Revealed: the process of art installation

Carlos Herrera, and some museum studies students, wrapped up the installation of an art collection of prints by both worldwide famous artist and local artists for exhibition of the GCSU Permanent Art Collection to take place between the dates of Sept. 22 and Oct. 17.

“Last semester, I asked the museum studies students to help me pull out all the prints and they selected a handful. From that, I edited and curated an exhibition,” said Herrera.

The prints in the Blackbridge hall date from the early 1800s to today. In the gallery, there are Japanese wood block prints, digital prints and everything in between.

“This is an interesting show, because we have some from the era called photorealism.” said Herrera.

The installation process begins with selecting the pieces. The works are then examined for fading and other damages.
“The works were stored in a room and have never been presented,” Herrera said. “I start by pulling out the arts out of the old frames and the old acid mats, because a lot of these works had mats that weren’t acid free. The acid affects and destroys the artwork.”

Next, the works are framed. Each frame is chosen and designed for the piece of work that it will mount.

The most important part is preparing the space for the art. After each exhibition, a deinstallation must be done. The pieces have to be demounted, the screws removed and the artwork safely tucked away. Where there were screws, students sand away debris and spackle the holes. A new layer of paint freshens up the walls so that more work can be hung.

Once the walls are prepared, the curator must then decide where the pieces of art will go. It is a painstaking process, which taks into account lines, colors, shapes and even shadows in corners. There are a wide range of prints in the gallery, from lithographs to monotypes, to wood blocks. Herrera had to put works in their place based on the style of the artwork, the century it was printed in and other factors.

“We have to do research, some of these works we don’t even know who the artists are,” Herrera said. “Some haven’t been catalogued. There’s a piece called the ‘Tank Worker,’ which shows that industrial strength of the United States.”

Placement is very important when it comes to installing art pieces.

“You have to really think about that, not necessarily ‘let’s put everything up on the wall and that’s it,’” Herrera said. “It takes a little bit of work. Take a look and see which works better and where and how two works can go together.”

An example of this is the way some pieces of work in the gallery are hung,.One is hung by Dr. Dorothy Leland and next to it is one by Sally Heller. The two pieces have a green curly motion and an abstract pattern, so they sit next to each other. Another, is one with a red circle in it juxtaposed by one with a red circle in it as well.

“All the works need to hang between 58 and 60 inches.” said Herrera “It creates harmony.”

Herrera also mentions that a large part of the way pieces are hung are to cater to the viewer. It must be a comfortable place for the viewer to come into. This takes into account the lighting, the symmetry and the organization of the paintings.

“The space becomes a lab for the museum studies to come in and work in and be able to have that real life work experience.” says Herrera. “This process takes place in museums all over the world.”

Herrera had been researching for over a year for the exhibition.
The research is ongoing. During an interview with Herrera, a long awaited phone call came in revealing the title of the work hung in the gallery created by Dorothy Leland our GCSU President. The work was entitled ‘Animal Puzzle’, and was created in 2006.

Emily Ewalt, a museum studies major and an Art history minor played a big part in the research of the pieces being hung in the gallery.

“I went to the library. First we found the artists we wanted more information on, the famous artists we have displayed in the exhibition.” says Ewalt. “I would try to find resources online, but I wasn’t too sure if they were credible. I would compare them to other sources.”

There have been some setbacks.

“We’ve been trying to decipher the signatures on the bottom of the paintings, but its kind of difficult. For now, we’re just making them up and when the exhibition goes down, we’ll do a little more research.” says Ewalt.

“All the work is extremely different. Some very old and some very famous. It’s very cool.” Ewalt adds.

There’ s a little something for everyone.

Posted by Colonnade Archives on Sep 26 2008. Filed under Features. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0. You can leave a response or trackback to this entry