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FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE |
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POINTS OF ENTRY |
| March 21 – April 20, 2003 |
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KIMBERLY VENARDOS & COMPANY is pleased to announce the opening of an exhibition of drawings by ALBERT PALEY. Please join us at a reception for the artist Friday, March 21st, 2003 from 6pm to 8pm. The exhibition will remain on view through April 20th, 2003. KIMBERLY VENARDOS & COMPANY is located at 1014 Madison Avenue, between 78th and 79th Streets. POINTS OF ENTRY- THE DRAWINGS OF ALBERT PALEY traces the evolution of PALEY’s dialogue with art and architecture through a selection of important works on paper, spanning his 30 year career as a sculptor. Made in preparation for his large-scale sculpture and architectural works in metal, these drawings reveal PALEY’s creative process through line, form, and gesture. From spontaneous sketches to intricate final renderings, these rich textural works, like their three-dimensional incarnations, are infused with resolute vitality. In the mid 1960’s PALEY began as a goldsmith, working in precious metals. Defying the prevailing conventions of the time, his work revealed diverse influences - prehistoric bone ornaments, African amulets and elements of the aesthetic foundations of Art Nouveau. His transformation to sculptor came in 1973 when he won a competition to design and fabricate a pair of monumental gates for the Renwick Gallery of the Smithsonian Museum of American Art in Washington, D.C. Exploring ideas through dozens of studies and sketches - several of which are featured in this exhibition - PALEY revealed an intuitive and calligraphic approach to design, masterfully integrating ornament, structure and mechanism. Combining undulating coils with vertical tendrils, his fluid drawings demonstrated not only his working methods but also the agility of his visual thinking. Today PALEY’s Portal Gates stand as an icon of American architectural metalwork. Interlace, (2002), features a dense thicket of plant-like forms whose jagged shapes and spatial contrasts allow room for figurative illusion. The maquette of this work, presented here in counterpoint to the drawing, illustrates PALEY’s use of improvisational and irregular edges to suggest mass and proportion. Seemingly disparate images become abstract volumes of complex and energetic elegance. While striking as graphic works, PALEY’s drawings take on greater importance when linked to their three-dimensional counterparts. In the context of his sculpture and architectural works, PALEY’s drawings convey an even greater intent. The force of this intent is evident in steel, moved by skill and will to the gesture of the drawing. As he explains, “I have always been concerned with three-dimensional form and its dialogue with architecture. I am drawn more and more to the duality between a graphic image and three-dimensional form. I find this dichotomy, or this balance – the push-and-pull of forms, the play of positive and negative - very intriguing. What has brought about this change is an increased focus on drawing. Drawing was originally simply a way to realize form; now it is more of a process that aids in developing form. Many of the shapes, contours and gestures that appear in my work are directly determined by the drawing process, they open a perceptual window which has enabled me to expand my vocabulary.” ALBERT PALEY’s work can be found in the permanent collections of major museums including the Metropolitan Museum of Art; the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston; the Museum of Fine Arts, Houston; and the Victoria and Albert Museum, London. Broadly published and an international lecturer, he is the recipient of numerous grants and awards including the AIA Lifetime Achievement Award. Among his forty major commissions are works for the Smithsonian Museum of American Art; the New York State Senate Chamber of the State Capital, Albany; the Wortham Center for the Performing Arts, Houston; and The Philharmonic Center for the Arts, Naples, Florida. ALBERT PALEY is the Charlotte Fredericks Mowris Endowed Chair as Artist-in-Residence, Rochester Institute of Technology, Rochester, New York. Gallery hours: Tuesday through Saturday, 10am - 6pm Please visit our website www.venardos.com For additional information please contact: Kimberly Venardos & Company, Inc. (212) 879-5858. |