Anticipating Anticipator by Matthew Geller

As part of the Florence Griswold Museum’s Agora Project—an initiative funded by the Institute of Museum and Library Services to make our grounds and gardens a community gathering place—we have commissioned a new, temporary outdoor sculpture. A noted sculptor in the field of public art, Matthew Geller has designed Anticipator, a work for the Museum grounds that combines a recycled tree trunk with three “bionic” limbs forged from Cor-ten steel. These perforated branches will emit colored light and mist through oversized flower “blossoms.” Playful, accessible, and unexpected, the sculpture offers elements of surprise that will encourage visitors to interact with it and each other, fostering a sense of community as they stroll the grounds. Anticipator will shape its environment in an almost animate way, introducing the elements of mist and light and eliciting feedback in return.

Woozy Blossom (Platanus nebulosus), 2010.
 Katonah Museum of Art

Geller often incorporates mist into his works as a means of sparking conversation among viewers by subtly changing their surroundings. At FGM, the mist will transform the environment, influencing how visitors perceive light and air against the backdrop of the Lieutenant River, a subject of interest to the generations of artists who have painted in and around the Florence Griswold House. The sculpture’s futuristic combination of natural and artificial forms will play off our historic site—the tree trunk has been salvaged from the grounds and the exotic blooms recall Miss Florence’s interest in non-native species, many of which she planted around her house. A new biomechanical hybrid that is part plant and part machine, Anticipator will shape its environment in an almost animate way, introducing the elements of mist and light and eliciting feedback in return.

Anticipator arrives on June 8, with a day of fun family activities. Until then, check our website and Facebook for additional posts about the progress of the Anticipator project!

For more of Matthew Geller's work, check out his website: www.matthewgeller.com

Amy Kurtz Lansing

Curator

Florence Griswold Museum

A note from the artist, Patrick Dougherty

The work is entitled The Rambles, and I am proud of the sculpture which resulted from my residency. With the museum's help, I was able to find and gather birch saplings from several sites around Old Lyme, CT and transport them to the museum. Volunteers removed the leaves from the branches and then proceeded to help with the weaving process. I use the infuriating tendency of branches to entangle with one another as my method of joining and then worked at a breakneck speed to complete the sculpture. The work, encased in scaffolding during its construction, provided working platforms but also aided in the bending and tying of the larger support saplings into the desired shape. Ultimately all strings were removed and the smaller saplings, which had been intertwined by volunteers, secured the work. I thought of the sculpture not only three dimensionally but also concentrated on the outer surface as a canvas on which to draw. Sticks are the material of bird nests, but they are also bundles of lines. All the drawing conventions used with paper and pencil still apply.

I was given a beautiful site—behind the museum, but still visible through the large window wall in the lobby-gift shop. All in all, visitors need only walk a short distance to enter and explore the work. The sculpture is sited to take advantage of the bucolic view of the Lieutenant River, a classic vista for the painters who visited Florence Griswold so long ago.

When I began to search for an image or a starting point to guide the creation of the work at the Florence Griswold Museum, I imagined the garden follies of previous eras. In the past, those who had means sometimes festooned their gardens with strange architecture and even built intentional ruins. These structures were meant to evoke mystery and stimulate a longing for bygone days. They offered a kind of poetic drama as nature reclaimed the manmade. I have been intrigued by ruins all over the world because vine cover, tree roots and unruly branches are often the first blush of architectural decay. For me it is like throwing a dust cloth over a piece of furniture which can obscure the detail but cannot deny the basic manmade form. With this in mind, I envisioned a kind of drapery for the museum's imaginary ruin—one with a 22' high round tower, a square tower and many architectural features in between. The viewers are invited in to explore the interior, to walk in some doors and peer around others. In The Rambles, the energy of the natural world seems frozen in the drawn surfaces as all the unassuming sticks gathered by the volunteers in the first few days take on presence and new meaning. With only a hint of underlying geometry, this backyard folly has no core of stone or wooden beams. As the scaffolding was removed on the final day, it was as if an insect chrysalis had finally opened and an enormous sapling slipcover had been shaken free and set out to dry.

Day 1

The Stickwork has begun and volunteers are, at the moment, harvesting birch saplings for use in Patrick Dougherty's sculpture. The Waterford Target volunteer team has even gotten involved. Target team coordinator Edyse Smith said of her first day on the job: "It was a lot of work... but fun to be part of this project. I plan on volunteering each week to see it progress. It was nice to work right with Mr. Dougherty."

The sticks are beginning to pile up on the grounds of the museum and Patrick's plans for the sculpture will be revealed in a few days. It's not too late for you to join in the project, in fact, we're adding new shifts to the schedule. Click here to sign up or contact Nicole.