v i e w p o i n t D O R O T H Y S I M P S O N K R A U S E J u d i R o t e n b e r g G a l l e r y, L L C. B o s t o n, M A

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1 v i e w p o i n t D O R O T H Y S I M P S O N K R A U S E J u d i R o t e n b e r g G a l l e r y, L L C. B o s t o n, M A

2 Viewpoint Abigail Ross Goodman, Director and Curator Judi Rotenberg Gallery One of the first things I noticed when I descended into Dorothy Simpson Krause s studio this summer was the return of nature to her work. There were skeletons of trees, arteries of briars, gold-leafed terrain that read like flesh, and radiant or occluded atmospheres. These references of human vulnerabilities body and soul are an interesting counterpoint to this body of work which is about the condition of nature today. In 20 digital collages and an accompanying handmade book, Krause takes the environment around her home in Marshfield, Massachusetts as the jumping off point for a visual conversation about the impact of humans on the land. The traditional landscape is the entry point to the artist s complex technique of layering of abstract and representational images (and meaning) onto materials like aluminum, poly-carbonate, wax, gold and silver leaf. Following the artist s method, the pieces require the viewer to peel back each visual layer and then let them flip forward to reconstitute a whole. It is in this act of deconstructing and reconstructing that the viewer locates herself in the field of the images. The result is a sense of emotional presence and absence more than of location specifically. Further dualities abound in the Abigail Ross in the studio viewing Gate to the Dunes

3 work empty and built spaces, the uplifting and the foreboding, warmth and coolness. Krause unearths the beauty but recognizes the vulnerable in the landscape. She has a mournful awareness of humans impact on nature and explains the work as an elegy, a lament for a vanishing landscape. They also reveal her most intimate perspective. The name of the show, Viewpoints, is also the name of the home and studio where the artist has worked for the past 26 years. Krause s particular horizon, as it alters from season to season, year to year, also clearly provides the inspiration for these mixed media pieces. Using her home as the starting point, Krause has heightened and personalized the intensity of her observations. It is not just the environment she is concerned about, but her unique universe, the axis around which her life turns. It is intriguing to note that the only other time Krause specifically chronicled the land, was in a body of work from 2003 titled Sacred Spaces. Krause stated then that these sacred spaces are not religious shrines or destinations for pilgrims, as had been subjects in early works, but are the nearby places that still the mind, nourish the soul and provide a refuge for reflection and contemplation. Here too the artist looked outward to nature as the catalyst for looking inward. Krause has so often used her work as a platform for raising issues about culture, gender, politics and place, but only twice in larger works for addressing her own climate. In both instances, she turned away from architecture and cities, from people and relics towards the land. Here, her confluence of terra firma and the self are re-engaged. In this way it seems that these works reveal as much about the artist s personal sensitivities, as they do about our planet. Viewpoint, Inkjet printed concertina book, cover of handwoven fabric, 6 x 4.5 closed, 6 x 36 open

4 Beachgress UV cured flatbed print on polycarbonate over silver leaf 32 x 32

5 Gate to the Dunes UV cured flatbed print on polycarbonate over silver leaf 32 x 48

6 Light in the Tall Trees UV cured flatbed print on brushed aluminum dibond 48 x 32

7 Small Stream Inkjet print on silver leaf 24 x 24

8 IceStorm UV cured flatbed print on polycarbonate over silver leaf triptych 48 x 48

9 Snowpath UV cured flatbed print on polycarbonate over wood 48 x 32

10 Trees Inkjet print on aluminum 24 x 24

11 Briars Inkjet print on steel 24 x 24

12 The Shed Out Back UV cured flatbed print on polycarbonate over inkjet print 36 x 30

13 Branches UV cured flatbed print on polycarbonate over encaustic print and silver leaf 32 x 32 x 2

14 Spot for Contemplation UV cured flatbed print on polycarbonate over white paint 32 x 48

15 Through the Rain UV cured flatbed print on brushed aluminum dibond 32 x 48

16 Treeline UV cured flatbed print on polycarbonate over silver leaf 32 x 48

17 Fence UV cured flatbed print on polycarbonate over silver leaf 32 x 32

18 Shack in the Dunes UV cured flatbed print on polycarbonate over silver leaf 32 x 32

19 House on Stilts UV cured flatbed print on polycarbonate over oil on canvas painting and silver leaf 32 x 32 x 2

20 Snowfence UV cured flatbed print on polycarbonate over silver leaf 32 x 48

21 Wagon UV cured flatbed print on polycarbonate over gold wash 32 x 32

22 Horizonline Inkjet print on aluminum diptych 24 x 48

23 Storm Sky UV cured flatbed print on brushed aluminum dibond 32 x 48

24 Long Road to Sunset UV cured flatbed print on polycarbonate over metallic paint 48 x 32

25 Artist Statement Dorothy Simpson Krause For a quarter century my home and studio, Viewpoint, has been on a small island south of Boston. With the historic North River on one side, the South River on the other and Massachusetts Bay ahead, the island is connected to the mainland by a short causeway. The village of Marshfield Hills, as the name suggests, is a landscape of marshes, fields and hills. Founded in 1640 as a part of the original Plymouth Colony, the town is rich in history and natural beauty. The woods, meadows, fields, marshes, beaches, riverbanks, ponds and sky provide an ever changing panorama of nature. Each vista has unique characteristics that change with the seasons, weather and light. Within this small geographic area I am provided with an almost infinite variety of possibilities. This exhibition, also called Viewpoint, was chosen to reference both my physical vantage point and the way in which I see my world. It is an elegy, a lament for a vanishing landscape. The distant power lines, fences, footprints and empty benches serve as metaphors for the intrusion of man in nature. As I worked on the large format Viewpoint series, I also made a small concertina bound book. Focusing on the environment and our impact upon it, this small, enclosed, intimate book format allows me to research projects, ask questions and explore my responses. Crossing the boundaries between large-scale mixed media pieces and artist books, my work is an integrated mode of inquiry that links concept and media in an ongoing dialogue - a visible exploration of meaning.

26 The Process Dorothy Simpson Krause A painter by training and a collage maker by nature, I combine traditional and digital media to produce work that respects the past and alludes to the future. Although produced with the most current high technology equipment, the work is grounded in both time and place. The materials and processes I choose for my work are as varied as my concepts. In other work I have used recycled copper, plaster, tar and encaustic. In this series, in an attempt to capture the quality of light and shadow, I have used transparent and reflective materials polycarbonate, aluminum, steel, metallic pigments and silver leaf. As the viewer moves, the color shifts and shadows are cast. The images are soft and diffused as seen through a memory. The work in the Viewpoint series combines photographs and paintings. They were printed using both inkjet and uv cured flatbed printers. The inkjet prints are on aluminum and steel. The uv cured prints are printed onto 3/8 clear polycarbonate affixed to plywood which has been left natural, painted with white or metallic paint or covered with silver leaf. The image is carried around the edges of most pieces with paint. The process is most simply described as mixed media or digital collage. Incorporating variations on the Viewpoint images, the book Viewpoint is a 6 x 4.5 concertina. It has an inkjet printed landscape extending over eight folded pages to a length of 6 x 36 with a pastel, alcohol, colored pencil wash on the back. The cover is a fragment of handwoven fabric over bookcloth covered bookboard with an inkjet printed title.

27 painting on inkaid precoat work hanging in the sudio screwing on the polycarbonate printing on the HP flatbed printer painting around the edges image in Photoshop layers applying silver leaf printing on the Epson iinkjet printer the studio