Ruth Duckworth at the Smart Museum

 A review of "Ruth Duckworth: Life as Unity" at the Smart Museum

Sometime in the mid sixties -  around the time when the first full-disc photos of our planet were being published - Ruth Duckworth (1919-2009) had an epiphany:  "I think of life as a unity. This includes mountains, mice, rocks, trees, women, and men. It's all one big lump of clay. I  think of life as a unity."

It was soon commemorated by "Earth, Water, Sky" (1967-1968), a room-sized, permanent installation commissioned for the newly built Harry Hinds Laboratory for Geophysical Sciences at the University of Chicago.

Only the maquette could be included in this show  but you can already feel the inner power of our wonderful planet.

It’s constituent elements (earth, water, sky) are represented by the smaller ceramics included in this show.  She has fashioned clay into aerodynamic birds, round  heavy pots, and watery flowing waves.  All of these pieces are pleasant and imaginative, running the gamut of ceramic technique.  But none of them appear to be seeking the transformative, volcanic power of her immersive installation two blocks south on Ellis Avenue.  Nor do they have the formal intensity that traditional potters can summon for  the simple shapes of a cup or bowl.  Her pieces are more like a personal journey through the academic trends that coincided with her life.  They do not feel psychological - like the work of her more famous contemporary, Lee Bontecou.  Duckworth looks outward, not inward.

There’s the machine aesthetic of  British modernist sculpture;  the down-to-earth organics of environmentalism; and the provocation of feminism. A perforated tube that might suggest an alien space station is juxtaposed with a severely elegant bird form and a somewhat scary eruption of female genitalia.  Then there are the serene, watery pieces that belong in the lobby of a hotel or airport waiting room.

Duckworth retired from the University  of Chicago in 1977 - a few years before social justice swept over academia and rendered her work decidedly old-school elitist.  Oppressed people of the world don’t have time for natural cosmology, and neither do those who seek justice for them.    But the curators of this exhibit have added an extra gallery to present her "networks of influence", including the various community ceramic studios around the city.  But if Duckworth had ever contributed to them,  surely we would be told about it.  And what about her students at the university?  She taught there for 13 years.  Where are those who continued to work with clay and acknowledge her as a mentor?  There is a feeling of aloof loneliness in so much of her work. 

So far, the Smart is the only art (rather than craft) museum that has given her a retrospective.  This exhibit  will probably not change that.  But it does reveal a human life of industry, imagination, and sensitivity to the academic world around her.  Visualizing a cosmology based on science is a noble, daring, and maybe even indispensable project for a species that must think globally rather than tribally. Hopefully another artist will pick up where Duckworth has  left off.

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You might want to check out the landscape paintings by Duckworth's good friend, Martyl Langsdorf.  They feel quite similar to Duckworth's ceramics.

Funky naturalism - like detritus on the forest floor.

The bowl in the rear might be an old discarded hat.

Mysterious lumps.

Nature loves to bulge.

Seeds in a pod - or windows in a space station.

Not sure which.

Not for the eyes of men,

And especially not for  boys.

Serenity

Guardian

Spirit of Survival

Being unfamiliar with her public sculpture, I would have appreciated having the maquettes displayed beside each other - and accompanied by photographs of the installations.  

They feel silly - yet also quietly statist - like ancient Egyptian pharaohs carved in granite. Definitely not the celebration of the individual spirit - like monuments by Richard Hunt.

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By way of contrast —— consider Amber Ginsburg who currently teaches the ceramic classes at the University of Chicago. It’s possible that she actually works with clay herself, but if so, she has chosen not to show  any such work on her website.

She does show photos of a "tea project’ - but as you can see, the teacups are mass produced styrofoam and the accompanying text is all about politics.

Sixty years ago, Duckworth struck a balance between spiritual growth, political correctness, and aesthetic joy.

That’s probably not possible for those who teach visual art at the University of Chicago today.