The Observer, November 9, 2007
Volume XL, Issue 10
Maryland artist brings stop-motion films to Sculpture Center
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Enter the dark world of Brent Green and you will encounter a twisted realm of bizarre objects and gnarly characters created by Green for his original stop-motion films. The Sculpture Center's current exhibition, Brent Green: Animation in 4 Dimensions, is an uncanny display of film sets and props that will make any member of my generation who grew up following cult figures like Tim Burton feel right at home. Indeed, Green's Burton-esque aesthetic appeals to the anarchic, angsty Goth kid in me who delights in the warped sense of style that saturates his work, as well as the adult in me who appreciates Green's exceptional creative sensibility which fuels such thought-provoking films.
Brent Green is a sculptor, a stop-motion animator, and a musician who incorporates all of these creative facets in his films. The Main Gallery is full of his small scale film sets, all of which are either hand-built or composed of found objects. Props from three of Green's films are featured, including the warped house of Paulina Hollars, along with obsessively hand-carved wooden figures with wiry frames and grim expressions. The exhibition also includes the larger figures of Carlin (stuffed chickens included), along with props from his most recent film-in-progress, Louisville Gravity. Green has made an ornately hand-carved door specifically for the Main Gallery entrance, and covered the walls with charcoal figure drawings and text to create a story line that extends across the gallery walls.
The Euclid Avenue Gallery will continuously show Green's stop-motion animated films. His films are dark; they are often personal, fictional, or historical narratives of sickness, aging, and death, accompanied by a soundtrack of Green's own music and poetic lyrics that become increasingly urgent as his stories progress. Although his films convey suffering and loss, they ultimately have happy endings. For instance, Paulina Hollars is the story of an "asshole kid" who is run over by a bus, and his mother, Paulina, who commits suicide to find her son and help him escape from hell. This is certainly a grim tale, but Green ends it with a life-affirming message about appreciating every moment in life, stating "the world is beautiful and I cannot believe we are always forgetting that." Green incorporates childlike text, titles and poetic phrases to accompany his lyrics. He often uses animals in his work; a recurring motif of birds attached by strings to people and objects serves as a metaphor for harnessed freedom that speaks to the human experience.
Visitors are likely to find a thread of their own life experiences in the provocative, often darkly humorous, narratives composed of the highly imaginative sculptural creations of Brent Green. The stories conveyed in his work are often unusual, yet he deals with common difficulties faced by everyone – the grim realities of life that we must often face with the same frankness and wonder with which we experience Green's films. Enter the world of Brent Green and you will be transported to a place of rare unconventional beauty only to emerge refreshed by his eccentric vision and perhaps, like a young child, marvel at the small things we take for granted in life.
Brent Green: Animation in 4 Dimensions opens today, November 9 from 5:30 to 8 p.m. An artist's talk with Brent Green and performance artist Liz Cohen will be held in the Euclid Avenue Gallery at 6:30 p.m. The Sculpture Center is located at 1834 East 123rd Street in University Circle and Little Italy, beside Lake View Cemetery. Gallery hours are Wednesday through Friday from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m., and Saturday from noon to 4 p.m.
