'Choice' made by breadth of art school alumni

BY GEORGE WEINBERG

Conceived as part of the Tercentennial celebration, the show's idea did not strike an immediate chord with the current School of Art leadership. "The nightmare of any school is an alumni show, because you risk alienating 95 percent of your people, and to give it to a curator would be impossible," Stacey Gimmel, director of financial affairs for the Art School, remarked. As a solution, all graduate alumni were provided with comprehensive lists of Yale artists and invited to choose 30 names. A cut-off number of 130 was predetermined based on how many works were projected to fit within the three floors of Holcombe T. Greene, Jr. Hall's gallery. Selected artists submitted whatever work they wanted, as long as it was on paper and small enough.

"One can assume that more or less everyone worked on paper, whatever their interests," Andre Forge, Professor Emeritus of Painting and curator of the show, said. "That's an assumption that anyone of my generation would make. It may not be one we can make 30 years from now." Works on paper were also the easiest to ship or transport; some artists sent their works through FedEx and the U.S. Postal service. Brett Logan, special affairs assistant for the school, marvelled at the exhibit actually coming together, especially in the aftermath of Sept. 11. "Roughly 60 percent of the artists were from Manhattan or had their galleries in Manhattan, and people still got their work off," he said. "Our vans could not get below Canal Street, so artists let other people drop off their work...it's amazing."

Wonderful pairings of pieces lead one through the multitude of small, intimate works. On the top floor, Gregory Crewdson's, ART '88, Unititled from the Hover Series, which includes a man mowing a crop-circle, is suffused with an ethereal mystery that speaks to the power of fictional photography. When placed next to Joel Katz's, ART '67, image of an African-American woman in Ruleville, Miss. from 1964, the photograph somehow lends gravity to Katz's didacticism.

In the larger room of the first floor, Karen Yasinsky's, ART '92, Torn Curtain examines the self-consciousness of human actions and expressions, especially those made by mistake, which she translates into a criticism of the act of mark-making. The work appears next to Irving Pelin's, ART '59, The Lake as Furnace, where pastel solids melt into more discrete lines, painfully wrought where they move to describe human forms. Together they create an extended dialogue on the use of lines that express human emotion and thought on the act of artistic expression.

On the bottom floor, Charles Long's, ART '88, When did I notice I was blind simply places an amorphous solid on a black plane. Its texture and intangible meaning made me want to faint, go blind, or do something very, very drastic. Nearby is one of the show's most entertaining and pertinent pieces, done by Sean Landers, ART '86, reputed to be the "bad boy" of that graduating class. Entitled To whom it may concern, the work is a letter from 1991 from his creditors asking for him to repay his loans, and the letter he sends them explaining why he can not. In it he writes, "I moved to NYC from New Haven where I attended Yale School of Art where I incurred $17,000 of my debt, five years ago almost to the day. During that time I've been struggleing [sic] with the ferver [sic] of a drowning man to succede [sic] at this seemingly foolish occupation."

The show is very demanding on the viewer, who must commit energy and attention to so many "intimate" pieces. The number of artists, especially with regard to many lesser-known alumni, makes one desire more information about each artist.

The degrees and years next to the artists' names sit more like talismans than compasses, hinting of a limitless and fascinating web of histories: how these artists have matured since Yale, which teachers they shared, and which fellow contributors to the show they long ago befriended, and still interact with today.

The show also leaves one eager to grasp a certain unifier, something reflected throughout the sweeping variety of works, something that speaks to the artists' shared educational experiences. When asked if he felt such a quality was present, Forge responded, "If there is an unifying thing, it's a kind of thoughtfulness that is generated by the tradition at Yale of very searching and open-minded—but highly critical—discussion of the work that is being done." What makes this show so rewarding and amazing is the uniformity with which this utmost artistic intelligence permeates such a large and varied collection of works.

Back to A&E...