Natura Naturans Jill Slosburg Ackerman

Jill Slosburg-Ackerman

In Rome: The Pine Grove. And. Natura naturans; natura naturata.

WOR C ESTER ART M U SEU M / www.worcesterart.org

/3/

J I L L SL O S BU R G -A CK E RMAN

In Rome: The Pine Grove. And. Natura naturans; natura naturata.

/4/

/5/

J I L L SL O S BU R G -A CK E RMAN

In Rome: The Pine Grove. And. Natura naturans; natura naturata.

/6/

/7/

Jill Slosburg-Ackerman

In Rome: The Pine Grove. And. Natura naturans; natura naturata.

November 1, 2012 – March 31, 2013 Organized by Susan L. Stoops Worcester Art Museum

Worcester, Massachusetts

In Rome: The Pine Grove. And. Natura naturans; natura naturata.

/8/

Published on the occasion of the exhibition

Jill Slosburg-Ackerman — In Rome: The Pine Grove. And. Natura naturans; natura naturata.

November 1, 2012 – March 31, 2013

This exhibition and publication are generously supported by the Don and Mary Melville Contemporary Art Fund.

Additional support is provided by Massachusetts College of Art and Design Foundation, Inc. © 2013 Worcester Art Museum

55 Salisbury Street / Worcester, Massachusetts 01609 / www.worcesterart.org All rights reserved. No part of the contents of this publication may be reproduced without the written permission of the publisher.

All works by Jill Slosburg-Ackerman are © Jill Slosburg-Ackerman Photography by Stephen Briggs Design by Kim Noonan Printed by ……

Font: Arial

ISBN 978-0-936042-03-9 Inside front cover: Journal 2009-10, pages 24-25

Inside back cover: Journal 2009-10, pages 28-29

/9/

J I L L SL O S BU R G -A CK E RMAN

/ 10 /

FOR EWOR D

Jill Slosburg-Ackerman's installation at the Worcester Art Museum is based on an extended stay in Rome, one of the seminal places of artistic creation in Western culture.

As Rome has been replaced by other artistic centers – first Paris, then New York, and now possibly Berlin, Beijing, and Shanghai – one could read nostalgia into the first part of the title, In Rome: The Pine Grove. That same interpretation is, for some, also part of the experience of museums: treasures from the past that have been amassed to tell the tale of worlds long gone. An additional layer of nostalgia is added when one thinks that most of the artworks in institutions like ours were acquired in periods of exceptional, mostly manufacture-based wealth, which is also long gone.

As artists create on the basis of a cultural and biographical past of their choosing, museums build their own history via specific works that they juxtapose, allowing communities to invent their relationships to the past and future. The second part of Jill's installation title, And. Natura naturans; natura naturata., therefore encourages further interpretation, both for the work itself and for the museum as its foil: "nature natured" or, as one of the founders of English Romanticism, Samuel Taylor Coleridge, put it, nature in an active sense, creating in itself and following only the authority of itself. Applied to artistic creation, art therefore is the creation of artists at the same time that artists are the creation of art. One could add that museums preserve the memory of artists and their work – they are the memory – and foster new creations, sometimes even providing the inspiration that Rome once gave, beyond being a simple foil.

To write an institutional foreword for Jill's installation is particularly rewarding at this point in time, as the Worcester Art Museum creates the next chapter of its history with new leadership and focus – both salient conditions for any institutional capacity to maintain relevance and creativity. Jill's work is about creation; it is also somewhat of a metaphor for the museum, as it preserves, in many little formats, sediments of her creativity. In the process, the presentation becomes part of the creation: the frame as a container of her work, as an extension and the essence – equally, the museum functions as a container, an extension and the essence of the art it shows.

This exhibition was made possible thanks to the generous support of the Don and Mary Melville Contemporary Art Fund. Our curator of contemporary art, Susan Stoops, fostered, guided, and realized the project, as much as the project inspired and enriched her. We hope that the quirky magic of Jill's installation – with pine cones, different modes of drawings, frames, and seating – enhances the museum experience of our public, as the museum itself draws life from those that visit and engage with it.

Matthias Waschek Director

/ 11 /

J I LL S LO S B URG - AC KE RM AN

/ 12 /

IN TR OD U C TION

“One thing lets another thing make sense.”

(Journal entry, March 17, 2012)

Jill Slosburg-Ackerman’s drawing project, In Rome, was initiated while she was a visiting artist at the American Academy in Rome in 2009. Roman pine cones, with all their natural patterning, detail, and curved perfection, inspired her initial observational drawings. They led her to draw other forms, in particular, the polychrome stone floors called Cosmatesque in medieval Roman churches. Also detailed but organized in geometric units, they are tangible evidence of human devotion and our desire for manual perfection.

As she explored connections between these two representative forms of nature and civilization, Slosburg-Ackerman’s project evolved in ways that expose the fluidity of boundaries between two-and three-dimensional experience, organic and geometric structure, intimate and architectural scale, sculptural object and furniture. Occupying wall and floor and framed by the architecture of the museum’s gallery, the installation is composed of hundreds of elements – drawings, photographs, paintings, sculptures, video, furniture, hand-carved frames – grouped into visual “episodes” (each of which is alluded to in the exhibition’s extended title).

Slosburg-Ackerman’s art does not imitate the phenomena of nature (natura naturata) but engages nature as a creative force (natura naturans); always undergoing change, it is nature

/ 13 /

JI L L S L O SB U RG -A CK ER MAN

deeply interconnected with history and cultural processes. Drawings of pine cones are overlaid with Cosmatesque patterns; a naturally shaped wooden burl is additionally carved by hand; a pair of laminate end-tables is deconstructed into sculpture and reappears as a mirror image; a pine cone with fungi is translated as drawing and as table ornament; wood scraps are collaged into a three-dimensional abstract drawing; a carved element simultaneously obscures and extends a drawing underneath.

The prominent roles of the pine frames (whether unembellished, elaborately carved, hinged, or stacked) are dual: emphasizing the exquisitely drawn details within their borders and acting as intermediaries between adjacent elements. Complementing the relatively standard 8x10-inch rectangular units of drawing paper, In Rome reveals a world of diversity in which interval, density, scale, and volume serve as visual points of reference.

With basic materials and methods, Slosburg-Ackerman has created an unusually immersive and participatory perceptual experience, one which invites both detailed and leisurely exploration (the latter encouraged by the inclusion of her Arts and Crafts settle and an expanse of carpet for sitting, reclining, or socializing). In its translation from studio to museum, In Rome has become a public reflection on the creative process as one involving scrutiny, faithfulness, recognition, intuition, correction, imperfection, and certainty.

“EVERYTHING AT THE SAME TIME. Edges without ending. From the right or the left. Like a raga. Like Sebald. Like Reich’s ‘Six Pianos’.

(Journal entry, November 2012)

In Rome: The Pine Grove. And. Natura naturans; natura naturata.

/ 14 /

I.

“What is it to draw with the purpose of representation?”

(Journal entry, October 21, 2009)

“The struggle of representation. Power of skills in opposition to the declaration… detail, faithful exactitude require a certain kind of commitment. The risk of representation is that it might misrepresent intent.”

(Journal entry, June 29, 2012)

When Slosburg-Ackerman, a sculptor, decided to bring only drawing materials with her to her temporary studio at the American Academy in Rome, she most likely was being practical. However, drawing has always been an integral part of her studio practice and regularly has informed (and been shaped by) her sculptures. The unanticipated primacy of drawing during the ensuing three-year period (2009-2012), as evidenced by the In Rome project, began with observational drawings of the Roman pine cone as a way of understanding the relation between accuracy and essence, core and exterior, scrutiny and invention. As she incorporated into her subject matter the Cosmatesque floor patterns, drawing became a method of internalizing the subject, learning the pattern from practice, and exploring the complex relation between representation and abstraction. As it evolved, In Rome became what the artist described in a 2011 journal entry as a “chronicle of my learning and thinking.”

From her thoughtful and probing journal entries over the three-year time span, one can hear her questions, her doubts, her discoveries.

“As drawing transforms and image is obliterated, does the form, line which comes from pure observations still communicate its origin?”

(Journal entry, December 23, 2009)

“Moving from the intuitive to the orderly. Interim. Contingencies. This makes that.

Can’t be random. Sometimes I want to weep.”

(Journal entry, March 5, 2012)

“The cosmati star. Initially awkward but beginning to own it. To see/feel all the connections within the structure. Teaching myself relationships.”

(Journal entry, January 20 & 21, 2010)

/ 15 /

JI L L S L O SB U RG -A CK ER MAN

In Rome: The Pine Grove. And. Natura naturans; natura naturata.

/ 16 /

/ 17 /

JI L L S L O SB U RG -A CK ER MAN

In Rome: The Pine Grove. And. Natura naturans; natura naturata.

/ 18 /

/ 19 /

JI L L S L O SB U RG -A CK ER MAN

In Rome: The Pine Grove. And. Natura naturans; natura naturata.

/ 20 /

/ 21 /

JI L L S L O SB U RG -A CK ER MAN

In Rome: The Pine Grove. And. Natura naturans; natura naturata.

/ 22 /

/ 23 /

JI L L S L O SB U RG -A CK ER MAN

In Rome: The Pine Grove. And. Natura naturans; natura naturata.

/ 24 /

/ 25 /

JI L L S L O SB U RG -A CK ER MAN

In Rome: The Pine Grove. And. Natura naturans; natura naturata.

/ 26 /

/ 27 /

JI L L S L O SB U RG -A CK ER MAN

In Rome: The Pine Grove. And. Natura naturans; natura naturata.

/ 28 /

II.

“This morning I’m shuttling between verisimilitude and veracity.

To capture essence.”

(Journal entry, October 22, 2009)

“It doesn’t have to be the pine cone all the time, but it started there.

It’s in the DNA, the structure. ABUNDANCE. Every mark shows.”

(Journal entry, October 26, 2009)

An overall density of elements and imagery characterizes the far left sections of the installation (referred to by the artist in the title as In Rome and The Pine Grove). Here, we are introduced to representations of the Roman pine cone, the Cosmatesque floor patterns, and hybrids of the two in a variety of media and forms, including drawings in graphite, gouache paintings, photographs, wood objects, and a video, all of which are supported by an equally expansive range of frames and/or shelves. That density translates into a visual abundance and conceptual complexity that far exceeds the number of objects. Connections from one object/image to the next, while never arbitrary, are as limitless as there are individual viewers and occasions of viewing. Primary among them is the relation between patterns as structures found in nature and those in human-designed forms. The “grounded” quality of this part of the installation (as compared with passages that are more weightless and open, even “airy”) weds this experience to the originating sites of the pine grove and church floor, a connection that is emphasized by SlosburgAckerman’s placement of several drawings and a cluster of wood objects (burl, tables, painted frame) that engage the gallery’s floor.

/ 29 /

JI L L S L O SB U RG -A CK ER MAN

/ 30 /

/ 31 /

JI L L S L O SB U RG -A CK ER MAN

In Rome: The Pine Grove. And. Natura naturans; natura naturata.

/ 32 /

/ 33 /

JI L L S L O SB U RG -A CK ER MAN

In Rome: The Pine Grove. And. Natura naturans; natura naturata.

/ 34 /

/ 35 /

/ 36 /

III.

“Drawing S. Clemente floor tiles. Freehand toward geometric perfection.

To see. To analyze. To feel. To internalize the patterning. To have it inside (Devotion).”

(Sketchbook, 2009, page 29)

“I ‘found’ the pine cone & the Cosmati because they match my morphology/grammar of drawing.”

(Journal entry, August 30, 2012)

Slosburg-Ackerman’s In Rome engages history on many levels – from the visible record of its own making over the course of three years, to the before-and-after state of materials she has transformed, and the more distant art history alluded to by the medieval Cosmatesque floors. In addition to a shared architectural sensitivity, there are numerous ways in which Slosburg-Ackerman and the Cosmati artists have become kindred spirits and their art forms empathetic endeavors. Technical rigor and keen observation (“learning the pattern through making the pattern…practicing the eye and hand”) combined with a faith in human intuition are central to both. Like the Cosmatesque patterns, SlosburgAckerman’s project engages simultaneously two- and three-dimensionality. The hybrid nature of Slosburg-Ackerman’s practice – her training as a jeweler and a sculptor, and her inclination for multi-dimensional and multi-media aesthetic experiences – has parallels in the Cosmati artists’ multi-talented roles as “ornamenters, mosaicists, sculptors, and architects”1 as well as their “blending of local artistic traditions with external influences” including Roman, Byzantine, Carolingian, and Islamic traditions.2

When one considers the prominent role of framing as an organizing principle in SlosburgAckerman’s mosaic-like installation on the gallery’s wall (as well as the architecturally site-responsive nature of the project), one can see a relation to the compartmentalization of different size geometric units of stone so characteristic of the Cosmatesque floors.

Because quarried marble was scarce when the Cosmati artists worked, they turned to scraps obtained from buildings in ruin as well as the marble remnants they generated.3 While not out of necessity, Slosburg-Ackerman also embraces the idea and practice of recycling, whether used furniture, old frames, or repurposing into new objects the wood scraps and dust left behind in the production of other sculptures. Even her choice of a common building material like pine signals an affinity for the pragmatic perfection to which the Cosmati artists aspired.

1.

2.

3.

/ 37 /

Paloma Pajares-Ayuela, Cosmatesque Ornament, trans. Maria Fleming Alvarez (New York & London: W.W. Norton & Company, 2001), 31.

Ibid., 22.

Ibid., 143.

JI L L S L O SB U RG -A CK ER MAN

/ 38 /

/ 39 /

/ 40 /

In Rome: The Pine Grove. And. Natura naturans; natura naturata.

/ 42 /

/ 43 /

JI L L S L O SB U RG -A CK ER MAN

In Rome: The Pine Grove. And. Natura naturans; natura naturata.

/ 44 /

/ 45 /

IV.

“Perfection AND flaws.”

(Journal entry, January 6, 2012)

“The insistence of AND.”

(Journal entry, September 17, 2012) The English conjunction “and” is such a common linguistic connector that its suggestions of inclusivity and possibility may risk being overlooked. In her title, Slosburg-Ackerman draws our attention to the word and these meanings by identifying an episode of the installation as AND. While one encounters occasional AND drawings as moments of simplicity and quiet inserted throughout the installation, the majority of these elements – identifiable as graphite linear drawings configured around a hexagonal shape and primarily housed in white frames – are concentrated at the far right of the gallery wall in a cloud-like formation ascending towards the ceiling. The tile-inspired geometric patterns, so accessible in part because they are so obviously drawn freehand (“Don’t erase. Leave every line.”), shift in scale and density relative to their height on the wall. Drawings hinged at angles to the wall, frames with undulating surfaces, and elements spaced in irregular intervals loosen the predictability of any underlying grid and suggest a performance of possibilities. And. And. And.

In Rome: The Pine Grove. And. Natura naturans; natura naturata.

/ 46 /

/ 47 /

/ 48 /

/ 49 /

JI L L S L O SB U RG -A CK ER MAN

In Rome: The Pine Grove. And. Natura naturans; natura naturata.

/ 50 /

V.

“The carved frame is how this pine cone feels.”

(Journal entry, August 12, 2012)

“Important to me to process the wood. Preserve what is found.

But alter what is necessary to create an entity.”

(Sketchbook, 2009)

“The frame is geometry/math – I’m turning it, returning it to nature.”

(Journal entry, September 1, 2012)

Slosburg-Ackerman’s extended title, In Rome: The Pine Grove. And. Natura naturans; natura naturata, not only alludes to the visual “episodes” of her installation, but also embodies the manner in which the project evolved and how it is experienced – as clusters of related but separate elements, in apparent as well as unanticipated relationships, with intervals and pauses, and over time. The final Latin part of the title is, perhaps, the most central to Slosburg-Ackerman’s enterprise. It is a concept that regularly is attributed to the 17th-century philosopher, Benedict de Spinoza, which distinguishes between nature as a creative force (natura naturans) and the phenomena of nature (natura naturata). Slosburg-Ackerman’s art, while it references the latter (most explicitly in the many forms of the pine cone), engages the former as performative processes of continuous change in ways that are deeply connected to human activity.

A massive tree burl hugging the floor was both shaped by nature and altered by carving.

A diminutive table supports a quietly compelling nature morte of pine cone and fungi. The geometric precision of a frame many steps removed from its pine-tree origins bares the physical traces of repeated actions, abrasions, distortions (the artist’s gesture understood over time as “returning it to nature”). Occasionally, fragments of the past in the form of older, ornate frame segments are affixed to the new in an artful attempt at reconstructing history.

Anchoring the extreme right edge of the installation sits a sculpture (its title, Pair & Double) which was originally a pair of end tables made from a laminate (a contemporary surrogate for “natural wood”). One table performs the traditional role of sculptural pedestal, holding the other which has been transformed by the artist’s saw. What was generated in the process now includes a stack of irregular laminate slices – evidence of an evolution or the remnants of an extinct form? The sculpture faces overlapping mirrors leaning against the wall, as though contemplating (with us) its fractured reflection and complicated history. Natura naturans; natura naturata.

Susan L. Stoops Curator of Contemporary Art

/ 51 /

JI L L S L O SB U RG -A CK ER MAN

In Rome: The Pine Grove. And. Natura naturans; natura naturata.

/ 52 /

/ 53 /

JI L L S L O SB U RG -A CK ER MAN

In Rome: The Pine Grove. And. Natura naturans; natura naturata.

/ 54 /

/ 55 /

J IL L S L OS B U R G-A C KER MA N

In Rome: The Pine Grove. And. Natura naturans; natura naturata.

/ 56 /

/ 57 /

/ 58 /

/ 59 /

JI L L S L O SB U RG -A CK ER MAN

In Rome: The Pine Grove. And. Natura naturans; natura naturata.

/ 60 /

/ 61 /

/ 62 /

ABOU T TH E ARTIST I was born in 1948 in Omaha, Nebraska, and inspired by the pragmatism of the Pioneers who settled the Great Plains, and trained as a jeweler and a sculptor which accounts for my joint interests in the applied and fine arts. I have been equally influenced by Ferdinand Braudel's material culture study, The Structure of Every Day Life, the ambitions of the Bauhaus, and the work of the artist Constantin Brancusi. Since 1974, I have been a Professor of Art at the Massachusetts College of Art and Design.

ED U C ATION 1983 Boston Museum School and Tufts University, MFA 1971 Boston Museum School and Tufts University, Diploma and BFA SOL O AN D TWO- PER SON EXH IBITION S 2012 In Rome. The Pine Grove. And. Natura naturans; natura naturata. Worcester Art Museum, Worcester, MA (catalogue) 2011 minus + plus, McCoy Gallery, Merrimack College, N. Andover, MA. Curator: David Raymond (brochure) 2009 ART + HISTORY (with Carla Herrera-Prats), John Nicholas Brown House, Brown University, Providence, RI. Curators: Rosie Branson-Gill and Meg Rotzel 2004 Judy Ann Goldman Fine Art, Boston 1999 Judy Ann Goldman Fine Art, Boston University of Massachusetts, Dartmouth The Gallery @ Green Street (with Taylor Davis), Jamaica Plain, MA 1996 Rose Art Museum, Brandeis University, Waltham, MA Natural Discourse (with Pamela Marks), Elgin Community College, Elgin, IL (catalogue) 1995 Manwaring Gallery, Cummings Art Center, Connecticut College, New London, CT Genovese Gallery, Boston 1985 Body Sculpture, Boston Folding Screens: A Collaboration, Van Buren/Brazelton/Cutting Gallery, Cambridge, MA 1982 Helen Shlien Gallery, Boston Cohen Arts Center, Tufts University, Medford, MA 1980 Helen Shlien Gallery, Boston Harcus-Krakow-Rosen-Sonnabend Gallery, Boston 1978 Harcus-Krakow-Rosen-Sonnabend Gallery, Boston SEL EC TED GR OU P EXH IBITION S 2011 Drawing Expanded, Concord Art Association, Concord, MA. Curator: Deborah Davidson Art Encounters Preservation, Wentworth-Coolidge Mansion, Portsmouth, NH. Curator: Allison Newsome 2009 Drawings that Work, Mills Gallery, Boston. Juror: Andrew Stein Raftery Economies of Scale, Miller Block Gallery, Boston 2007 Rock, Paper, Scissors, Judy Ann Goldman Fine Art, Boston Cut, Paul Kotula Projects, Ferndale, MI Take Nine, North American Costa Rica Cultural Center, San Jose, Costa Rica Uncommon Denominations, Trustman Gallery, Simmons College, Boston, MA On Line: Drawing/Printmaking/Artist Books by award-winning Massachusetts Artists, ArtSpace Gallery, Maynard, MA 2005 The Edge of Grace, Fuller Craft Museum, Brockton, MA 2004 Revisited (collaboration with Jon Williams), Forest Hills Cemetery, Boston The Drawing Show, Mills Gallery, Boston Center for the Arts. Curator: Raphaela Platow 2003 Call & Response, College of the Holy Cross, Worcester, MA. Curator: Barbara O’Brien (catalogue) The Art of Drawing, Concord Art Association, Concord, MA 2002 Spirits in the Trees, Forest Hills Cemetery, Boston Flat/Not Flat, Judy Ann Goldman Fine Art, Boston

(cont.)

/ 63 /

JI L L S L O SB U RG -A CK ER MAN

/ 64 /

2001 2000 1999 1998 1997 1996

1995 1995 1994 1993 1992 1991 1990 1987 1986

Symposium of Art & Science, National Art Museum of China, Beijing The Drawing Show, Boston Center for the Arts. Curator: Bill Arning Annual Exhibition, DeCordova Museum and Sculpture Park, Lincoln, MA (catalogue) Traveling Scholars, Boston Museum of Fine Arts The Drawing Show, Boston Center for the Arts. Curator: Carl Belz Enchanted Nature, Judy Ann Goldman Fine Art, Boston Material Force, Boston Center for the Arts. Curator: Carole Anne Meehan Jewelry in Europe and America: New Times, New Thinking, Crafts Council Gallery, London.

Curator: Ralph Turner (book) 3 Generations, Mobilia Gallery, Cambridge, MA Signals: Late Twentieth Century American Jewelry, Cranbrook Art Museum, Bloomfield Hills, MI The Drawing Show, Boston Center for the Arts. Curators: Debra Bricker Balken, Howard Yezerski Art Jewelry: An Historical View, Mobilia Gallery, Cambridge, MA One of a Kind, Mobilia Gallery, Cambridge, MA (book) Schmuckzene ’93, Munich, Germany (catalogue) Crossroads, Artwear, New York City (catalogue) Of Power, Myth and Memory, Bellevue Art Museum, Bellevue, WA Other Voices, Nancy Margolis Gallery, New York City (catalogue) Amerricky Sperk, Museum of Decorative Arts, Prague, Czech Republic Jewelries/ Epiphanies, The Artists Foundation, Boston (catalogue) Massachusarts—Installations, Boston Center for the Arts. Curator: Marjorie Jacobson The Tree Show, North Hall Gallery, MassArt, Boston. Curator: Jeffrey Keough Jeux d’Espace, Conseil de la Sculpture, Montreal, Canada (catalogue)

GR AN TS & AWAR D S 2009 Faculty Development Grant, Massachusetts College of Art and Design Foundation, Inc. 2007 Artist’s Grant, Anonymous Was a Woman 2006 Artist Grant, Drawing/Printmaking/Artist Books, Massachusetts Cultural Council Best Gallery Show of a Mid-Career Artist (Judy Goldman Gallery), New England Art Critics Association 2004 2nd Place, Best Group Show in an Institutional/University Gallery (Call & Response, curated

by Barbara O’Brien), New England Art Critics Association 2001 Berkshire Taconic Trust Artists Grant 1999 Fellowship for Sculpture, Massachusetts Cultural Council 1998 Traveling Scholar’s Award, School of the Boston Museum of Fine Arts Fellowship for Works on Paper, New England Foundation for the Arts 1991 Artist’s Grant, Artists Foundation, MA 1988 20 x 24 Photography Grant, Polaroid Corporation 1987 Professional Development Grant, Massachusetts College of Art 1986 Fellowship, National Endowment for the Arts 1985-6 Fellow, Mary Ingraham Bunting Institute, Radcliffe College, Cambridge, MA 1984 Patricia Jellinek Prize for Jewelry Fellowship, Artists Foundation, Boston 1983 Professional Development Grant, Massachusetts College of Art, Boston 1982 Finalist, Fulbright Fellowship to Japan 1980 Distinguished Service Award, Massachusetts College of Art, Boston 1976 Fellowship, Haystack Mountain School of Crafts, Deer Isle, ME 1975 Artist in Residence to the Public, National Endowment for the Arts, sponsored by the Institute of Contemporary Art’s “Works in Progress”, Boston 1974 Fellowship, National Endowment for the Arts 1972 Fellowship, Haystack Mountain School of Crafts

(cont.)

/ 65 /

JI L L S L O SB U RG -A CK ER MAN

In Rome: The Pine Grove. And. Natura naturans; natura naturata.

/ 66 /

C OL L EC TION S

Boston Public Library, Boston, MA Boston Museum of Fine Arts J.L. Brandeis & Sons, Omaha, NB Mary Ingraham Bunting Institute, Cambridge, MA City of Cambridge, MA Cranbrook Academy of Art, Bloomfield Hills, MI Daphne Farago Massachusetts College of Art, Boston, MA Metropolitan Museum, New York, NY Robert Lee Morris Simmons College, Boston, MA Union Pacific Railroad, New York, NY Worcester Art Museum, Worcester, MA SEL EC TED BIBL IOGR APH Y

Baran-Mickle, William. “Of Magic, Power & Memory: Contemporary and International Jewelry,” Metalsmith, Fall, 1992.

Blatti, Jo. “Art + History,” The Nightingale-Brown House, Providence, RI. Public Historian, Fall, 2009.

Essex, Eve. “ART + HISTORY@ NIGHTINGALE-BROWN HOUSE,” exhibition review, Big Red & Shiny, August 11, 2009.

Hill, Shawn. “Jill Slosburg-Ackerman, In Rome: The Pine Grove. And. Natura naturans; Natura Naturata”, Art New England, January/February 2013.

Lewin, Susan Grant. One of a Kind: American Art Jewelry Today (New York: Harry N. Abrams, 1994), 194-7.

Lloyd, Ann Wilson. Exhibition review, Art in America, June 2005.

McCoy, Mary Bucci. Exhibition review, Art New England, February/March 2004.

McQuaid, Cate. “Sprawling Exhibit fits in at Historic Mansion,” The Boston Globe, September 6, 2011.

McQuaid, Cate. “Taking a new look at this old house,” The Boston Globe, August 19, 2009.

McQuaid, Cate. “Up from the Protean Stew,” South End News, June 1 1995.

McQuaid, Cate. Exhibition review, The Boston Globe, March 8, 1999.

McQuaid, Cate. Exhibition review, The Boston Globe, December 16, 2004.

McQuaid, Cate. “The seeds of imagination: Worcester museum’s Jill Slosburg-Ackerman show links nature and art as creative forces,” The Boston Globe, November 13, 2012.

Millis, Christopher. “New Faces on Newbury Street,” The Boston Phoenix, July 19, 2002.

Millis, Christopher. “Traveling Music,” The Boston Phoenix, February 26, 1999.

Millis, Christopher. “Force Field,” The Boston Phoenix, April 3, 1998.

Millis, Christopher. Exhibition review, The Boston Phoenix, December 3, 2004.

Nemser, Rebecca. “Places in the heart: the installations of ‘Massachusarts’,” The Boston Phoenix, May 4, 1990.

Parcellin, Paul. “About Trees,” Art New England, February/March 1995.

Sherman, Mary. “Sculptors’ ‘Force’ issues through use of materials,” The Boston Herald, April 5, 1998.

Silver, JoAnn. Exhibition review, The Boston Herald, February 19, 1999.

Silver, JoAnn. “Drawing Show: Traces of Humanity,” The Boston Herald, December 1, 1995.

Tarlow, Lois. Artist Profile, Art New England, March 1999.

Temin, Christine. “ ‘Traveling’ MFA show satisfies without fads,” The Boston Globe, February 23, 1999.

Temin, Christine. “Making Room for Artworks,” The Boston Globe, July 20, 1990.

Turner, Ralph. Jewelry in Europe and America: New Times, New Thinking (London: Thames & Hudson Ltd., 1996), 14-15, 135.

/ 67 /

JI L L S L O SB U RG -A CK ER MAN

In Rome: The Pine Grove. And. Natura naturans; natura naturata.

/ 68 /

AC KN OWL ED GM EN TS This publication documents and celebrates Jill Slosburg-Ackerman’s In Rome project, the evolution of which I have had the honor and pleasure of experiencing in the studio over the past three years. This project also marks a much longer engagement between artist and curator, as we have followed one another’s work for over two decades. Over that time, drawing has been a consistently integral part of Jill’s practice; similarly, it also has been an especially potent point of departure for our ongoing dialogue about making and seeing. It seems only appropriate that on the occasion of the Worcester Art Museum’s presentation of In Rome, this publication alludes in format and content to our exchange of ideas.

Foremost among the numerous individuals who have made this project possible are Don and Mary Melville, whose commitment to the Museum’s program in contemporary art and financial support enable us to bring the work of leading contemporary artists to the Worcester Art Museum. I am fortunate to collaborate daily with many dedicated and talented colleagues. For his demonstrated support for the Museum’s contemporary program and his personal engagement with this exhibition, I thank Matthias Waschek, Director. Colleagues whose special efforts, patience, and expertise on this project were invaluable to its successful transformation from studio to museum include Patrick Brown, Exhibition Designer and Chief Preparator; Joseph Leduc, Registrar; Paula Artal-Isbrand, Objects Conservator; Kate Dalton, Curatorial Assistant; Kim Noonan, Manager of Publications and Graphic Design; Stephen Briggs, Photographer; Marcia Lagerway, Head of Education; and Katrina Stacy, Assistant Curator of Education. For their special assistance on the project, I thank Board President Cliff Schorer, preparator Tim Johnson, and studio assistant Ashley McDowell.

Lastly, I extend my deep thanks to Jill for welcoming me into the studio on many occasions and sharing so unselfishly her creative process. It is a professional and personal privilege to collaborate with her on this project and to have this opportunity to reflect on her achievement.

Susan L. Stoops I wish to acknowledge the following for their generous assistance with the exhibition and publication: Stanhope Framers; Ashley McDowell; Tim Johnson; Patrick Brown, Kate Dalton, Kim Noonan, and the preparators, conservators, registrars, and educators of the Worcester Art Museum with whom I collaborated. I thank the Massachusetts College of Art and Design and the American Academy in Rome for their contributions to my artistic endeavors. And finally, I extend my gratitude to Susan L. Stoops for her sensitive intellect, vision, and longstanding support and to James Sloss Ackerman for decades of conversation.

Jill Slosburg-Ackerman

/ 69 /

JI L L S L O SB U RG -A CK ER MAN

In Rome: The Pine Grove. And. Natura naturans; natura naturata.

/ 70 /

/ 71 /

JI L L S L O SB U RG -A CK ER MAN

In Rome: The Pine Grove. And. Natura naturans; natura naturata.

/ 72 /

W ORC ES TE R A RT MUS E U M / www.worcesterart.org