Albertine Monroe – Brown Gallery
September 10 – October 09, 2009
Amy Hauft: Counter Re-Formation
Don Desmett, curator
The exhibition itself is composed of two parts: table and curtain. The 30’ x 25’ table is modeled after a Louis XIV banquet table (designed originally to serve 100 diners). Hauft has reproduced the size and shape of this table - with a single deviation – that none-the less results in a crazy, eccentrically ornate contour shape, something like a fleur-de-lys as seen through a kaleidoscope. The full expanse of the table will be covered with an equally expansive but perfectly tailored white tablecloth, on top of which will be displayed a series of architectural follies made of sugar.
It was during the Baroque era, prior to the Europeans’ ability to perfect the recipe for porcelain, that royal artists were commissioned to create figurines and architectural follies in sugar for their masters. These sculpted and cast sugar works graced royal dessert tables as demonstrations of conspicuous consumption: the sugar was imported from the far away East Indies and the sculptors were the finest in the land. The objects themselves were temporal displays of skill and artistry “thrown away” on the production of unique ephemeral objects.
The second part of the exhibition takes the form of an undulating curtain that starts at the table and snakes towards the entrance of the gallery – a seeming extension of the expansive tablecloth. The curtain will partially obscure the entering viewer’s sightline into the gallery. The curtain will be suspended from the 25-foot high gallery ceiling. It will hang from a curtain track that has an exaggerated undulation, emphasizing the curtain’s organic path. This will make the exhibition particularly interesting from the 2nd story views that wrap around the top of the exhibition space, in addition to the traditional view from the ground level.
