Galia Amsel’s minimal, vivid sculptures couple searing lines with muted textures and deep hues. The result is Alternative Views, a rare opportunity to see and acquire work from the artist’s recent solo museum exhibition at the Museo de Arte en Vidrio de Alcorcon, Madrid. The Bullseye Connection Gallery, May 1 – 29, 2004.
Portland, OR –The Bullseye Connection Gallery presents Alternative Views, an exhibition of Galia Amsel’s contemporary sculptures in kilnformed glass May 1 -- 29, 2004. Alternative Views is a collection from the artist’s recent solo museum exhibition at the Museo de Arte en Vidrio de Alcorcon, Madrid.
Amsel is recognized as one of the best British glass artists of her generation. Her sculptural cast glass works exhibited in solo shows in Britain, France, the USA and now Spain emphasize what the contemporary studio glass authority Dan Klein has called a "geometry of mystery".
Klein’s writing about Amsel’s work describes her ability to contain a world of movement and color in a minimal form: “It is impressive how much varied movement and rhythm [Amsel] manages to achieve from piece to piece within the simple variations of her contained forms and restrained colours. Texture, whether smooth and shiny or with the pitting of lunar landscape is also used to great effect. The different surface textures add sensuality. There is, particularly in her more recent work, a great variety of carefully controlled light and shade, or to describe it in another way, a great variety of moods. The darkness of night and the brightness of day are juxtaposed to create contrast and atmosphere...Her work refers to landscape, to movement, to atmospherics or to a combination of all of these and it manages to convey its message with the utmost simplicity.”
The kilnformed glass medium Amsel uses to achieve her unique depth and colors holds particular challenges. The technical expertise required for working with kiln-cast glass is not that of the glass blower (an athletic exercise), but of the engineer and sometimes the seer: a knowledge of how glass will move within a mold, under high heat, untouched by the artist. Her finished works are generally of tabletop size in basic forms - circles, rectangles, squares that are broken or cut in a way that emphasizes frozen movement, whether it be of man or machine.
“In a sense [Amsel] choreographs movement, capturing a moment of balance that has almost bodily tension,” says Klein. “The rhythm, movements, balance and tension referred to are those of moving parts, whether they be related to the world of humans or the world of machines. ‘I like things that work – machinery, bridges, things that fit together and move, work together,’ she says...Her visual imagery relates to the mechanics of movement. Her work, like the work of skilled photographers, freezes a gestural or operational split second, making one aware of the structural detail of things in motion.” Amsel’s work echoes with both stillness and force, like pieces from a machine whose function is left to the viewer to discern.
To request additional information, images, or schedule a studio tour or interview with an artist or gallery staff member, please contact Nicole Leaper by phone at 503-227-0222 or by email at nicoleleaper@bullseyeglass.com.
For purchase information please contact Rebecca Rockom by phone at 503-227-0222 or by email at rebeccarockom@bullseyeglass.com.
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Download: Galia Amsel: Alternative Views 2004
- Alternative Views Galia Amsel
May01 - July03 2004
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