Thesis and Art.: Water Show Review

Water Show Review

The Water Exhibition at the Zimmerli Art Museum showcases artwork from a variety of pieces that art mostly pulled from the museums own collection. Although the pieces are from different sections of the museum such as nonconformist soviet art, american art, european art, and russian art, they are unified under the theme of Water and how it appears in art. The exhibition is divided into six sections into which the works are grouped and displayed in different rooms. The first room is about the nature of water. The curator formed the room based on a large photograph of an Iceberg by Lynn Davis. This picture shows the nature of water in its three forms; solid, liquid, and gas. This piece sets the tone for the rest of the works in the room such as the Condensation Cube, the Geoffrey Hendricks pieces about clouds, and the Francisco Infante pieces, Wanderings of a Square which showed water in its liquid form and water as clouds. The Geoffrey Hendricks pieces paired with the Infante piece is interesting because of the uses of three different media to show clouds. Topics such as “women in water men in boats”, “divine water”, “water in the landscape”, and “urban water” were displayed in the exhibit with equally cohesive pairings and works of art. In the “Urban Water” section, there were two large series centered around fountains and faucets that complimented each other very well.

The curator’s intentions of creating an experience through this exhibition came through very well. While walking through this show, the viewer is encapsulated by the water because the curator has chosen to paint the walls shades of blue as well as include subtle sounds of the ocean playing throughout the show. The curator’s intention was to bring about a greater awareness to the importance of water and display its many purposes in life, as well as in art. During the tour, curator Donna Gustafson said that when moving the pieces from different parts of the museum and juxtaposing them with other pieces, “everything changes and it becomes a new work of art.” All of the work took on new meaning and displayed how water is essential to life. This show should definitely be seen.

I’ve selected these five works to be placed together because I highly enjoy non-western art. Although “The Wave” is not non-western art, I believe it captures the spirit that these artists capture in their paintings. It is interesting to see how non-western painters perceive nature and how they translate their feelings onto the scroll. They concentrate not on portraying nature how it is, but rather the essence of nature and the relationship they have with it. This can be seen in Hiroshige’s power ocean/sea paintings showing the strength as well as the beauty of water. In Privat-Livemont’s lithograph, the woman seems to be receding peacefully into the ocean. These pieces capture our relationships with the water through their portrayal and depiction of the scenes.