{"id":12214,"date":"2012-08-01T14:37:21","date_gmt":"2012-08-01T20:37:21","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/artistsofutah.org\/15Bytes\/?p=12214"},"modified":"2025-12-23T06:01:02","modified_gmt":"2025-12-23T13:01:02","slug":"the-face-of-utah-sculpture-viii","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/artistsofutah.org\/15Bytes\/the-face-of-utah-sculpture-viii\/","title":{"rendered":"The Face of Utah Sculpture VIII"},"content":{"rendered":"
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The Face of Utah Sculpture at the Utah Cultural Celebration Center<\/p><\/div>\n

In an interview he gave Jennifer Napier Pierce prior to the opening of\u00a0The Face Of Utah Sculpture,\u00a0<\/em>an annual exhibition he founded and curates, Dan Cummings explained why he considers this such an important opportunity for artists like him. \u201cSculptors,\u201d he said, \u201cdon\u2019t much get single shows.\u201d It\u2019s true. Sculptors are typically invited to take part in two-person shows, where their work complements the work of a painter. To be seen clearly, paintings require empty rooms; sculpture ensures the resulting space is not wasted. Thus the celebrated judgment of Barnett Newman: \u201cA sculpture is what you bump into when you back up to get a look at a painting.\u201d But there is good reason why we, as audience, should see what Cummings has brought to the Cultural Celebration Center. Far from the display of challenging aesthetic statements that make up many modern art shows, this one is immediately accessible and, in place of consternation, is more likely to generate feelings of pleasure, fun, and even exhilaration.<\/p>\n

Anyone who thinks artists work best in garrets, away from interference by the public, can learn something from the example of Marilyn Sunderland. A few years ago, her painted gourds brought to mind folk arts. Although she selected the gourd as a painter selects a grade and shape of canvas, the final product resembled classroom design practice: fit the image to the 3D shape. Interaction with her peers and the public has opened up her approach, literally: in \u201cThe Rope\u201d she cuts away the negative space between coils of illusionistic cordage carved in bas relief, revealing the solid-looking gourd to be a thin, hollow skin.\u00a0Paradoxically, the more she reduces the solid-looking ellipsoid to a surface of lace, the more solid the representation appears. The gourd\u2019s shape disappears, demonstrating the dimensional alchemy underlying all visual art. Rope connects thematically with \u201cLooking At An Object I\u2019ll Never Understand,\u201d one of Cummings\u2019 fused and carved glass pieces, in which a black-and-white checkerboard resembles water into which stones are thrown, the surface roiling into ornaments suggesting a computer animation of a mathematical equation. Another glass artist, Andrew Kosorok, uses the translucence of flat glass to model the dimensions of space, demonstrating the notion shared among the Jewish, Christian, and Islamic traditions that spirit first creates, and then infuses, everything.<\/p>\n