3441 Cedar Ave. S
Minneapolis, MN 55407
phone/fax 612 722-2324
susan@susanhenseldesign.com
www.susanhenseldesign.com
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Sue's Musings and News
February 2003
Musings
Try something new.
My cocoon was mighty comfortable. It's pretty scary to spread your wings and then wait helplessly for the sun to dry them before you can fly! Winter seems to be that risky waiting period for me. My wings are still useless, but they are drying in the sun. So this is something new I'm writing to you.
My plan is to keep you updated with happenings at Susan Hensel Design and to share musings. How often will this happen? I really don't know at this time...so keep checking back.
Marginalization
This seems to be the constant current topic of my musings lately. How do we marginalize ourselves as artists?
We categorize ourselves by gender, race, art form and materials...to what end? The human urge to catalog knowledge is certainly part of it. We put brackets,walls and limits around facts to get a handle on them. It allows us to digest and synthesize in manageable chunks.
There is a clear risk inherent in this cataloguing. We begin to rank entries in the catalog for their supposed intrinsic value. However, the parameters are neither stated nor vetted.
This leads me to the marginalization of artists books in the greater art marketplace. Granted, the book field is amorphous and ungainly, comprised as it is of fine press, democratic multiples, livre's d'artistes, blank handmade journals, even `zines and all of it somehow expected to relate to the pricing structure of trade books.
A suite of handpulled etchings by a respectable artist will fetch a tidy sum in any number of commercial galleries. They are acknowledged as full fledged original works of art. But, the moment those etchings are bound into a book, their market value plummets. The fact that aesthetically they are a time-based performative art object by necessity of their content and intent seem of no moment. The act of binding them actually or metaphorically to the book tradition devalues them, marginalizes them.
Perhaps it is time to move artists books out of the margin. They are full fledged original works of art.
News
After two very full years, the Art Apartment in East Lansing has closed. Working with Nancy McRay (www.mcrayweaving.com) and Leslie Donaldson, we ran this as a non-profit alternative exhibition space. We focused on performance art, installation and video. We also hosted A Reader's Art 1 and 2.
I am curating A Reader's Art 3 for the Lansing Art Gallery now. The show will run the month of April. Participants so far are:Alicia Bailey, Doug Beube, Jeanne Buescher, Macy Chadwick, Steve Daiber, Joanne Davis, Jeanne Drewes, Shirley Ende- Saxe, Holly Hanessian , Karen Hamner, Susan Hensel, Karen Kunc, Emily Martin, Mary Ann McKellar Schwarcz, Bea Nettles, Mary Windram, Theresa Prater, Eve Reid, Sally Rose, Maddy Rosenberg, Miriam Schaer, Susan Joy Share, Jessica Spring, Lynne Sures.
Check out my online interview with The Crafts Report.
http://www.craftsreport.com/february03/oe.htmll
Up-Coming Shows
March 9-April 18 2003
A Way WIth Words:the text based artwork of Susan Hensel
Appalachian Center for Craft
Smithville TN
April 7-May 17 2003
a group show of artists books
Thomasville Cultural Center
600 E. Washington St.
Thomasville, GA
July 11-August 24 2003
A Way With Words
City of Las
Vegas
Charleston Heights Arts Center
Las Vegas, NE