Artists Space

Beverly Semmes

April 19 – May 19, 1990

A Sculptural Installation
Selected by Connie Butler

A black and white photograph of a field with trees in the background has been cut into strips and woven back together.
Beverly Semmes, Woven Photograph, 1989. [A black and white photograph of a field with trees in the background has been cut into strips and woven back together.]

Beverly Semmes' sculptural installations represent in an elegant but humorous manner our relationship to objects in our natural environment. Her oversized sculptures made of copper, aluminum, hay and chicken wire are at once beautiful and absurd.

With an obsessive attention to detail in some works, Semmes literally weaves a compelling, impenetrable surface that surrounds an implied but unseen interior. In others the viewer is offered a structure that is so entirely penetrable to the eye that it seems to exist as suspended color alone.

With a keen sense of materials Semmes constructs ill-shaped "hedges," "trees," "clouds," and "ground" that exist, together with woven photographs on the walls, as an installation. This combination locates us in a well-groomed English garden, but through the incongruities of the complex surface and the size and shape of the sculptures, relocated us in an alienating, surreal environment.

A black and white photograph of a sculpture, which sits on the ground near the corner of a room, its wiry frame covered by a transparent mesh material.
Beverly Semmes, Tree Net, 1989. [A black and white photograph of a sculpture, which sits on the ground near the corner of a room, its wiry frame covered by a transparent mesh material.]
Long, thin bundles of hay are arranged one over the other, mimicking the woven pattern of a textile.
Beverly Semmes, Eel Mat (detail), 1989. Copper, aluminum, hay, and chicken wire. Dimensions variable. [Long, thin bundles of hay are arranged one over the other, mimicking the woven pattern of a textile.]

Beverly Semmes Press Release

Beverly Semmes Catalogue Cover

Beverly Semmes Postcard

Artists Space programs are made possible by: the National Endowment for the Arts, a federal agency, New York State Council on the Arts, and New York City Department of Cultural Affairs; AT&T Foundation, Inc., The David Bermant Foundation: Color, Light, Motion, The Bohen Foundation, The Cowles Charitable Trust, Geraldine R. Dodge Foundation, Foundation for Contemporary Performance Arts, Inc., Horace w. Goldsmith Foundation, The Greenwall Foundation, Jerome Foundation, The J.M. Kaplan Fund, The Dorothea L. Leonhardt Foundation, Inc., The Joe and Emily Lowe Foundation, Inc., The Robert Mapplethorpe Foundation, The Menemsha Fund, Joyce Mertz-Gilmore Foundation, Betty Parsons Foundation, The Reed Foundation, Inc., The Rockefeller Foundation, The Mark Rothko Foundation, Inc., and The Andy Warhol Foundation for the Visual Arts, Inc.; American Express Company, The Chase Manhattan Bank, N.A., Consolidated Edison Company of New York, Inc., Equitable Real Estate Group, Inc., General Atlantic Corporation, R.H. Macy and Company, Inc., Morgan Guaranty Trust Company of New York, Philip Morris Companies Inc., and U.S. Trust Company of New York; as well as Artwatch, Galleries in Support of Artists Space, Members and numerous Friends.

Additional funding for Artists Space activities has been provided by: Art Dealers Association of America, Inc., Louis A. Bradbury Fund, The Penny McCall Foundation, Motherwell Foundation, Inc., The Pace Gallery, and Payson Enterprises, Inc., among others.

Artists Space is a member of the National Association of Artists Organizations (NAAO) and the National Alliance of Media Arts Centers (NAMAC).

    A photograph of a figure in a long furry coat who walks along a path in a lush garden, their back facing the camera.
    Beverly Semmes, Still from Cornelia Walking Through the Formal Garden in the Pink Feather Coat and Hedge Hat, 1988. [A photograph of a figure in a long furry coat who walks along a path in a lush garden, their back facing the camera.]