Wednesday, November 18, 2009

Jane Hammond:  "Fallen"



This is perhaps the most powerful metaphorical use of fallen leaves that has ever been used in art.  Jane Hammond started “Fallen” in 2004 and this ongoing installation of handmade paper leaves represents U.S. soldiers killed in Iraq.  Hammond gathered leaves herself to use as templates for these digitally-printed paper leaves. Each leaf represents a fallen soldier with the name of the soldier carefully handwritten on the back.  This memorial/installation began with 1,511 leaves and now has nearly 4,000.

The Whitney Museum of American Art has purchased this powerful work and various funds have been made available so that the artist can continue it.  Conceptually, this is brilliant – it grows as the sad facts that govern the piece change.  Aesthetically, it is visually compelling, each leaf a stand-in for an American who has died in Iraq.

The Wexner Center Director Sherri Geldin says: “Having initially seen Fallen in its earliest gallery exhibition, it is something of a bittersweet honor to present this work—now three times its original configuration—at the Wexner Center.  No matter what one’s political or military perspective, one can’t help but be touched and overwhelmed by the poetry of Hammond’s gesture to mark each individual life lost with a unique, meticulously crafted reflection of nature.”  The work was shown in its expanded version in 2008.  It was last seen at the Museum of Contepmorary Art-San Diego in 2009 and when I find out where it will go next, I will report on this stunning and poignant evolving work.  When the war in Iraq ends the piece can come to rest.
Jane Hammond is represented by Represented by John Berggreuen Gallery, San Fransisco, Galerie Lelong in New York, Bryon Cohen Gallery of Kansas City, Missouri, Lemberg Gallery in Ferndale, Micnigan and Wetterling Gallery in Stockholm.  Numerous print publishers publish her prints.

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