Michael Kuch Exhibition
7/6/10-9/26/10
The Schick Art Gallery at ³Ô¹Ï±¬ÁÏ College presents an exhibition featuring works by printmaker / book artist Michael Kuch. A reception will take place in the gallery from 5:30 to 7 p.m. Tuesday, July 6 and immediately following the Fox-Adler Lecture on September 23. The show remains on exhibit through September 26, 2010. (NOTE - The gallery is closed August 6 through September 6 for Summer Break.) Many of Kuch's limited edition books are held in the artists' book collection in the Department of Special Collections, Pondorff Room, Lucy Scribner Library, ³Ô¹Ï±¬ÁÏ College. Kuch will deliver the 2010 Fox-Adler Lecture on September 23. The Fox-Adler Lecture is named after the late Hannah M. Adler and donor Norman M. Fox and supports the intellectual mission of the Fox Collection, an invaluable asset for ³Ô¹Ï±¬ÁÏ students and faculty studying literature and book illustration. The Schick receptions and exhibition are free and open to the public, as is the lecture; please join us.
Drawing from his imagination, Michael Kuch portrays a world both fantastic and familiar.
Whimsical juxtapositions of human figure and natural form fuse into personal metaphor.
A head sprouts flowers, evocative of inner growth; another face hides under a seashell
hat, seeking protection. A distinctive, patient tenderness suffuses his imagery. Anthropomorphic
frogs, wearing no more than frowns, satire our naked, vulnerable condition. Unceremonious
portraits of biblical and mythological characters comment gently on iconoclastic times.
A Sisyphus, toiling behind a giant snail, does not strain his muscles; his sad, soft
posture conveys a mental rather than physical burden. Kuch's art does not focus on
verisimilitude, nor does it dwell in aesthetic interpretation; rather these qualities
attend human experience as revealed from the inside: a world of psychological reflection.
Kuch matches his prolific generation of iconography with facility in diverse media,
which the Schick Art Gallery will showcase. Anchored in solid pen & ink draftsmanship,
Kuch is at ease working in ink wash, watercolor, oils, pastels, etching, lithography,
and bronze sculpture. In these multiple mediums, Kuch explores his ideas, creating
woodcuts and etchings that are incorporated into his limited edition books. One can
see an interpretation of a single image in varied techniques. Ink wash adds mystery
to his meticulous line; ink mixed with watercolor articulates outlines and solidifies
space. Knowledge of watercolor's transparencies helps him create layered, gem-like
oils. Kuch's first bronze sculpture, Pregnant Man, even plays literally with the creative physicality of the medium. Kuch's various
talents give his themes room to evolve according to the subtle, expressive strengths
of each material.
Michael Kuch was born in 1965 and grew up in northern Vermont. He began drawing in
pen & ink at the age of 11 and the following year had a one-person show at a local
museum. He remained self-taught until he came under the wing of Leonard Baskin at
Hampshire College. Under Baskin's critical eye, Kuch studied life drawing in the classical
tradition. As a student, he was particularly struck by the print work of Odilon Redon,
Francisco Goya, and Giambattista Tiepolo. For many years after receiving his BA, Kuch
continued to work closely with Baskin, printing etchings in color for Baskin's Gehenna
Press. In 1994 Kuch started his own Double Elephant Press with the publication of
a book of frog etchings entitled, A Plague on Your House. A recent book project, Apocalypse Clocks was a millennial retrospective of the end of time. A collaboration with former Poet
Laureate, Anthony Hecht, Séance for a Minyan, resurrected original testament figures to let them speak to modern times. Kuch's
poetry has been published in The Nation. In 2000, Kuch produced the book Falling to Earth in reaction to the events of September 11th. He currently divides his time between
his apartment near Ground Zero in Manhattan and his studio in Hadley, Massachusetts.
The Schick Art Gallery will also feature works relating to Kuch's recent book projects
A Sphinx's Field Guide to Questionable Answers and Common Monsters as well as Waterlines, published this past year.
Schick Art Gallery acknowledges Northampton Mass., for lending works in support of this exhibition.
RECENT BOOK PROJECTS:
A SPHINX'S FIELD GUIDE TO QUESTIONABLE ANSWERS
This book commences with chiaroscuro woodcuts of various sphinxes in natural settings
who serve as guides to common, rhetorical riddles. Colorful answers are displayed
in wood type. The viewer is left to unriddle the question from which each answer was
derived. An alphabetical key, loose in the back of the book, provides the names of
the various typefaces displayed on the pages, turning the field guide into a rather
curious specimen book.
COMMON MONSTERS
Outlandish fauna are artfully observed & illuminated by Michael Kuch. From the American
Imperialist Moth, Pax americana to the Fat-Man Stealth Bat, Papilla terror, this natural
history surveys the salient creatures of our current political landscape.
