We watched a film on Russian artist Louise Nevelson in sculpture class last week and I was completely in awe of this woman. The film was made in the 70's, when she was 80, and she has such a strong energy and presence when she works. She's funny as hell and has such conviction in everything she does. I tried to find clips of the video we watched but couldn't so instead I'm posting an interview she did on American Architecture Now. It's a bit long, about a half hour, but it's totally worth it. She says the most amazing things.
She worked primarily with objects she found on the streets of New York - old wooden crates, discarded banisters from the school across the street from her house and some of her later work was recreated on larger scales using sheet metal and glass.
She's quite amazing.
-Once her friend and patron Howard Lipman showed her an early American rocking chair that he had just acquired. He asked Nevelson's opinion of the chair. "I couldn't care less about the chair," she said, "but look at its shadow."-
"I have made my world and it is a much better world than I ever saw outside."
"Anywhere I found wood I took it home and started working with it..to show the world that art is everywhere, except it has to pass through a creative mind."
Links to more of her work.
