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Alyson Shotz

January 01, 1970

Alyson Shotz (born 1964) is an American sculptor based in Brooklyn, New York.[1] She is known for experiential, large-scale abstract sculptures and installations inspired by nature and scientific concepts, which manipulate light, shadow, space and gravity in order to investigate and complicate perception.[2][3][4] Writers suggest her work challenges tenets of monumental, minimalist sculpture—traditionally welded, solid, heavy and static—through its accumulation of common materials in constructions that are often flexible, translucent, reflective, seemingly weightless, and responsive to changing conditions and basic forces.[5][6][7] Sculpture critic Lilly Wei wrote, "In Shotz’s realizations, the definition of sculpture becomes increasingly expansive—each project, often in series, testing another proposition, another possibility, another permutation, while ignoring conventional boundaries."[8]

Alyson Shotz
Born1964
Glendale, Arizona, United States
NationalityAmerican
EducationUniversity of Washington, Rhode Island School of Design
Known forSculpture, installation art, photography, video
AwardsStanford University Research Fellow, Pollock-Krasner Foundation, New York Foundation for the Arts
WebsiteAlyson Shotz
Alyson Shotz, The Shape of Space, cut plastic fresnel lens sheets and staples, 175" x 456" x 96", Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, 2007. Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum collection.

Shotz’s artwork has been loosely grouped into three types: expansive, intricate large sculptures and installations that are handmade; minimal, self-contained sculptures that sometimes involve fabrication and elements of chance; and abstract photographs and digital prints based on photographs.[9][10] Her work belongs to the collections of the Museum of Modern Art,[11] Whitney Museum,[12] Museum of Fine Arts, Houston,[13] Guggenheim Museum Bilbao[14] and Storm King Art Center,[15] among others. She has exhibited at the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum,[16] Hirshhorn Museum, San Francisco Museum of Modern Art (SFMOMA),[17] Guggenheim Bilbao,[18][19] Wexner Center for the Arts[20] and Indianapolis Museum of Art.[21]

Education and early and career edit

Shotz was born in Glendale, Arizona in 1964, the daughter of an Air Force pilot and a teacher.[9][17] In childhood, she lived throughout the West and Midwest due to her father's career. She initially studied geology, but turned to art; science has remained a strong influence on her work.[17][4] After enrolling at Rhode Island School of Design, she graduated with a BFA in 1987 and earned an MFA from the University of Washington in 1991.[4][14] In the early 1990s, she moved to New York City.[22]

Shotz began as a painter, producing colorful images of organic forms, while sometimes integrating photography, collage and video into her practice.[17] A foundational work was Reflective Mimicry (1996), which included photographs and a video of a woman walking in the woods, clad in a full-body suit armored in small mirrors; its play of reflected foliage against actual foliage had the effect of de-materializing the figure.[9][22][17] She would continue to explore the blurring of figure and ground, most similarly, in large-scale outdoor installations such as Mirror Fence (2003) and Scattering Screen (2016).[17][9][23]

Work and reception edit

Shotz's sculptures and installations manipulate ordinary synthetic materials—optical lenses, mirrors, glass, piano strings, wire, beads, nails—in concert with physical forces in order to investigate the shaping of perception, experiential boundaries, and ephemeral phenomena.[8][2][19][24] She combines craftsmanship and process-intensive methods of accumulation and structure-building, often based in underlying concepts from physics, optics and mathematics.[25][26][5][20] Her work produces perceptual conundrums—visual flux, spatial distortion, kaleidoscopic effects, and illusions of movement that result from shifts in light and vantage point.[3][27][6][28] They evoke both natural sensations and scientific models, while blurring the ability to distinguish human-made from organic materials.[19][5]

 
Alyson Shotz, Object for Reflection, punched aluminum and stainless steel rings, 122.5" x 145" x 57", 2017. Guggenheim Museum Bilbao collection.

Critics suggest that her work recalls minimalist constructions (e.g., Richard Serra), but stretches the boundaries of modernist sculpture, subverting ostensibly masculine tenets such as solidity, weight and fixity with qualities of fluidity, weightlessness, permeability and translucency;[8][2][20][14] along these lines, one of Shotz's stated aims is to create volume without mass through her use of line, void, and carefully selected materials.[17][29] The blend of minimal and organic forms in her art has been compared to that of Eva Hesse, however, she differs in her interest in the viewer as a participant; that emphasis has been related to the conceptual work of Lygia Clark, though Shotz's entails a more optical than physical participation.[17][6][4]

Works and exhibitions, 1999–2009 edit

In the late 1990s, Shotz began receiving critical attention for work The New Yorker deemed "a cyberorganic spin on landscape,"[30] in exhibitions at the Aldrich Museum of Contemporary Art, MoMA PS1 and MASS MoCA.[31][11][32][33] The New Art Examiner described her solo exhibition at Susan Inglett (1999) as displaying a "fascination with nature that's part childlike wonder, part humorous romp, and part clinical investigation."[34] It included a digital photo of collaged budding flowers suggesting genetic engineering, a video, and Pink Swarm, one of two shimmering, suspended topiary- or cloud-like sculptures made of plastic, wire and clear surgical tubing.[35][34] Covered with hundreds of tiny petals that dripped strings of goo, the sculptures evoked natural processes gone to excess.[35]

For the Whitney Museum show "Pastoral Pop" (2000), Shotz installed Mobile Flora, a grove of 9-foot-tall, slender stalks made of Q-tips coated in green rubber with casters replacing roots, that reviews characterized as "weird, plant-machine hybrids,"[31] "alien bamboo,"[36] and "genetically mutated lily pads and beanstalks."[37] In 2003, she created "Mirror Fence" at the Socrates Sculpture Park, a shimmering, three-by-130-foot-long picket fence faced in mirrors, whose slats disappeared and reappeared amid the surrounding landscape as viewers approached.[38][39]

In subsequent exhibitions, Shotz presented abstract sculptures characterized as updated postminimalism "with a dash of pop science."[5] These works consisted of accumulations of common materials that hung like drawings in space, evoking natural phenomena, invisible dimensions, and theoretical concepts such as string theory and dark matter.[10][5][26] The Shape of Space (2004) is representative of this period. It was an undulating, translucent curtain-like form whose thousands of hand-cut and stapled plastic lenses bent and refracted light, distorting and fragmenting space to create confounding kaleidoscopic optical effects.[3][10][27][26] Its fluctuating appearance was likened to a shimmering waterfall, a wall of ice, frosted translucent glass bricks,[10] and—in its Guggenheim Museum presentation (2007), by Roberta Smith—to a "giant wind chime … dividing and multiplying its surroundings [to] provide tiny, glimmering, beveled views of the museum's rings, Central Park, an apartment building, traffic."[16]

In shows at Locks Gallery, SFMOMA (both 2008), Derek Eller and Warehouse Gallery (both 2009), Shotz exhibited related suspended and wall-based sculptures that resembled ghostly, floating chandeliers or iced-over molecular forms (Crystalline Structure, 2007); weightless, skeletal apparitions made of long, bowing strands of beaded piano wire (The Structure of Light, 2008; Equilibrium, 2009); and billowing webs created by looping thread around pins nailed to walls in complex, mathematically based networks of triangles ("Thread Drawings", 2008).[40][5][26][17] During this period, she also produced collage-like digital prints sourced from photographs of her own work (e.g., the series "A Momentary Configuration of Matter"). Reviews described them as hybrid, hive-like organic structures resembling DNA strands from an artificial life form, Rorschach tests, butterflies, lace patterns and skulls.[10][40]

 
Alyson Shotz, Wave Equation, stainless steel wire, silvered glass beads and aluminum, 120" x 144" x 117", 2010, installation at the Nasher Sculpture Center. Indianapolis Museum of Art collection.

Installations and exhibitions, 2010– edit

In later work, Shotz continued to explore perceptual concerns while pursuing a wider range of materials, forms and processes.[20][41][8] "Standing Wave" (2010, Wexner Center for the Arts) consisted of thousands of thin, iridescent clear acrylic strips placed side by side and projecting from a 25-foot-long wall in curved arches and undulating waves; the shifting refractions and reflections suggested op-art constructions.[20][7] Wave Equation (2010, Nasher Sculpture Center) and Invariant Interval (2013, University of Texas) were monumental, yet delicate constructions employing piano and steel wire filaments in skeletal ellipses or web-like forms; reviews described them as "gossamer" works moving between presence and absence, interior and exterior, and static mass and illusory motion.[42][25][8] The installations Plane Weave (2016, Pennsylvania Academy of Fine Art) and Object for Reflection (2017/2020, Guggenheim Bilbao) were vertical, tapestry-like works made of thousands of octagonal pieces of perforated aluminum joined by steel rings, whose flexible, open construction dramatically slumped and folded while appearing both solid and transparent.[43][19][44] Their shimmering responses to changing sunlight evoked patterns ranging from natural (the sun on rippling water) to human-made (fabric, chain mail) to digital (screen pixels).[43][45][14]

In exhibitions at Carolina Nitsch (2014), the Wellin Museum (2015) and Derek Eller (2017, 2020), Shotz presented bodies of work relying on chance.[41][24] "Topographic Iterations" were abstract photo-drawings with a mystifying trompe l'oeil effect resembling cracked-earth interplanetary surfaces. She created them created by crumpling Japanese Masa paper, photographing and printing it, then crumpling the print.[41] The "Recumbent Folds" series (2012–4) consisted of white, soft-sculpture-like porcelain forms created by dropping slabs or cylinders of clay from various heights and leaving them to harden.[41][8] For "Crushed Cubes" (2018), she crushed steel, copper or bronze cubes to form new, unpredictably organic objects that also reimagined conventional minimalist objects.[46] The Imaginary Sculptures series (2014) eschewed materials altogether by simply visualizing possible sculptures with haiku-like imperatives inscribed on enameled wall plaques.[8]

 
Alyson Shotz, Three Fold, welded aluminum frame, acrylic with dichroic lamination, 56' x 15' x 6', 2013. Permanent Installation, Stanford University Li Ka Shing Center for Learning and Knowledge.

In 2020, she exhibited the "Intricate Metamorphosis" works—intimate, corporeal ceiling-hung sculptures with iridescent, chain-mail-like surfaces made of small electroplated steel disks—and "Chronometer" series, which comprised rhythmic, wall-mounted abstractions like paintings composed of thousands of gleaming copper washers and nails, interrupted by snaking bands of recycled rubber bicycle inner tubes.[1] New Yorker critic Johanna Fateman likened the former to "empty cocoons of some unknown species or, more fantastically, tails abandoned by mermaids," while suggesting the latter works embodied COVID-related themes of marking time and confronting mortality.[1] In her 2023 exhibitions "Alloys of Moonlight" and "The Silent Constellations," Shotz explored space, energy, light and phenomenological experience through minimal, metallic mesh forms resembling Möbius strips and delicate rectangular and fan-like reliefs of hand-folded aluminum, respectively.[47][48]

Public commissions edit

Shotz has been has commissioned to create large-scale, site-specific works for the Stanford University Li Ka Shing Center for Learning and Knowledge,[49] NYU Langone Health, MTA Arts & Design (New York), High Museum of Art,[50] Cleveland Clinic and AT&T Stadium (Dallas).[51][45][9] In 2022, she installed the permanent, twisting painted-steel sculpture Entanglement above the atrium of the Skidmore College Center for Integrated Sciences.[52] Her glass mosaic work for the domed ceiling of the Fred D. Thompson Federal Courthouse in Nashville, The Robes of Justitia, was commissioned by the U.S. General Services Administration (GSA) and won the organization's 2022 Honor Award in Art.[53][54] In 2023, Shotz's outdoor, site-responsive sculpture, Temporal Shift, was acquired by the deCordova Sculpture Park and Museum; originally commissioned by the Grace Farms Foundation, the work's elliptical, stainless-steel form interacts with natural light and references the Earth’s orbital pathway around the Sun.[55][56]

Collections and recognition edit

Shotz's work belongs to the public collections of the Academy Art Museum,[57] Baltimore Museum of Art,[58] Brooklyn Museum of Art,[59] deCordova Sculpture Park and Museum,[56] Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum,[4] Guggenheim Bilbao,[60] Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden,[61] Indianapolis Museum of Art,[62] Los Angeles County Museum of Art, Madison Museum of Contemporary Art,[63] Museum of Fine Arts, Houston,[13] Museum of Modern Art,[11] National Gallery of Art,[64] Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts,[65] The Phillips Collection,[66] Rose Art Museum,[67] San Francisco Museum of Modern Art,[68] San Jose Museum of Art,[69] Storm King Art Center[70][15] and Whitney Museum, among others.[71][72]

She has been awarded fellowships from the Saint-Gaudens Memorial (2007), New York Foundation for the Arts (2004), MacDowell (2021) and Stanford University (2014), and received awards from Art Matters (1996), Yale University (2005), the U.S. GSA (Honor Award in Art, 2022),[54] and the Pollock-Krasner (1999), Marie Walsh Sharpe (2004) and Peter S. Reed (2021) foundations, among others.[73][71][74][75][76][60][4]

References edit

  1. ^ a b c Fateman, Johanna. "Alyson Shotz," The New Yorker, October 12, 2020. Retrieved July 7, 2022.
  2. ^ a b c Sexton, Elaine. "Alyson Shotz, Derek Eller," Art in America, September 2009.
  3. ^ a b c Goodman, Jonathan. "Alyson Shotz at Derek Eller," Sculpture, October 2005, p. 75–6.
  4. ^ a b c d e f Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum. Alyson Shotz, Artists. Retrieved July 10, 2022.
  5. ^ a b c d e f Rosenberg, Karen. "Alyson Shotz: Phase Shift," The New York Times, March 13, 2009. Retrieved July 7, 2022.
  6. ^ a b c Chávez, Anja. A Conversation with Alyson Shotz," Sculpture, November 2008.
  7. ^ a b Scott, Andrea "Alyson Shotz at Derek Eller," The New Yorker, March 14, 2011. Retrieved July 7, 2022.
  8. ^ a b c d e f g Wei, Lilly. "Alyson Shotz," Sculpture, May 2015, p. 75–6. Retrieved July 7, 2022.
  9. ^ a b c d e Hanson, Sarah P. "Alyson Shotz," Art + Auction, May 2012.
  10. ^ a b c d e Genocchio, Benjamin. "Quiet Dazzle and Chaotic Chimes," The New York Times, March 6, 2005. Retrieved July 7, 2022.
  11. ^ a b c Museum of Modern Art. Alyson Shotz, Artists. Retrieved July 10, 2022.
  12. ^ Whitney Museum of American Art. Alyson Shotz, Artists. Retrieved July 10, 2022.
  13. ^ a b Museum of Fine Arts, Houston. Alyson Shotz, Mirror Fence, Objects. Retrieved July 10, 2022.
  14. ^ a b c d Guggenheim Bilbao. Object for Reflection, Alyson Shotz, Collection. Retrieved July 7, 2022.
  15. ^ a b Storm King Art Center. Alyson Shotz, Collection. Retrieved July 10, 2022.
  16. ^ a b Smith, Roberta. Smith, Roberta. "Guggenheim exhibit explores the forms of space," The New York Times, July 20, 2007. Retrieved July 7, 2022.
  17. ^ a b c d e f g h i Sheets, Hilarie M. "Turning Piano Wire Into Light," ARTnews, January 2010.
  18. ^ Artsy. "The Line of Wit, Guggenheim Museum Bilbao," Exhibition. Retrieved January 17, 2024.
  19. ^ a b c d Brady, Shaun. "Alyson Shotz’s newest exhibition shimmers at PAFA," Metro Philadelphia, April 21, 2016. Retrieved July 7, 2022.
  20. ^ a b c d e Yates, Christopher. "Shimmery installation toys with perception," The Columbus Dispatch, February 7, 2010.
  21. ^ Indianapolis Museum of Art. "Indianapolis Museum of Art announces Alyson Shotz, Fluid State," March 11, 2012. Retrieved July 10, 2022.
  22. ^ a b Abramenko, Maria. "Alyson Shotz/Investigations Into Space, Light and Matter," Nasty, October 1, 2020.
  23. ^ Dawkins, Chad. "An Interview with Alyson Shotz on Her New Work in San Antonio," Glasstire, July 1, 2016. Retrieved July 10, 2022.
  24. ^ a b Helmke, Juliet. "The Transmuting Sculptures of Alyson Shotz," Blouin ArtInfo, February 21, 2017.
  25. ^ a b Adjarian, M.M. "Invariant Interval," Arts + Culture Texas, November 2013.
  26. ^ a b c d Rushworth, Katherine. "Space, Light and Life," The Post-Standard, November 29, 2009.
  27. ^ a b Johnson, Ken. "Alyson Shotz," The New York Times, April 8, 2005. Retrieved July 7, 2022.
  28. ^ Brundage, Brita. "Reflections/Deceptions," Fairfield Weekly, March 10, 2005.
  29. ^ Glasstire. "Nasher Sculpture Center, Sightings: Alyson Shotz," September 2010. Retrieved July 10, 2022.
  30. ^ The New Yorker. "Alyson Shotz," May 12, 2003.
  31. ^ a b Johnson, Ken. "Pastoral Pop," The New York Times, August 11, 2000, p. E34. Retrieved July 7, 2022.
  32. ^ Allen, Jane Ingram. "Expanding Space/Engaging Viewers: Mirrors and Reflective Materials in Contemporary Sculpture," Sculpture, November 2004.
  33. ^ Mass MoCA. "Mirror Mirror," Events. Retrieved July 10, 2022.
  34. ^ a b Clifford, Katie. "Alyson Shotz," New Art Examiner, February 2000.
  35. ^ a b Johnson, Ken. "Alyson Shotz," The New York Times, October 8, 1999. Retrieved July 7, 2022.
  36. ^ Nagy, Peter. "Against Nature," Time Out (New York), August 24, 2000.
  37. ^ Pagel, David. "Reality and Irony Collide," Los Angeles Times, January 2, 2004. Retrieved July 7, 2022.
  38. ^ Smith, Roberta. Smith, Roberta. "Impressions of the Yard, Visual and Olfactory," The New York Times, June 27, 2003. Retrieved July 7, 2022.
  39. ^ Pratt, Kevin. "Yard," Artforum, September 2003. Retrieved July 7, 2022.
  40. ^ a b Newhall, Edith. "Photos and Sculpture at Locks: Techno Treatment by Alyson Shotz," The Philadelphia Inquirer, February 1, 2008.
  41. ^ a b c d Boucher, Brian. "Alyson Shotz at Carolina Nitsch," Art in America, October 2014.
  42. ^ Carter, Rebecca. "Alyson Shotz Investigates Materiality, Sculpture Architecture and Sound," D Magazine, November 23, 2010. Retrieved July 7, 2022.
  43. ^ a b Newhall, Edith. "Glistening metallic fabric," The Philadelphia Inquirer, June 19, 2016.
  44. ^ Brady, Erik. "The Line of Ingenuity at The Guggenheim Bilbao," Wide World Magazine, June 10, 2021. Retrieved July 7, 2022.
  45. ^ a b Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts. Alyson Shotz: Plane Weave, Exhibitions. Retrieved July 7, 2022.
  46. ^ Shotz, Alyson. "Object Lessons: Alyson Shotz," Sculpture, June 2019, p. 96.
  47. ^ Ebony, David. Alyson Shotz: Alloys of Moonlight," The Brooklyn Rail, March 2023. Retrieved January 17, 2024.
  48. ^ GSA Gallery. "Alyson Shotz, The Silent Constellations." Retrieved January 17, 2024.
  49. ^ Spector, Rosanne. "A latticework of iridescent color and light," May 20, 2013. Retrieved July 18, 2022.
  50. ^ High Museum of Art. Arnolfini 360° x 30, Collections. Retrieved July 10, 2022.
  51. ^ Granberry, Michael. "Contemporary artist Alyson Shotz is the Dallas Cowboys' latest addition," The Dallas Morning News, September 6, 2013. Retrieved July 7, 2022.
  52. ^ Tang Museum. "Alyson Shotz Creates New Sculpture for Skidmore College,", Press. Retrieved January 17, 2024.
  53. ^ U.S. General Services Administration. The Robes of Justitia, Artwork. Retrieved January 17, 2024.
  54. ^ a b U.S. General Services Administration. GSA Design Awards 2022, Washington, DC: U.S. General Services Administration, 2022, p. 52–55. Retrieved January 17, 2024.
  55. ^ Grace Farms. Alyson Shotz, Temporal Shift. Retrieved January 17, 2024.
  56. ^ a b The Trustees. Alyson Shotz, Temporal Shift. Retrieved January 17, 2024.
  57. ^ Academy Art Museum. "Artist Lecture: Alyson Shotz. Retrieved January 17, 2024.
  58. ^ Baltimore Museum of Art. Art Archives. Retrieved July 10, 2022.
  59. ^ Brooklyn Museum. Natural Selection #3, Alyson Shotz, Collection. Retrieved July 10, 2022.
  60. ^ a b Guggenheim Bilbao. Alyson Shotz, Artists. Retrieved July 7, 2022.
  61. ^ Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden. Radiant, Collection. Retrieved June 10, 2022.
  62. ^ Indianapolis Museum of Art. Wave Equation, Alyson Shotz, Artwork. Retrieved July 7, 2022.
  63. ^ Madison Museum of Contemporary Art. Alyson Shotz. Retrieved July 10, 2022.
  64. ^ National Gallery of Art. Acquisition Press Releases: 2019, Press. Retrieved July 10, 2022.
  65. ^ Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts. Plane Weave, Alyson Shotz, Collection. Retrieved July 7, 2022.
  66. ^ The Phillips Collection. Allusion of Gravity, Alyson Shotz, Collection. Retrieved July 10, 2022.
  67. ^ Rose Art Museum. Mobile Flora, Alyson Shotz, Objects. Retrieved July 10, 2022.
  68. ^ San Francisco Museum of Modern Art. Alyson Shotz, The Structure of Light, Artwork. Retrieved July 10, 2022.
  69. ^ San Jose Museum of Art. False Branches #2, Objects. Retrieved July 10, 2022.
  70. ^ Esplund, Lance. "A Five-Decade Marriage of Nature and Art," The Wall Street Journal, July 10, 2010. Retrieved July 7, 2022.
  71. ^ a b Macdowell. Alyson Shotz, Artists. Retrieved July 7, 2022.
  72. ^ Crystal Bridges Museum of American Art. "ArtistatCB: Alyson Shotz." Retrieved July 10, 2022.
  73. ^ Stockwell, Craig. "Alyson Shotz," Art New England, October/November 2008, p. 57.
  74. ^ Yale University. "Gallery's new artist-in-residence aims to connect viewers with nature," Yale Bulletin & Calendar, December 2, 2005. Retrieved July 10, 2022.
  75. ^ The Pollock-Krasner Foundation. Alyson Shotz, Artist. Retrieved July 10, 2022.
  76. ^ Peter S. Reed Foundation. 2021 Grant Recipients. Retrieved January 17, 2024.

Further reading edit

  • Ciraqui, Manuel and Sara Nadal-Melsió, (2017). Art and Space. Guggenheim Bilbao, Bilbao, Spain.
  • Adler, Tracy L.; Veronica Roberts; Nat Trotman, (2015). Alyson Shotz: Force of Nature. The Ruth and Elmer Wellin Museum of Art, Hamilton College.
  • Al-Hadid, Diana; Lisa Freiman; Alison Gass; Jennifer Gross; Josiah McElheny; Jed Morse; David Norr; Carrie Mae Weems, (2014). Alyson Shotz. Derek Eller Gallery. ISBN 978-0-9779002-4-4.

External links edit

  • Alyson Shotz website
  • Alyson Shotz video studio visit Sculpture, 2019]
  • In conversation with Alyson Shotz, The Phillips Collection, 2020
  • A conversation with Alyson Shotz, Guggenheim Bilbao
  • Alyson Shotz and curator Anne Ellegood, Hirshhorn Museum, 2008
  • Alyson Shotz, Derek Eller Gallery
  • Alyson Shotz, GSA Gallery

January 01, 1970
alyson, shotz, born, 1964, american, sculptor, based, brooklyn, york, known, experiential, large, scale, abstract, sculptures, installations, inspired, nature, scientific, concepts, which, manipulate, light, shadow, space, gravity, order, investigate, complica. Alyson Shotz born 1964 is an American sculptor based in Brooklyn New York 1 She is known for experiential large scale abstract sculptures and installations inspired by nature and scientific concepts which manipulate light shadow space and gravity in order to investigate and complicate perception 2 3 4 Writers suggest her work challenges tenets of monumental minimalist sculpture traditionally welded solid heavy and static through its accumulation of common materials in constructions that are often flexible translucent reflective seemingly weightless and responsive to changing conditions and basic forces 5 6 7 Sculpture critic Lilly Wei wrote In Shotz s realizations the definition of sculpture becomes increasingly expansive each project often in series testing another proposition another possibility another permutation while ignoring conventional boundaries 8 Alyson ShotzBorn1964Glendale Arizona United StatesNationalityAmericanEducationUniversity of Washington Rhode Island School of DesignKnown forSculpture installation art photography videoAwardsStanford University Research Fellow Pollock Krasner Foundation New York Foundation for the ArtsWebsiteAlyson Shotz Alyson Shotz The Shape of Space cut plastic fresnel lens sheets and staples 175 x 456 x 96 Solomon R Guggenheim Museum 2007 Solomon R Guggenheim Museum collection Shotz s artwork has been loosely grouped into three types expansive intricate large sculptures and installations that are handmade minimal self contained sculptures that sometimes involve fabrication and elements of chance and abstract photographs and digital prints based on photographs 9 10 Her work belongs to the collections of the Museum of Modern Art 11 Whitney Museum 12 Museum of Fine Arts Houston 13 Guggenheim Museum Bilbao 14 and Storm King Art Center 15 among others She has exhibited at the Solomon R Guggenheim Museum 16 Hirshhorn Museum San Francisco Museum of Modern Art SFMOMA 17 Guggenheim Bilbao 18 19 Wexner Center for the Arts 20 and Indianapolis Museum of Art 21 Contents 1 Education and early and career 2 Work and reception 2 1 Works and exhibitions 1999 2009 2 2 Installations and exhibitions 2010 3 Public commissions 4 Collections and recognition 5 References 6 Further reading 7 External linksEducation and early and career editShotz was born in Glendale Arizona in 1964 the daughter of an Air Force pilot and a teacher 9 17 In childhood she lived throughout the West and Midwest due to her father s career She initially studied geology but turned to art science has remained a strong influence on her work 17 4 After enrolling at Rhode Island School of Design she graduated with a BFA in 1987 and earned an MFA from the University of Washington in 1991 4 14 In the early 1990s she moved to New York City 22 Shotz began as a painter producing colorful images of organic forms while sometimes integrating photography collage and video into her practice 17 A foundational work was Reflective Mimicry 1996 which included photographs and a video of a woman walking in the woods clad in a full body suit armored in small mirrors its play of reflected foliage against actual foliage had the effect of de materializing the figure 9 22 17 She would continue to explore the blurring of figure and ground most similarly in large scale outdoor installations such as Mirror Fence 2003 and Scattering Screen 2016 17 9 23 Work and reception editShotz s sculptures and installations manipulate ordinary synthetic materials optical lenses mirrors glass piano strings wire beads nails in concert with physical forces in order to investigate the shaping of perception experiential boundaries and ephemeral phenomena 8 2 19 24 She combines craftsmanship and process intensive methods of accumulation and structure building often based in underlying concepts from physics optics and mathematics 25 26 5 20 Her work produces perceptual conundrums visual flux spatial distortion kaleidoscopic effects and illusions of movement that result from shifts in light and vantage point 3 27 6 28 They evoke both natural sensations and scientific models while blurring the ability to distinguish human made from organic materials 19 5 nbsp Alyson Shotz Object for Reflection punched aluminum and stainless steel rings 122 5 x 145 x 57 2017 Guggenheim Museum Bilbao collection Critics suggest that her work recalls minimalist constructions e g Richard Serra but stretches the boundaries of modernist sculpture subverting ostensibly masculine tenets such as solidity weight and fixity with qualities of fluidity weightlessness permeability and translucency 8 2 20 14 along these lines one of Shotz s stated aims is to create volume without mass through her use of line void and carefully selected materials 17 29 The blend of minimal and organic forms in her art has been compared to that of Eva Hesse however she differs in her interest in the viewer as a participant that emphasis has been related to the conceptual work of Lygia Clark though Shotz s entails a more optical than physical participation 17 6 4 Works and exhibitions 1999 2009 edit In the late 1990s Shotz began receiving critical attention for work The New Yorker deemed a cyberorganic spin on landscape 30 in exhibitions at the Aldrich Museum of Contemporary Art MoMA PS1 and MASS MoCA 31 11 32 33 The New Art Examiner described her solo exhibition at Susan Inglett 1999 as displaying a fascination with nature that s part childlike wonder part humorous romp and part clinical investigation 34 It included a digital photo of collaged budding flowers suggesting genetic engineering a video and Pink Swarm one of two shimmering suspended topiary or cloud like sculptures made of plastic wire and clear surgical tubing 35 34 Covered with hundreds of tiny petals that dripped strings of goo the sculptures evoked natural processes gone to excess 35 For the Whitney Museum show Pastoral Pop 2000 Shotz installed Mobile Flora a grove of 9 foot tall slender stalks made of Q tips coated in green rubber with casters replacing roots that reviews characterized as weird plant machine hybrids 31 alien bamboo 36 and genetically mutated lily pads and beanstalks 37 In 2003 she created Mirror Fence at the Socrates Sculpture Park a shimmering three by 130 foot long picket fence faced in mirrors whose slats disappeared and reappeared amid the surrounding landscape as viewers approached 38 39 In subsequent exhibitions Shotz presented abstract sculptures characterized as updated postminimalism with a dash of pop science 5 These works consisted of accumulations of common materials that hung like drawings in space evoking natural phenomena invisible dimensions and theoretical concepts such as string theory and dark matter 10 5 26 The Shape of Space 2004 is representative of this period It was an undulating translucent curtain like form whose thousands of hand cut and stapled plastic lenses bent and refracted light distorting and fragmenting space to create confounding kaleidoscopic optical effects 3 10 27 26 Its fluctuating appearance was likened to a shimmering waterfall a wall of ice frosted translucent glass bricks 10 and in its Guggenheim Museum presentation 2007 by Roberta Smith to a giant wind chime dividing and multiplying its surroundings to provide tiny glimmering beveled views of the museum s rings Central Park an apartment building traffic 16 In shows at Locks Gallery SFMOMA both 2008 Derek Eller and Warehouse Gallery both 2009 Shotz exhibited related suspended and wall based sculptures that resembled ghostly floating chandeliers or iced over molecular forms Crystalline Structure 2007 weightless skeletal apparitions made of long bowing strands of beaded piano wire The Structure of Light 2008 Equilibrium 2009 and billowing webs created by looping thread around pins nailed to walls in complex mathematically based networks of triangles Thread Drawings 2008 40 5 26 17 During this period she also produced collage like digital prints sourced from photographs of her own work e g the series A Momentary Configuration of Matter Reviews described them as hybrid hive like organic structures resembling DNA strands from an artificial life form Rorschach tests butterflies lace patterns and skulls 10 40 nbsp Alyson Shotz Wave Equation stainless steel wire silvered glass beads and aluminum 120 x 144 x 117 2010 installation at the Nasher Sculpture Center Indianapolis Museum of Art collection Installations and exhibitions 2010 edit In later work Shotz continued to explore perceptual concerns while pursuing a wider range of materials forms and processes 20 41 8 Standing Wave 2010 Wexner Center for the Arts consisted of thousands of thin iridescent clear acrylic strips placed side by side and projecting from a 25 foot long wall in curved arches and undulating waves the shifting refractions and reflections suggested op art constructions 20 7 Wave Equation 2010 Nasher Sculpture Center and Invariant Interval 2013 University of Texas were monumental yet delicate constructions employing piano and steel wire filaments in skeletal ellipses or web like forms reviews described them as gossamer works moving between presence and absence interior and exterior and static mass and illusory motion 42 25 8 The installations Plane Weave 2016 Pennsylvania Academy of Fine Art and Object for Reflection 2017 2020 Guggenheim Bilbao were vertical tapestry like works made of thousands of octagonal pieces of perforated aluminum joined by steel rings whose flexible open construction dramatically slumped and folded while appearing both solid and transparent 43 19 44 Their shimmering responses to changing sunlight evoked patterns ranging from natural the sun on rippling water to human made fabric chain mail to digital screen pixels 43 45 14 In exhibitions at Carolina Nitsch 2014 the Wellin Museum 2015 and Derek Eller 2017 2020 Shotz presented bodies of work relying on chance 41 24 Topographic Iterations were abstract photo drawings with a mystifying trompe l oeil effect resembling cracked earth interplanetary surfaces She created them created by crumpling Japanese Masa paper photographing and printing it then crumpling the print 41 The Recumbent Folds series 2012 4 consisted of white soft sculpture like porcelain forms created by dropping slabs or cylinders of clay from various heights and leaving them to harden 41 8 For Crushed Cubes 2018 she crushed steel copper or bronze cubes to form new unpredictably organic objects that also reimagined conventional minimalist objects 46 The Imaginary Sculptures series 2014 eschewed materials altogether by simply visualizing possible sculptures with haiku like imperatives inscribed on enameled wall plaques 8 nbsp Alyson Shotz Three Fold welded aluminum frame acrylic with dichroic lamination 56 x 15 x 6 2013 Permanent Installation Stanford University Li Ka Shing Center for Learning and Knowledge In 2020 she exhibited the Intricate Metamorphosis works intimate corporeal ceiling hung sculptures with iridescent chain mail like surfaces made of small electroplated steel disks and Chronometer series which comprised rhythmic wall mounted abstractions like paintings composed of thousands of gleaming copper washers and nails interrupted by snaking bands of recycled rubber bicycle inner tubes 1 New Yorker critic Johanna Fateman likened the former to empty cocoons of some unknown species or more fantastically tails abandoned by mermaids while suggesting the latter works embodied COVID related themes of marking time and confronting mortality 1 In her 2023 exhibitions Alloys of Moonlight and The Silent Constellations Shotz explored space energy light and phenomenological experience through minimal metallic mesh forms resembling Mobius strips and delicate rectangular and fan like reliefs of hand folded aluminum respectively 47 48 Public commissions editShotz has been has commissioned to create large scale site specific works for the Stanford University Li Ka Shing Center for Learning and Knowledge 49 NYU Langone Health MTA Arts amp Design New York High Museum of Art 50 Cleveland Clinic and AT amp T Stadium Dallas 51 45 9 In 2022 she installed the permanent twisting painted steel sculpture Entanglement above the atrium of the Skidmore College Center for Integrated Sciences 52 Her glass mosaic work for the domed ceiling of the Fred D Thompson Federal Courthouse in Nashville The Robes of Justitia was commissioned by the U S General Services Administration GSA and won the organization s 2022 Honor Award in Art 53 54 In 2023 Shotz s outdoor site responsive sculpture Temporal Shift was acquired by the deCordova Sculpture Park and Museum originally commissioned by the Grace Farms Foundation the work s elliptical stainless steel form interacts with natural light and references the Earth s orbital pathway around the Sun 55 56 Collections and recognition editShotz s work belongs to the public collections of the Academy Art Museum 57 Baltimore Museum of Art 58 Brooklyn Museum of Art 59 deCordova Sculpture Park and Museum 56 Solomon R Guggenheim Museum 4 Guggenheim Bilbao 60 Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden 61 Indianapolis Museum of Art 62 Los Angeles County Museum of Art Madison Museum of Contemporary Art 63 Museum of Fine Arts Houston 13 Museum of Modern Art 11 National Gallery of Art 64 Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts 65 The Phillips Collection 66 Rose Art Museum 67 San Francisco Museum of Modern Art 68 San Jose Museum of Art 69 Storm King Art Center 70 15 and Whitney Museum among others 71 72 She has been awarded fellowships from the Saint Gaudens Memorial 2007 New York Foundation for the Arts 2004 MacDowell 2021 and Stanford University 2014 and received awards from Art Matters 1996 Yale University 2005 the U S GSA Honor Award in Art 2022 54 and the Pollock Krasner 1999 Marie Walsh Sharpe 2004 and Peter S Reed 2021 foundations among others 73 71 74 75 76 60 4 References edit a b c Fateman Johanna Alyson Shotz The New Yorker October 12 2020 Retrieved July 7 2022 a b c Sexton Elaine Alyson Shotz Derek Eller Art in America September 2009 a b c Goodman Jonathan Alyson Shotz at Derek Eller Sculpture October 2005 p 75 6 a b c d e f Solomon R Guggenheim Museum Alyson Shotz Artists Retrieved July 10 2022 a b c d e f Rosenberg Karen Alyson Shotz Phase Shift The New York Times March 13 2009 Retrieved July 7 2022 a b c Chavez Anja A Conversation with Alyson Shotz Sculpture November 2008 a b Scott Andrea Alyson Shotz at Derek Eller The New Yorker March 14 2011 Retrieved July 7 2022 a b c d e f g Wei Lilly Alyson Shotz Sculpture May 2015 p 75 6 Retrieved July 7 2022 a b c d e Hanson Sarah P Alyson Shotz Art Auction May 2012 a b c d e Genocchio Benjamin Quiet Dazzle and Chaotic Chimes The New York Times March 6 2005 Retrieved July 7 2022 a b c Museum of Modern Art Alyson Shotz Artists Retrieved July 10 2022 Whitney Museum of American Art Alyson Shotz Artists Retrieved July 10 2022 a b Museum of Fine Arts Houston Alyson Shotz Mirror Fence Objects Retrieved July 10 2022 a b c d Guggenheim Bilbao Object for Reflection Alyson Shotz Collection Retrieved July 7 2022 a b Storm King Art Center Alyson Shotz Collection Retrieved July 10 2022 a b Smith Roberta Smith Roberta Guggenheim exhibit explores the forms of space The New York Times July 20 2007 Retrieved July 7 2022 a b c d e f g h i Sheets Hilarie M Turning Piano Wire Into Light ARTnews January 2010 Artsy The Line of Wit Guggenheim Museum Bilbao Exhibition Retrieved January 17 2024 a b c d Brady Shaun Alyson Shotz s newest exhibition shimmers at PAFA Metro Philadelphia April 21 2016 Retrieved July 7 2022 a b c d e Yates Christopher Shimmery installation toys with perception The Columbus Dispatch February 7 2010 Indianapolis Museum of Art Indianapolis Museum of Art announces Alyson Shotz Fluid State March 11 2012 Retrieved July 10 2022 a b Abramenko Maria Alyson Shotz Investigations Into Space Light and Matter Nasty October 1 2020 Dawkins Chad An Interview with Alyson Shotz on Her New Work in San Antonio Glasstire July 1 2016 Retrieved July 10 2022 a b Helmke Juliet The Transmuting Sculptures of Alyson Shotz Blouin ArtInfo February 21 2017 a b Adjarian M M Invariant Interval Arts Culture Texas November 2013 a b c d Rushworth Katherine Space Light and Life The Post Standard November 29 2009 a b Johnson Ken Alyson Shotz The New York Times April 8 2005 Retrieved July 7 2022 Brundage Brita Reflections Deceptions Fairfield Weekly March 10 2005 Glasstire Nasher Sculpture Center Sightings Alyson Shotz September 2010 Retrieved July 10 2022 The New Yorker Alyson Shotz May 12 2003 a b Johnson Ken Pastoral Pop The New York Times August 11 2000 p E34 Retrieved July 7 2022 Allen Jane Ingram Expanding Space Engaging Viewers Mirrors and Reflective Materials in Contemporary Sculpture Sculpture November 2004 Mass MoCA Mirror Mirror Events Retrieved July 10 2022 a b Clifford Katie Alyson Shotz New Art Examiner February 2000 a b Johnson Ken Alyson Shotz The New York Times October 8 1999 Retrieved July 7 2022 Nagy Peter Against Nature Time Out New York August 24 2000 Pagel David Reality and Irony Collide Los Angeles Times January 2 2004 Retrieved July 7 2022 Smith Roberta Smith Roberta Impressions of the Yard Visual and Olfactory The New York Times June 27 2003 Retrieved July 7 2022 Pratt Kevin Yard Artforum September 2003 Retrieved July 7 2022 a b Newhall Edith Photos and Sculpture at Locks Techno Treatment by Alyson Shotz The Philadelphia Inquirer February 1 2008 a b c d Boucher Brian Alyson Shotz at Carolina Nitsch Art in America October 2014 Carter Rebecca Alyson Shotz Investigates Materiality Sculpture Architecture and Sound D Magazine November 23 2010 Retrieved July 7 2022 a b Newhall Edith Glistening metallic fabric The Philadelphia Inquirer June 19 2016 Brady Erik The Line of Ingenuity at The Guggenheim Bilbao Wide World Magazine June 10 2021 Retrieved July 7 2022 a b Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts Alyson Shotz Plane Weave Exhibitions Retrieved July 7 2022 Shotz Alyson Object Lessons Alyson Shotz Sculpture June 2019 p 96 Ebony David Alyson Shotz Alloys of Moonlight The Brooklyn Rail March 2023 Retrieved January 17 2024 GSA Gallery Alyson Shotz The Silent Constellations Retrieved January 17 2024 Spector Rosanne A latticework of iridescent color and light May 20 2013 Retrieved July 18 2022 High Museum of Art Arnolfini 360 x 30 Collections Retrieved July 10 2022 Granberry Michael Contemporary artist Alyson Shotz is the Dallas Cowboys latest addition The Dallas Morning News September 6 2013 Retrieved July 7 2022 Tang Museum Alyson Shotz Creates New Sculpture for Skidmore College Press Retrieved January 17 2024 U S General Services Administration The Robes of Justitia Artwork Retrieved January 17 2024 a b U S General Services Administration GSA Design Awards 2022 Washington DC U S General Services Administration 2022 p 52 55 Retrieved January 17 2024 Grace Farms Alyson Shotz Temporal Shift Retrieved January 17 2024 a b The Trustees Alyson Shotz Temporal Shift Retrieved January 17 2024 Academy Art Museum Artist Lecture Alyson Shotz Retrieved January 17 2024 Baltimore Museum of Art Art Archives Retrieved July 10 2022 Brooklyn Museum Natural Selection 3 Alyson Shotz Collection Retrieved July 10 2022 a b Guggenheim Bilbao Alyson Shotz Artists Retrieved July 7 2022 Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden Radiant Collection Retrieved June 10 2022 Indianapolis Museum of Art Wave Equation Alyson Shotz Artwork Retrieved July 7 2022 Madison Museum of Contemporary Art Alyson Shotz Retrieved July 10 2022 National Gallery of Art Acquisition Press Releases 2019 Press Retrieved July 10 2022 Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts Plane Weave Alyson Shotz Collection Retrieved July 7 2022 The Phillips Collection Allusion of Gravity Alyson Shotz Collection Retrieved July 10 2022 Rose Art Museum Mobile Flora Alyson Shotz Objects Retrieved July 10 2022 San Francisco Museum of Modern Art Alyson Shotz The Structure of Light Artwork Retrieved July 10 2022 San Jose Museum of Art False Branches 2 Objects Retrieved July 10 2022 Esplund Lance A Five Decade Marriage of Nature and Art The Wall Street Journal July 10 2010 Retrieved July 7 2022 a b Macdowell Alyson Shotz Artists Retrieved July 7 2022 Crystal Bridges Museum of American Art ArtistatCB Alyson Shotz Retrieved July 10 2022 Stockwell Craig Alyson Shotz Art New England October November 2008 p 57 Yale University Gallery s new artist in residence aims to connect viewers with nature Yale Bulletin amp Calendar December 2 2005 Retrieved July 10 2022 The Pollock Krasner Foundation Alyson Shotz Artist Retrieved July 10 2022 Peter S Reed Foundation 2021 Grant Recipients Retrieved January 17 2024 Further reading editCiraqui Manuel and Sara Nadal Melsio 2017 Art and Space Guggenheim Bilbao Bilbao Spain Adler Tracy L Veronica Roberts Nat Trotman 2015 Alyson Shotz Force of Nature The Ruth and Elmer Wellin Museum of Art Hamilton College Al Hadid Diana Lisa Freiman Alison Gass Jennifer Gross Josiah McElheny Jed Morse David Norr Carrie Mae Weems 2014 Alyson Shotz Derek Eller Gallery ISBN 978 0 9779002 4 4 External links editAlyson Shotz website Alyson Shotz video studio visit Sculpture 2019 In conversation with Alyson Shotz The Phillips Collection 2020 A conversation with Alyson Shotz Guggenheim Bilbao Alyson Shotz and curator Anne Ellegood Hirshhorn Museum 2008 Alyson Shotz Derek Eller Gallery Alyson Shotz GSA Gallery Retrieved from https en wikipedia org w index php title Alyson Shotz amp oldid 1204766555, wikipedia, wiki, book, books, library,

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