USU Museum Asks 'What Makes An Object Art?'

The Nora Eccles Harrison Museum of Art at Utah State University introduces a new exhibition, “Uses of the Real: Originality, Conditional Objects, Action/Documentation and Contemplation.”

Contemporary art can be baffling. Artists sometimes take objects from the everyday world and transform them into art. What makes an object art? Is it originality, genuineness, authorship or is it context? USU museum staff and guest curators selected works from the museum’s permanent collection that provoke the question “What makes it art?”

 

As part of programs supporting the “Uses of the Real” exhibition and the topic of contemplative art, the museum is featuring 12 works on loan by artist Channa Horwitz. The special focus exhibition will be on display in the Marie Eccles Caine Gallery of the museum through May. Horwitz is a guest on campus Monday, Feb. 11, and presents a lecture about her work at 7 p.m. in the Performance Hall (approximately 1090 E. 675 North) on USU campus.

 

The focus of Horwitz’s lecture is her series of artworks called “Sonakinatography,” in which she creates visual representations of sound and movement. Her modern representations are drawn on graph paper and can be read as musical notes through her uses of color and space. The Marie Eccles Caine Foundation Opera Quartet at USU will perform a brief poem opera, and two percussionists will perform a musical interpretation of Horwitz’s work featuring a score written by Scott Higgins, a L.A. musician. Both performances are part of Horwitz’s presentation Monday evening.

 

A minimal artist, Horwitz experiments with shape and line to create a universal language of art. Horwitz is often motivated by concepts of logic, structure, time and explores these concepts through her geometric work on graph paper.

 

“I experience freedom through limitation and structure,” Horwitz said when discussing her art. “It would appear that limitation and structure are dichotomies to freedom, but through experience, I have found them to be synonymous and the basis for freedom. I limit my choice/freedom by selecting the minimum number of colors to work with. My art, much like my life, is not solely based on chance, but my desires and limitations, both conscious and unconscious.”

 

Born in Los Angeles, Calif., Horwitz received her bachelor’s of fine art degree from the California Institute of the Arts in 1972. Her work is currently shown in the collections of the Los Angeles County Museum of Art, the National Gallery of Art in Washington, D.C. and the Nora Eccles Harrison Museum of Art.

 

For more information or to schedule a tour of the Nora Eccles Harrison Museum of Art, call (435) 797-0165. The Nora Eccles Harrison Museum of Art is on the USU campus at 650 North 1100 East, Logan, Utah, 84322, (435) 797-0163; fax (435) 797-3423. Information is also available at the museum’s Web site (http://www.usu.edu/artmuseum). The museum is open Tuesday-Friday, 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. and Saturday, noon-4 p.m. The museum is closed Sundays, Mondays and holidays. Admission is free. The museum is accessible to persons with disabilities.

 

Parking for the museum is available in lot C3 to the west of the museum. The parking fee in this area is $6 ($3 will be refunded if parked for two hours or less). Parking is free after 5 p.m. and on weekends. Two dedicated stalls are available for museum members. Call Rachel for reservations: 797-1414. Parking is also available in the USU Parking Terrace, located near the Taggart Student Center, for $1.50/hour ($7.50/day maximum). Free parking after 2 p.m. is available at lot B, located at the corner of 700 North and 1200 East (by Aggie Ice Cream).

 

Contact: Deborah Banerjee, assistant curator (435) 797-8207
Writer: Casey T. Allen