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Large triptych: Beneath top photo: |
Except from the "Burchfield Penney
Art Center at Buffalo State College Grand Opening" Catalog, November 22, 2008,
pp. 19, 22
By Ted Pietrzak, Director, Burchfield
Penney Art Center
Gateway and the Power of Memory
Russell Drisch has exhibited his art since the early 1970s. When living in Buffalo in the 1970s and 80s, he was known for his still lifes of flowers and vegetables presented against white or gray backgrounds. By manipulating the photographic process, he created an effect that accentuated the luminosity of the objects he was photographing.
When referencing Gateway, Drisch explains that the image was constructed from photographs taken at Nemours, the restorede state of Alfred T. du Pont in Wilmington, Delaware. In Gateway, Drisch presents three large sections assembled from numerous panels - the central one being a cobblestone pathway along an arbor, ending at a gateway. The two adjoining sections depict a shimmering and undulating water surface, which Drisch speaks of as being part of an ethereal world: moving, reflecting, not solid.
Drisch was captivated by the garden's trellis and gateway. He states that his childhood memories of arbors and gateways are "fanciful, alluring and evocative," and describes "anticipation" in the walktowards the gateway. His statements suggest his attraction to explore, a desire to enter through a gate into another place he has yet to discover. He presents the dream world of Nemours, a created paradise, with his own memories of childhood and the ethereal.
The artwork poses many questions. Do we live in a world of ambiguities where reality and mystery coexist? Are nature and beauty parts of that ambiguity? Why is there such fascination when our positive memories enter the present? What is reality: the hardness of objects, or the shimmering of a water pool, or the magic of childhood memories?
See also: Links to additional excerpts by Director Pietrzak from the catalog
