Petah Coyne

Years ago a few art friends gave me a Petah Coyne book. They gave it to me thinking that I had a similar aesthetic. Although mine is not as developed, I agree. I was going through the book today and also looking for further reading and images on Coyne online. As you can see, there was a plethera of images I was drawn to -- and really each of them I wanted to put up here. No one represented her work to an extent that satisfied me. I didn't feel repetitious in showing multiple images... I think it is because I'm really into her work.

The book shows the bottom images here + the third row down (white) images. They contain waxed flowers, taxidermy, ribbon, tassles, curly branches, feathers etc. The information in the book covered Coyne's fascination with Japanese culture and mentions the color vermilion at the very beginning. Vermilion is a color used in Japanese buddhist temples. I thought it was a purplish hue - given much of the work in the book - but it is actually a red - A vivid red to reddish orange. It is the color on the first page of the book...

That means nothing really - to my inquiry into Coyne's work - well, maybe it affects the mood. Even though parts of her work are white, I am drawn to the darkness felt in these pieces...and a purplish black embodies that mood. Vermilion - not directly about death, but with the right mix of colors... it is a passionate color. It is red and that can mean life and death.

The book also states that there are literary references and cinema references in her subtitles...that reminds me of how I have been considering bring storyline/narrative references into my work as a guiding point - maybe a story will help me to put my work together in a more cohesive manner.

When looking online, I noticed she does photography as well. Her b/w photo at the top of monks is GORGEOUS. I will have to think further on how her photography and sculpture work go together, yet are so different... I need to find more of her photography work.

I was just reading a Bomb Magazine interview of hers - in addition to Japanese and Chinese culture - she also speaks of Catholicism which I'm assuming she grew up with. Now I see where our paths may cross!

From the Bomb interview with Lynn Tillman :

"LT You’re often referred to as a lapsed Catholic.

PC Very much so.

LT I wonder what lapsed means. It’s one thing not to be a practicing Catholic, but to lapse is something else, to disconnect, not be involved.

PC You can’t disconnect.

LT Bataille writes sex scenes on altars; only someone still connected would care.

PC But that is what Catholicism is about. You’re kneeling in front of this naked man up on a crucifix."

WHOA! YES! 1. that you can't disconnect. 2. sexuality in catholicism. She doesn't say so, but I suddenly wonder about the connection between ornate decoration and sexuality!! Oh my- why have I not thought of that before?! How interesting! I do think of femininity and decoration - in luring someone in...and there is also a luring into a cathedral - into a place of worship. I will never forget the inside decor of the church I was raised in. It is a major part of ME. I spent so many hours gazing at the kalaidescope of colors, patterns and statuary within the church. I always knew it was special to me - always thought it was so beautiful and unique.

In grad school, i was just beginning to figure out my aesthetic with my sculptures. It was a time of experimentation - I knew I was working on embryos - that I hadn't even begun to get into the meat of it - I still don't fully KNOW it - I am working on it but it is still embryonic, I'd say. I remember in grad. school having a hard time fully acknowledging what I was and was not attracted to aesthetically. I am attracted to the clean, white spaces of a modern room - for instance. But, damn, I love decoration and admire many antiques and ornateness. I am probably still not resolved in what it is my specific aesthetic is - I do like art decor for the way it sat between the two: modern line and form with decor and intricacy still playing a role -- I like that a negotiation was going on between the two. TO DO: look more at art deco in order to flesh some more of that out.

From Bomb article:

"PC: But I could tell who would and who wouldn’t. Often I could do it by smell. It’s so animal in a way. You could usually know two days before. The physician said that at that point, a patient’s system begins to break down, so I was probably sensing that. At times the odor was so sweet, like when you smell babies’ heads. My brother, before he died, smelled glorious. When he died, he turned bright yellow because of all the toxins."

The article states that she worked with people that were dying - as a job - for awhile. There is so much death in her work - in the darkness, the taxidermy, the falling 'blobs', the sculptures writhing on the ground - yet there is so much beauty as well. The book states that showing the beauty in death is a japanese idea - it definitely isn't American! But I am sure that other cultures have looked at death with beauty as well - I will have to look at that further.

From Bomb article again:

"PC I think it’s about pretense, all the work is pretense. They’re hanging from the ceiling, seemingly very delicate and easily breakable. Instead, what they really are is a threat. They’re extremely heavy, and if they fell on you, they’d crush you. So the work has all these dimensions. I’m interested in the bride who is really the bride past. I’m so far from a bride at this point that my white hair could be the bridal gown. I love Charles Dickens’s Miss Havisham, who was left at the altar. Time stopped for her, everything in the house stopped, nothing changed. The wedding cake stayed on the table for 30 years, uneaten. She lived in that bridal dress, withered like grave clothing.

LT Maybe that’s incorporated into the bride. She’s an image representing time standing still. The bride’s always new, always loved, always true. Fifty percent of marriages break up; but the bride is permanence, love, being forever young. She’s almost like the cross, having withstood reality. Reality tells us being the bride isn’t what it’s cracked up to be. We know there’s an emptiness.

PC There’s the beauty of not knowing. Brides have that. I just photographed all these debutantes and brides; they were beautiful, even when they were at their most self-conscious and showing signs of awkwardness. I’m really not interested in the fresh, new bride. From my vantage point, I’m much more interested in being past your prime. All these wax pieces are the parties afterward, the residue that’s left. It’s not about fresh, new. It’s about a type of beauty that’s long after, which is more beautiful than what’s promised to the bride. But it’s not a beauty we’re accustomed to looking at.

LT But how do we see that in the brides, that it’s afterward, say, in the wax sculptures?

PC Because the wax pieces are half-melted, the images don’t read sharply anymore. The big floor pieces shown in the middle of Galerie Lelong were two “virgins” sharing one arm. Most people thought that arm was just a lump of wax, they didn’t see that the two brides were each holding a baby; actually, it’s my sister holding the perfect baby, I’m holding a headless one. Everything was melted into what looked like the floor. If I had made them fresh and new, you would read everything as softer."

I like what both women are saying about brides...what Lynn is saying about the NEW FOREVER YOUNG and what Petah is saying about it aging and the half-melted image that doesn't read sharply anymore -- It's funny but I'd also say that at the beginning things are also not sharp. Dreams aren't sharp - they are hazy themselves. The truth of the dream is sharper and more fine tuned.

From Bomb again:

'Petah Coyne It’s all the associations that I make with the work. I don’t know if it’s important that the general audience see it, but many of my associations come from Japanese literature and culture. You wouldn’t recognize those associations unless you had read a tremendous amount about Japanese culture or were familiar with it. Recently, Martha Schwendener mentioned that my last exhibition was about obscuring objects by continually adding layer upon layer of white wax. Although the work was made before September 11, she felt it was quite reminiscent of the chalky dust and ash that blanketed the buildings and occupants of lower Manhattan with a premature “snow.” Her description reminded me of Butoh, the sixties Japanese dance movement, which was drawn from both the energy of death or a life consumed in both sorrow and joy. Butoh is also referred to as the dance of the dark soul. I was dealing with Hiroshima, catastrophes and almost panic.

LT Almost panic?

PC The way in which people panic afterward and then are filled with rage. Right after Hiroshima is when Japanese artists started doing Gutai.

LT What is Gutai?

PC It’s a post—World War II art movement. It isn’t exhibited much, because the ideas are more captivating than the work. It seems the conceptual intentions were to purge all formal painting of its traditionally rigid scope. It was about making work and destroying it. They’d hang large sheets of paper from trees and drive motorcycles through them. My impression was that everything was about rage.'

Rage, panic - I see that in her work. The motorcycle/paper work sounds fascinating and beautiful.

Damn. I know there was a quote in this piece about catholicism sitting on your head. Now I can't find it for the life of me... I could have sworn I read that. And I love it.