{"id":5356,"date":"2018-11-01T07:17:19","date_gmt":"2018-11-01T07:17:19","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/notofu.com\/new\/?p=5356"},"modified":"2018-11-03T08:30:26","modified_gmt":"2018-11-03T08:30:26","slug":"mary-corse","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/notofu.com\/new\/mary-corse\/","title":{"rendered":"Mary Corse"},"content":{"rendered":"

For over half a century, Mary Corse\u2014an American artist, primarily working through the medium of painting\u2014has confronted the aura and specificity of materials, experimenting with their capacity to respond to the surrounding environment. From her iconic use of prismatic, glass microspheres, to her ongoing explorations of organic materials, Corse roots her practice in the belief that the essence of painting is not specific to paint itself.<\/p>\n

Corse emerged in the 1960s alongside the West coast, minimalist aesthetic known as Light and Sound. While she resists singular classification within this movement, she clearly relishes in the conceptual space its minimalism affords. Through a bold erasure of excess, Corse draws attention to both the psychology and corporeality of perception. It is her keen attention to the minutiae\u2014right down to her use of beveled canvases that minimize her work\u2019s protrusion from the wall\u2014that makes the dimensionality of her paintings even more robust.<\/p>\n

I was fortunate to catch up with Corse to discuss the role of the artist within the secular world, and consider three questions essential to her practice: What is seen? What is unseen? and What is real?<\/p>\n

NICO: There is a bodily aspect to your work that seems to reward\u2014maybe even necessitate\u2014an active viewer. Light refracts, hues emerge and patinas shift as one moves across the surface of your paintings. I know you have described perception as the true art form at play in your work, so how much is your role as an artist tied to intuiting certain spatial relations to your work?<\/em><\/p>\n

MARY: Oh sure, I think about the architecture, the proportions of the space, and the relation of the paintings to each other, knowing that the viewer will ultimately come in and be involved. But it is not a controlled situation that I envision in exactly one way; instead, it encompasses whatever happens in that moment. I get more concerned about the dialogue between the works, which is a conversation that of course the viewer becomes a part of. They walk around the painting or they don\u2019t, that\u2019s their choice. But my hope is that they can become part of the painting.<\/p>\n

N: Can you explain how the materials themselves invite viewers to become part of the work?<\/em><\/p>\n

M: People often think my paintings are made from microbeads that reflect light in a 1-2 relationship, but that\u2019s a misconception. I actually use glass microspheres, or prisms that forge a triangular relationship between the painting\u2019s surface, the light and the viewer. And at the middle of this is the viewer\u2019s perception, which animates the work as they move and shift; so in that way, the art is really not on the wall at all, it\u2019s in their perception.<\/p>\n

N: Working with reflective and refractive materials, are you able to you see yourself in your work as you create it? How does the process of making the work differ from that of viewing it on the wall?<\/em><\/p>\n

M: \u00a0Before I even start the painting, I see it as a vision. I see it in my mind, similar to how we see images in our dreams. But when I\u2019m working on the painting, it\u2019s a totally different experience from when I step back and see it in its entirety. It\u2019s a different kind of connection; I can\u2019t wait to see it, but I\u2019m so caught up in the process that I don\u2019t actually see it at all. And it could drive you crazy, all the layers, all the sanding, and you don\u2019t even know what you have until dusting off the final layer. And if there is one brushstroke that I don\u2019t like, it can ruin the whole painting. But I don\u2019t see it in this final state until its done and I am in the same position as the viewer.<\/p>\n

N: Have you ever had an unveiling moment where the final piece was so far from your vision for it that you were unable to work with it anymore?<\/em><\/p>\n

M: Absolutely. When that happens, there is no working with it. Its over and there is no fixing it or going back. That\u2019s just it, because it is all happening in the moment. The painting is on the floor, I am over it painting and pouring beads, and my assistant is pulling me back and forth on this long board with wheels, and we just keep going and going. Some people can work on a painting for years, forever, which would drive me crazy! So in a way it\u2019s OK that it\u2019s over when it\u2019s over, regardless of the outcome. I either made it, or I didn\u2019t.<\/p>\n

N: I understand that feeling well. I think it is similar to any process where you throw yourself in completely, both physically and emotionally. There must be an end or else the process can end you. What are the physical challenges to painting intuitively, and have you ever had an idea for a work that you were unable to visualize?<\/em><\/p>\n

M: After ten years of making white paintings in the sixties and seventies, I found myself in the mountains molding these black, earth tiles. Before that, I hadn\u2019t made a painting smaller than eight feet. I had to design and build this kiln, in which I managed to make a four square foot tile. At the time, that was the world\u2019s largest tile, and all the kiln builders had said it would never work. While I haven\u2019t realized that project yet at the scale I intend to, at least I kept at it until I found the way to do it. It was a real earth slab factory I had going on out there in Topanga Canyon, right off a quiet dirt road up in the mountains.<\/p>\n

This was in the seventies so I really had no funding; I mean, all I needed was an extra ten thousand dollars, you know, and I could have done it right then and there! Richard Bellamy was supportive to a certain extent, but those kinds of experiments cost a lot of money. I made a lot of experimental progress, but before I could get the rest of the funds together for that, I had moved on to making these black on black glitter paintings. The slabs took me in that direction. But I still plan to make that earth tile piece one day.<\/p>\n

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