| Friday, October 03, 2003 | The Chillicothe Constitution Tribune, Chillicothe, Missouri |
|
|
|
|
|
Topographical map is 'sculpture in motion' CATHERINE STORTZ RIPLEY C-T News Editor Grand River Historical Society Museum in Chillicothe has acquired a topographical map of Missouri, courtesy of a New York artist. The map is approximately 3 by 23 by17 inches and made from cast hydrostone and coated with white primer. It is the creation of Allan McCollum, of New York City, who recently received support from the Grand Arts gallery in Kansas City to help finance and produce an art exhibition for him. "I decided to do a project that explored the shapes and topography of the two states, Kansas and Missouri," McCollum said when he stopped in Chillicothe on his way to Kansas City. "I believe that everyone has a profound emotional involvement with such features of their own home territory, and I think that these feelings can be an interesting subject for artistic exploration." Instead of making just one single project to be seen by a limited number of Kansas City art viewers, McCollum decided to expand the project into two parts. The first part, typical of what one expects from an artist, is to make some artworks for the gallery to put on exhibit and offer for sale. For this purpose he created a series of three-dimensional, topographical models of the two states, each cast from a mold in ceramic, and finished with bright colored glazes. The second part of the project uses the same molds again, but to create a different kind of object for an entirely different purpose. These additional topographical models are produced using a mixture of plaster and cement, and are being donated to small, regional historical society museums throughout Kansas and Missouri. "This part of the project is less about the objects themselves, and more about the distribution of the objects," McCollum said. "One could think of the movement of these objects across the two states as a kind of sculpture in motion." McCollum said that it can be expensive to create a topographical model, but once a rubber mold is made it can be relatively economical to produce them in quantity. |
|
|
||
|
"I am trying to piggy-back a practical educational project on top of an art gallery project, and thus extend the benefits of Grand Arts gallery's efforts into areas beyond the Kansas City art community. All the models are being produced from molds taken from two original topographical models that were created using a computer-controlled routing machine. The machine was programmed with geographic information systems data supplied by the U.S. government. Upon his arrival in Chillicothe, Dr. Frank Stark, president of the Grand River Historical Society, met McCollum at the museum. McCollum was traveling with Cydney Millstein, an architectural historian from Kansas City. Around 50 of these models were made during this past summer and are being donated and personally delivered to regional historical society museums throughout the state. Similar maps were distributed to nearby historical society museums in Carroll County (Carrollton) and DeKalb County (Maysville). |
|
McCollum, 59, was born in Los Angeles. He currently serves as practicum supervisor for the Center for Curatorial Studies at Bard College, in Annandale-on-Hudson, in New York. He is also an adjunct assistant professor at Columbia University School of the Arts, in New York. McCollum's work has been exhibited at galleries throughout the United States and in Europe. In Missouri, his work has been exhibited at Daum Museum of Contemporary Art in Sedalia; Washington University in St. Louis; the Kansas City Art Institute, Grandarts in Kansas City, Nelson Art Gallery in Kansas City, Gallery 1709 in St. Louis and Springfield Museum of Fine Art. He currently has representation at galleries in New York, Massachusetts, England, Belgium, Germany, and Italy. The exhibition of the ceramic models at Grand Arts will be on view from Nov. 7 through Dec. 20, at Grand Arts, 1819 Grand Blvd., Kansas City, Mo. On the Web: grandartsproject.html. | ||
