Constance Lowe American, b. 1951
Bluebird Between Here and Not There, 2023/1994
Wool felt, metal grommet and buckles, leather on wood panel; archival inkjet print with metal grommet and leather, wood frame, glass
object
object
24 x 6 x 1 ¾ inches; print: 11 ¼ x 9 ¼ inches; overall dimensions variable
Bluebird Between Here and Not-There (1994/2023) pairs a felt and leather object with a framed photograph of a cloud formation. The small square, covered in blue felt with attached blue...
Bluebird Between Here and Not-There (1994/2023) pairs a felt and leather object with a framed photograph of a cloud formation. The small square, covered in blue felt with attached blue suede straps, is a re-making of a work in an earlier series in which geometric forms -- covered in vinyl, felt, leather, and velvet -- also had grommets, straps, and handles that suggested a mysterious function for the abstract objects. The new addition of the photograph (taken by the artist) expands the work’s imaginative potential for the viewer
Like other colors along the visible light spectrum, the visual sensation of “blue” is a collaboration between chemistry, physics, and the physiology of the human eye. It is also a multi-faceted notion that cannot be entirely possessed, contained, or settled. The different blues of the dyed felt and leather are unnatural to the animal origins of those materials, and the variations of “blue” perceivable in the sky are continually shifting as sunlight meets atmosphere. The grommet that pierces the cloud image and opens onto a glimpse of red leather reminds us that the image is an illusion of ink on paper that attempts to represent what is actually a brief moment in time.
The title was given after the completion of the work, inspired in part by Lowe’s neighbor’s attempts to lure Eastern bluebirds to a nesting box in her yard. It also references the first of four chapters all entitled “The Blue of Distance” by author Rebecca Solnit in her widely read book A Field Guide to Getting Lost. Solnit describes the elusiveness of the blue we perceive in the sky but at which we can never actually arrive as it continually recedes away from our immediate experience, “the color of there seen from here, the color of where you are not.” Together, the objects, image, and title become a metaphor for the elusiveness of certainty, continuing Lowe’s aim to imbue formal structures with emotional agency.
Like other colors along the visible light spectrum, the visual sensation of “blue” is a collaboration between chemistry, physics, and the physiology of the human eye. It is also a multi-faceted notion that cannot be entirely possessed, contained, or settled. The different blues of the dyed felt and leather are unnatural to the animal origins of those materials, and the variations of “blue” perceivable in the sky are continually shifting as sunlight meets atmosphere. The grommet that pierces the cloud image and opens onto a glimpse of red leather reminds us that the image is an illusion of ink on paper that attempts to represent what is actually a brief moment in time.
The title was given after the completion of the work, inspired in part by Lowe’s neighbor’s attempts to lure Eastern bluebirds to a nesting box in her yard. It also references the first of four chapters all entitled “The Blue of Distance” by author Rebecca Solnit in her widely read book A Field Guide to Getting Lost. Solnit describes the elusiveness of the blue we perceive in the sky but at which we can never actually arrive as it continually recedes away from our immediate experience, “the color of there seen from here, the color of where you are not.” Together, the objects, image, and title become a metaphor for the elusiveness of certainty, continuing Lowe’s aim to imbue formal structures with emotional agency.
