Cutting-edge contemporary at PMA's Biennial

Every two years, the Portland Museum of Art treats us to a snapshot of the Maine contemporary art scene in the form of the much-anticipated Biennial exhibition. This is one of those delightful years. The show opens to the public tomorrow and is sure to generate a lot of excitement.

Today I was one of the lucky few who had the chance to tour the exhibition during the press preview with Director Mark Bessire and curators Susan Danly and Sage Lewis. Here you can see some of the fine folks who work their magic at local media outlets, including the Portland Press Herald, the Lewiston Sun Journal, Portland Magazine, The Bollard and WCSH-6.

Susan called this show a "radical change" from past year's Biennials. Why? Because of the number of artists and works in the show. The 2009 exhibition includes 29 works by 17 artists. In contrast, the 2007 Biennial included 98 works by 61 artists.

Jurors for this year's show were Elizabeth Burke, an art consultant and former co-director of the Clementine Gallery in New York, Denise Markonish, curator at the Massachusetts Museum of Contemporary Art, and Dan Graham, a video, installation and performance artist who lives in New York.

Susan credited Dan Graham with steering the jurors to a number of excellent installation works. After the jurors selected the installations, they then looked for a number of smaller works that would relate to the installations. These works generally provide a new way of looking at landscapes, such as Mary Aro's Ashcan-style paintings of a Maine dump and Melissa A. Calderon's chromogenic prints of a gold-plated chicken traveling through an urban environment.

Here are just a few of the installations sure to wow museum visitors:

This is "Thumper," by Sam van Aken. The work is composed of 50 subwoofers and when turned on emits a loud thumping bass, reminiscent of the noise that comes from the cars of teenage boys. Sam won the Jurors' Prize at the 2007 Biennial.

This is just part of Sean Foley's installation "Menace." His work was featured in a recent show at Whitney Art Works, and he won a Jurors' Prize at the 2003 Biennial.

This massive installation, "Falsework" by Wade Kavanaugh, fills the entrance to the main gallery and forms a wall that guides visitors into the space before it spills out in undulating waves. You can see a satellite installation of this work in the window of the Port City Music Hall.

And here's the result of Ethan Hayes-Chute's construction project, which I blogged about a couple weeks ago. It's called "Hermitage" and reminds me of a shack my uncle built in the woods behind my grandfather's dairy farm when he was a teenager.

The really cool think about Ethan's piece is you can actually walk around inside it. As you explore, you'll find the belongings of an imaginary hermit, including his liquor cabinet. The work feels so real, down to the ashes on the stove and the pinecones on the roof. This realism extends to the nearby outhouse, where you'll want to be sure to check out what lies beneath the seat.

The Portland Museum of Art's 2009 Biennial opens April 8 and remains on view through June 7. Tickets cost $10 and admission is free on Friday nights.

Artist builds house inside PMA for Biennial

Right now the Portland Museum of Art is filled with the sound of pounding nails. The uncharacteristic noise is coming from the construction of of Ethan Hayes-Chute's spectacular piece called "Hermitage," which is part of the soon-to-open 2009 Biennial. An actual two-story building, he and his friends are building it right in the center of the Great Hall.

Here's Ethan, who grew up in Freeport and now lives in Berlin, peering out of one of the unfinished windows. His aim is to re-create a backwoods camp or a seaside shack. The type of structure a hermit would call home.

In the 2007 Biennial, four of his small acrylic paintings were selected for inclusion and all depicted small cabins.

"I'm often trying to create feelings of isolation and solitude with my paintings," he told me, later adding "this is based on numerous other cabins I've seen in movies or real life."

When it's complete, the hut will be open for museum visitors to enter and explore. This photo (snapped from the show's catalog proof) gives a glimpse of what the inside of the cabin will look like. Ethan plans to fill it with found and salvaged objects to give it a real lived-in feel.

"I'm a total pack rat, so I've been collecting stuff since I could drive," Ethan said, and added that he plans to clean out all the stuff he's stored in his parents' basement over the years. (I can just hear them breathing a sigh of relief.)

All the wood being used in the project was salvaged from local recycling centers or donated by friends and family. This past winter, Ethan created a similar piece for the Berlin gallery Program.

"I'm trying to make it as authentic as a real house would be," Ethan said.

He expects to finish construction this week and then work on outfitting the interior next week.

This year's much anticipated Biennial will feature a number of unusual art installations, including a piece by Sam van Aken that will reportedly play music and roll around. The show opens to the public April 8, but anyone can stop by this week or next to see Ethan at work.

17 make Biennial cut

Today the Portland Museum of Art announced the list of artists chosen for inclusion in the 2009 Biennial. This will be the sixth time the PMA has assembled this much-anticipated show, which serves as a snapshot of the state's current art vibe. On the off years when the PMA is not hosting the Biennial, the Center for Maine Contemporary Art picks up the slack (this year's show just closed on Oct. 5).

In a departure from previous exhibitions, the PMA's 2009 Biennial will present a more pared down view. While the 2007 show included 98 works by 61 artists, the 2009 show includes just 28 works by 17 artists. The intent, according to the press release, is to "present a close examination of works by a small but diverse group of artists with ties to Maine, rather than a broad survey of the contemporary art scene here."

The show attracted 970 applications, so selecting just 17 artists must have been tough for the jurors, who are Elizabeth Burke, art consultant and former co-director of Clementine Gallery in New York; Dan Graham, a video, installation, and performance artist based in New York; and Denise Markonish, curator at the Massachusetts Museum of Contemporary Art in North Adams.

As you can see in this photo courtesy of the PMA, Curatorial Coordinator Sage Lewis hardly had room to move around in her office once the submissions began to arrive.

The exhibition opens April 8, 2009 and remains on view until June 7.

Here are the artists whose work will be in the show:

*Eric Aho (Saxtons River, VT and Islesford, ME) (2003)
*Mary Aro (Grosse Pointe Park, MI and Sedgwick, ME) (1998, 2001, 2007)
Dozier Bell (Waldoboro, ME)
Melissa A. Calderon (Bronx, NY)
*Tillman Crane (Camden, ME) (2007)
*Sean Foley (Worthington, OH) (2003)
A. Jacob Galle (Berryville, VA)
Ilana Halperin (Glasgow, Scotland and Camden, ME)
*Ethan Hayes-Chute (Berlin, Germany and Freeport, ME) (2007)
*Tanja Alexia Hollander (Auburn, ME) (2001, 2007)
Wade Kavanaugh (Brooklyn, NY and Brunswick, ME)
Steven Perkins (Bath, ME)
Andrew Rosen (South Portland, ME)
Julianna Swaney (Portland, OR)
Susan Hayre Thelwell (Santa Fe, NM and Hulls Cove, ME)
Susan Prince Thompson (Wilton, NH)
*Sam Van Aken (Syracuse, NY and Portland, ME) (2007)

* exhibited in past Biennials