork. On a recent morning, the staff had begun the equally massive and meticulous task of hanging the show, which opens this weekend. "But that doesn't even speak to the whole scope of the project," she added. "Twenty organizations in the community have gotten involved," playing host to a wide range of exhibits, performances, lectures and workshops focusing on the Holocaust and related issues of tolerance and diversity (see sidebar). "This project has helped all of us stretch a little bit." As the museum's curator, Bill Tourtillotte had to stretch more than most. "If we can get up this hill, we can get up pretty much anything," said Tourtillotte, surveying the partial transformation of the 5,000-square-foot Warner Gallery. Normally a clean, open space with a soothing view of the St. Joseph River, at the moment the Warner looked and sounded more like three episodes of "Home Improvement" being taped simultaneously -- a scattering of ladders, lumber, crates, paint, conversation, laughter, drilling, hammering. Tourtillotte flipped through a heavy packet of schematic drawings, notes and other directives from the exhibition's home in Minnesota. In mapping the exhibition for the Regional Museum, Tourtillotte said, he had to follow artists' specifications while considering a number of other factors: cost, for one, which meant getting by with as few new walls as possible. The construction had to be aesthetically pleasing as well as safe for visitors and protective of the gallery's hardwood floor. And in determining the flow of the exhibition, he had to balance aesthetics against viewer psychology. "Obviously, this work -- some of it is quite intense," Tourtillotte explained. "We want to lead people in and gradually introduce them to the content so that we're not slamming a door in their face. We want to allow them a chance to grow with and observe the show as they go through it. "It's like a huge puzzle, really," the curator said. Then he added, laughing, "We just hope we don't get to the day of the opening and realize we missed a puzzle piece." To help ensure that doesn't happen, the exhibition's main sponsor, the Regis Foundation, sends an installation expert to each host museum for a few days. Chris Zerendow, a Minneapolis-based painter, was at the Regional Museum last week putting up the five room-size works -- each one a complex puzzle in itself. Wearing dusty work clothes and an immaculate pair of white gloves, Zerendow tacked a series of rectangular tiles to the wall, checking the arrangement against a paper diagram. These "badges," he explained, part of Edith Altman's "Reclaiming the Symbol/The Art of Memory," referred to the Nazis' practice of identifying various populations: Jews, homosexuals, criminals. On the other side of the installation, a giant gold swastika appears to cast a black shadow across the floor. "The symbol of the swastika is actually centuries old. Hitler borrowed it from other cultures," Zerendow explained. "By taking the swastika and making it into art, (Altman) is trying to transform the meaning, to reinvent it and take it back for herself." Other installations in "Witness and Legacy" call to mind the boxcars used to transport Jews to the death camps, the camps themselves or, as with Gabrielle Rossmer's ghostly "Revenants," the spirits of those lost. Tourtillotte recalled unpacking one of the exhibition's sculptures, "Wrapping," a group of seven dark, life-size figures by artist Shirley Samberg. Made of burlap stiffened by glue, the pieces look like armless, faceless human mummies. The gallery visitor sees them huddled on the floor; Tourtillotte found them strapped into foam beds inside a two-tier, rectangular crate. "You pull the shelf out and unstrap them," the curator said, shaking his head at the memory. "It gives you this feeling for them beyond the finished product." "This is powerful art about a powerful subject," Visser observed. "I think it's going to be an intense experience for virtually everyone who comes through it. And for those of us here at the museum who live with this art and interact with it every day -- I don't think it's going to go away."
|
|