Deborah Butterfield - winter, summer, rain and sun

Martin Friedman, Director Emeritus of the Walker Art Center in Minneapolis, MN, discusses in the video linked below the issues of selecting sculpture to be shown outside. The core of these decisions is based on whether the sculpture can withstand the elements of the seasons -- winter, summer, rain, sun. I might add for Minneapolis -- snow, not inches but feet. In any case, the Walker Art Center is home to Woodrow, the first bronze sculpture Deborah Butterfield had made. Prior to that her work had been in metal, sticks, mud, not necessarily suited for the outdoors whether in Minneapolis or Portland. Do a Google search for Deborah Butterfield, click on images instead of web and you'll see any number of her pieces. Or go to Flickr and do a search and the same will happen. Butterfield is everywhere. If you should want to visit, she has homes in Montana and Hawaii which she shares with John Buck, another sculptor of note. Fifty Two Pieces presented a week of John Buck earlier this year. That week is available by clicking here.

Deborah Butterfield ~ Dance Horse and relative at Purdue

Yes, I know. We look similar. And we're related. Deborah Butterfield, the sculptor who created us, makes horses. Some say she has a horse obsession. If you're looking for us, you find us everywhere. A few of us have been able to stay home in Montana. Others of us have have been let loose so to speak and now live elsewhere. Some of us are still inside like I used to be when I first came to the Portland Art Museum. Others of us now live outside like my still unnamed relative (seen in the image above) who just arrived last month at Purdue University in Indiana. Yikes, it's cold there and she is out in front of the Yue-Kong Pao Hall, which opened in 2005. That's the home to the Patti and Rusty Rueff School of Visual and Performing Arts.

Much as I do, this horse looks like she's made of wood. I really like the whole positive, negative space thing people talk about – how you can see me for all of what I am and could be in your eyes, but not at the same time. Then look close and you can see the texture and color of wood. Some people actually touch me, expecting that I'll feel softer than the bronze I'm made of, more like the driftwood they "see" with their eyes. How did Butterfield do this? From a collection of wooden sticks, logs and branches, she creates my being. Then there's a lot more work that is best described in this article written about my Purdue relative...

"Photographs of the sculpture were taken before it was carefully disassembled. The individual pieces were then covered with a ceramic mold material that was fired in a kiln, burning away the wood but leaving an impression in the ceramic. After cleaning, the molds were used to cast replicas of the original wood in bronze, and then the molds were destroyed when the bronze was removed to ensure the sculpture is unique. After reassembly of the various parts, the bronze was then treated with a chemical solution that formed a patina that closely emulates the character of the original wood. In most cases, the patina and texture are so effective that viewers believe they are actually viewing a wooden sculpture."

In any case, I may or may not weigh more than the Purdue horse, who everyone says weighs 1,700 pounds. If only more of you would bring me apples and carrots, I know I'd best her on the scales.

Deborah Butterfield ~ Dance Horse and the Kentucky Derby

Deborah Butterfield is known worldwide for her horses, better known than Michael Brophy whose painting hung behind Dance Horse back in 1999. Perhaps it's having horses be the core of her ouvere. In any case, her sculptures, and they are of horses, are in the collections of almost all of the major museums in the country. How did this fascination start? Many biographies cite that she was born in San Diego, California, on the day of the 75th running of the Kentucky Derby and that Butterfield herself credits this event as determining her career as a modernist sculptor of horses.

Listening to her talk about the core of her work, she tells us of how we changed the horse and the horse changed us. These videos, recorded at a presentation to docents at the Nevada Art Museum in November 2007, are short and will take just a few minutes to view. Listening to Butterfield talk about her work is most compelling.

Butterfield at the Airport

If you ever get a deja vu feeling when you see the horse in the sculpture court it could be that you are remembering, faintly, the ones you saw near the airport. In 1995 the Portland International Airport commissioned some of Butterfield's horses to graze the drive as one leaves the airport. They have names. These two are Lyon and Princess Pine.
Made to look like wood, the wood pieces are each cast into molds, she burns out the stick and pours in molten bronze. She has to assemble them in wood first and take numerous photographs so when she has all the bronze pieces she will know how they go back together. Having made horses in wood that deteriorated over time she decided she needed a permanent fix to her wooden horses, and as creatives do, she made it happen.
My latest horse story is something I picked up from watching Philip Glass speak at the museum last week. He was talking about his work setting Jean Cocteau's film Beauty and the Beast to opera. Glass explained how Cocteau's hidden message of magic and power was a metaphor for the life of the artist, or for anyone whether she calls herself an artist or not.
The Beast tells Beauty that she can have all his magic powers, the horse, the mirror, the rose, the key and the glove.
As Glass pondered the meaning of the five powers he quickly concluded that Cocteau's horse stood for strength and determination. The rose stood for the goal, which is beauty. The mirror stood for the path that the artist, or person, must take. The key is the technique that the artist employs. But he couldn't figure out what Cocteau meant by the glove. He showed the audience the scene in the film where the beast removes the glove and gives it to Beauty.
It is a velvet and gold threaded bejeweled thing. Glass says it was when he realized the detail in the glove that the fifth magic power made sense. The glove stands for nobility and pride, it means the artist must know she is noble and worthy of the path and the goal and that she has the right technique to ride the horse of strength and determination.
Philip Glass and Jean Cocteau are in good company with Deborah Butterfield and her noble horses.

Deborah Butterfield ~ Dance Horse, Inside

Ten years ago, Dance Horse lived inside. Here is a shot of Deborah Butterfield's sculpture on the 4th Floor of the Hoffman Wing at the Portland Art Museum in 1999. Standing as regal as it does out in the Sculpture Garden today, it somehow has a different overall aura. I feel less like offering it an apple or a carrot. Why is that?

Take a tour through Flickr.com using the tags Portland, art, and museum. You'll see any number of photos. Now go to the museum's official website and read the rules. I have been fascinated by what people have taken photos of and then chosen to upload on Flickr. All of that takes intention. And intention defines a major portion of modern art.

Deborah Butterfield ~ Dance Horse

When you're walking by the Portland Art Museum, you're able to see a portion of the collection without even stepping through the doors, let alone paying admission. This week's selection here at Fifty Two Pieces is one of the many sculptures in the outdoor Sculpture Garden. Rain or shine, day or night, Deborah Butterfield's Dance Horse stands as if looking for a carrot, apple or maybe some alfalfa. Butterfield is known for her horse sculptures. This week well be looking more closely at Dance Horse as well as some of the others that she has created over the years and released into the wild.