From the Ground Up: Challenging Perceptions

A lunchtime need to get out of the office brought me to the Renwick Gallery - an often overlooked museum in my repetoire. I admit it has been about five years since my last visit and for someone who works in the arts and just two blocks from the gallery, that is a big confession. After today's visit, I wonder what it is that I've been missing.

From the Ground Up (through July 22) will challenge the way you look at objects and any traditional notion of craft that you may have (other than, perhaps, that it is a "women's" art field). Set in an intimate and crowd-free setting, this show is much more manageable than the larger craft collections on view at the Smithsonian Museum of American Art and is an excellent introduction into the boundaries that craft artists are breaking. No longer do objects have to be "useful," they can just be.

This 2007 Renwick Gallery Invitational features the work of four artists: Paula Bartron (glass), Jocelyn Chateauvert (paper), Beth Lipman (glass), and Beth Cavener Stichter (clay). This is not a show that one can easily just pass through. Each piece invites closer examination and careful inspection to fully know what is going on.

For example, take Bartron's glass works. "Glass?" you might say, "But that looks like stone, heavy and rock-like." Yes Bartron's works are indeed cast glass, but covered with sand and made to look not at all like glass. It is only with the introduction of light that one begins to wonder what are these things exactly. Each piece seems to emanate the ambient light from its core, made possible by the faintest and smallest areas of glass that peek through the sand covering. One particularly striking piece is Blue Disks - a wall installation of 28 identically sized earth-toned disks that, with the introduction of a bit of blue sand, seem to radiate an aura from within.

Lipman creates clear glass renderings of well-known still-life paintings by the Old Masters. Beautiful compositions sparkle in the museum lighting and each piece proves more complex than the last. Glass is layered next to and on top of each other, replicating the end of a raucous dinner party in the 20 foot long Bancketje. Walking around the featured installation, I wanted to tread lightly for fear of disturbing one piece and sending all of the components crashing to the floor. And then I noticed the artist's touch. A few small shards of glass, already positioned on the floor. For a moment, I wondered if the guard had noticed.

Stichter's work is equally intriguing as it is haunting. Fantastical clay creatures, half human-half animal, leap into the space at the viewer or are bound by ropes, one clings to a wall-shelf for dear life. The wall text explains that all are portraits of people Stichter knows and her website elaborates that these works were born of personal accounts of people's "most intimate experiences relating to gender identity, fantasies, fetishes, and abuses." The works are powerful and dramatic.

In the last set of galleries, Chateauvert positions her handmade paper and light into a crafty dialogue. They co-exist harmoniously with the light playing off of each fold in the work. A large piece, that replicates a tree trunk, is a clever take on the origins of paper and really looks like hard, sturdy wood. Other works use paper in its most basic and natural fiber form, the light projecting through soft, wispy strands. And one gallery installation, in particular, will make you feel like Alice in Wonderland.

From the Ground Up is an excellent look at today's craft artists. It will make you take a pause from harried city life and marvel at the magic of art.