Galleries and museums commonly have a “no touching” rule about the artworks, and responsible visitors keep their hands to themselves. But with an exhibit that aims to provoke “tactile curiosity in the viewer,” breaking that rule is awfully tempting.
That’s the case with “Texture & Response,” currently on view in the second-floor gallery of the BCA Center in Burlington. It’s a modest but compelling show featuring three artists who work with materials traditionally associated with craft — but not to create traditionally “functional” items. Then again, provoking curiosity is a laudable function.
Vermont fiber artist and writer Karen Cygnarowicz turns cotton and polypropylene rope, yarn, and thread into captivating wall-hung sculptures. Their tight weaving and loose braids or knotty macramé seem to be in conversation with each other. For the 35-by-12-inch “Chill Pill,” Cygnarowicz paired a squarish weaving of brilliant orange yarn with a shorter section of natural hemp; at the top of the piece, braided loops droop forward like an unruly coif; at the bottom, loops and knots somehow have a jaunty look.
Cygnarowicz’s other two wall hangings do not inspire anthropomorphism, even if you do want to feel them; they are simply ingenious manipulations of material, color and shape.
Conversely, Ann Wessmann‘s “Gathering #4” repels touching: It consists of multiple strands of horse chestnut leaf stems strung on waxed-linen thread, and it is thorny. Both ends of the 54-by-48-inch piece are attached to ceiling-high dowels so that it swoops downward like a giant necklace. The wonder is that Wessmann herself could manipulate such user-unfriendly items, and yet in doing so she invites a consideration of our often uncomfortable relationship to the natural world.
The Boston artist’s other piece, “Gathering #8,” assembles stems from the same plant in a remarkable dual-part wall sculpture. Mirroring each other, the two gently volumetric columns seem caught in the act of separating — or perhaps reuniting. A ragged edge of tiny twigs reaches into the negative space at the center. Who knew that horse chestnut stems could convey a sense of longing?
In a wall-mounted, framed video titled “Lay Me Down to Rest,” Gracia Nash squats over a large sheet of silicone and glass beads and continuously wrestles with it. The Rochester, N.Y.-based artist is nude, which adds a feeling of vulnerability to her Sisyphean task. The crackling sound heightens our understanding of the material and is oddly satisfying, like popping bubble wrap. Nash’s video makes her two still installations of rumpled silicone, such as the wall-hung “Specimen #2,” seem post-performative: The artist has come to terms with her medium.
In “Texture & Response,” the viewer is literally a material witness. Alternately meditative and provocative, the exhibit offers an empathic art experience: To see is to feel.
