"Through a Different Lens"

Neil Goodman at Carl Hammer Gallery

 

by Rebecca Memoli

 

Looking through a lens provides an enhanced view of the world. Lenses can create the illusion of closeness or allow a view wider than the human eye can see. This fall the exhibition “Through a Different Lens” at Carl Hammer Gallery included sculptures from two recent bodies of work by Neil Goodman. The sculptures are designed to be looked through, and, like lenses, they create a perspective that is changed. For Goodman, that change came after moving from the backdrop of industrial Gary, Indiana, to the picturesque landscape of the California coast.

All the works are first carved in wood and then cast in bronze. Some are finished and textured with patinas. There is an interesting juxtaposition in which metal is used to sculpt the natural elements of his current landscape. The hard metal materials, like the industrial landscape of South Chicago, become the physical manifestation of the artist’s perspective as he studies the landscape of his new home.

A series of polygonal sculptures were displayed on shelves at staggered levels along the south wall of the gallery. Each of these sculptures have a similar shape with a negative space carved out of the center. The works in this series are what Goodman describes as lenses—the slices of bronze offer a portal from one landscape to the other. Here both locations exist in the same space, and the lenses are like eyes that gaze inward and outward reflecting changes “both metaphorical and physical,” as Goodman puts it.

Negative space plays an equally important role as the metal form that surrounds it. The sculpture called Ripple interacts with the viewer by way of this negative space. The void cuts into the center of the sculpture and morphs its shape when the viewer walks around the sculpture. The shape and form of the negative space are especially interesting in Ripple because of deep folds that run through the middle of the piece, which creates sharp bends in the opening. Ripple is one of two sculptures that are on pedestals to allow movement around the works. The rest sit on shelves installed into the gallery walls so that they can only be viewed from one side.

The lens works feel like studies for a larger sculpture, Rudder, which is featured on the postcard for this exhibition but is actually on view at the Nathan Manilow Sculpture Park at Governors State University. The larger scale of this sculpture allows the viewer to walk around the work and view the landscape through the sculpture.

 

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Neil Goodman, Rudder, 2018. Museum of Outdoor Arts and Manilow Sculpture Garden. Photo: Neil Goodman.

 

Another body of work accompanies the lens sculptures. Toward the front of the gallery was a group of tall, elongated forms standing on two legs, giving a more anthropomorphic presence in comparison to the other works. These sculptures are described by Goodman as “gateways.” They are inspired by a more topographic view of the California coast. Unlike the lens sculptures, these sculptures are best viewed from one vantage point. At other angles the pieces are abstracted, but, if viewed from the front, they show the layers of a landscape. Crown, for instance, has two peaks at its top like mountains, with the vertical lines on either side drawing shapes like fields. For Goodman this is the vineyard that he can see out of his second-story window.

Carl Hammer Gallery features primarily Midwest-based artists. The connection to the Midwest is apparent in Goodman’s work. The landscapes formed in the gateway sculptures have a rounded architecture like the landscape elements in a Roger Brown painting. Brown’s work also puts a great emphasis on the negative spaces of the windows inside the buildings.

Goodman’s Midwest influence also comes through in his industrial materials, but sometimes the industrial aspects overshadow the natural elements that connect the work to the California landscape. The gateway sculptures work better at conveying that theme visually than the lens pieces. If looking for them, the mountains do emerge from beyond the vineyards.

The exhibition includes a lot of work, which reflects how prolific an artist Goodman is. The gallery space, however, doesn’t do the work justice. Goodman has a minimalist style that can make the meaning of the works hard to discern without his explanation. In a gallery setting, the smaller scale sculptures are harder to read as landscapes or lenses because the view they afford is of the wall behind them. The site-specific work Rudder, however, is successful at activating the landscape, given how its large scale interacts with the space.

 

Rebecca Memoli is a Chicago-based photographer and curator. She received her BFA from Pratt Institute and her MFA in Photography from Columbia College. Her work has been featured in several national and international group shows.