The theme of Art On Wheels will be explored in the works of Laurent Baude, Nancy Jurs, Lillian M?ndez, Christopher Stangler, Ellen Steinfeld, Carol Townsend and Alfonso Volo in Reaction to Traction: The Works of Seven Artists, on view at the Burchfield-Penney Art Center through October 12, 2003.

Laurent Baude, a native of France, has lived in Asia, Europe, the Middle East and presently in Chicago. He refers to his sculpture as "works that incorporate cast off materials from an over-materialized world." His piece, Managing Diversity, is a literal assemblage of the non-stop swirl of life at the World Trade Center in New York City in the year 2000. Conceived as a circle, the sculpture combines objects and materials that played a role in the daily lives of the workers. In a post 9/11 context everyday secular objects, a keyboard, paperweight, file cabinet, now become sacred and memorialize the tragic events of 9/11/01. Before Laurent became an artist, he wanted to be an archaeologist. Calling his works temoignages or witnessings, one can see how they act as archaeological fragments and bear witness to a former place in time.

Reunion, an assemblage by Nancy Jurs, combines found objects of transportation - a propeller, a wooden bicycle hoop, an ice sled, an oar - with antique shop mannequins and circular forms in a linear installation spanning twelve feet. Ironically, the mannequins, being only torsos, lack limbs and are incapable of the movement provided by the flea market finds. Reunion is a departure for Jurs whose medium, for the past 40 years, has been clay. She sees her work process as one that "transforms the earth itself and gives birth to endless, never-yet-existing forms. Now I have discovered another way of giving birth, more accurately rebirth…by the juxtaposing and grouping of unrelated found objects until they exude new meanings."

The works of Lillian M?ndez are often amalgams of two cultures, Puerto Rican and American. "As a Latina," M?ndez states, "I like to keep the traditions alive. This personal journey gives me tremendous energy for my work… creating in steel, paint and other sculpture materials, I revisit the stories told to me about my past."

Truck Angel/Baquin?, based on a Puerto Rican custom entitled El Baquin?, documents a child’s funeral and the bittersweet celebration long ago practiced by the Puerto Rican community. Mourners took part in the multi-day ceremony, chanting rosaries, preparing festive food tables, and playing traditional music. The child was dressed in white and a red flower would be placed on the child’s mouth. Members of the community would bring flowers and gifts. No one was allowed to sleep for several days, hence the celebration part of this ceremony. As people stayed awake, they believed that they were helping the child enter the gates of heaven.

Truck Angel/Baquin? incorporates parts of an older model pick-up truck painted with mourners and family members. In the truck’s bed stands a Plexiglas coffin with an image of a child partially shaped by the stiffened lace of a long white dress. The truck takes on the figurative presence of an angel enhanced by fiber-glassed banana leaves attached to a metal armature.

Snake Bite, a painting by Christopher Stangler, deals with environmental abuses caused by urban sprawl and irresponsible growth. "Development, or the wheel of progress," states Stangler, "continues to turn against what little green space we have left. On a small plot of wooded land, bulldozers and dump trucks made quick work of that which took nature generations."

Inspired by the changing landscape witnessed on a daily commute from Lockport to the University at Buffalo, Stangler's painting is a memorial to a land that was. Fallen trees are represented by leftover sawdust and wood chips. Wrapped taut around the canvasake, under pressure, as if it were to strike. An ice-fishing piece of equipment used to signal fishermen of a catch now symbolically sounds an environmental warning. "Something is going on in our environment," laments Stangler. "We watch it happen while waiting for the bite."

Juggle, a steel sculpture by Ellen Steinfeld, integrates found shapes with created forms. The theme of the wheel was used as a basic point of departure and referenced in positive and negative forms. "The purpose of the work was to push, stretch, balance and juggle solid and linear forms as far as possible while incorporating a feeling of the universe," states Steinfeld.

Juggle consists of three dominant circular forms intersected by strong vertical and zigzag elements. Appearing as if to topple over, these shapes are bolstered by an elliptical shape under which is a circular form painted sun bright orange and yellow-gold. Color, as in most of Steinfeld's works, is bold and textural creating depth in the steel. Cobalt blue mixed with violet vies for position with turquoises and apple greens.

"My sculptures deal with nature, the environment and the inter-relationships created between these concepts and people," said Steinfeld. The artist's visual vocabulary often combines realistic images with non-representational forms. The resulting energy and movement is uncontainable and formidable.

The ceramics of Carol Townsend find inspiration in the indigenous painted pottery of Crete, and in works found in the pottery villages of Mexico and the pueblos of the American Southwest. Speaking of her ceramics, Townsend expresses strong interest in exploring how surface pattern and texture develop a dialogue with the form underneath.

Full Cycle incorporates a clay head inscribed with writings pertaining to the wheel and cycles in nature. Both the work’s title and head shape reference the full stage of the moon. The wagon/coach, which holds the head, is compiled from both ceramic and found materials. Northwest American Indian cart forms, discovered by Townsend in a Vancouver museum, inspired this construction. "Looking like gigantic pull toys carrying deities," said Townsend. "These images have haunted me for years."

Alfonso Volo, painter, sculptor, and video artist, describes his work as "forms (which) take on absurdity and humor when they are created in a dialogue between the mysterious and the explicit." Fettered Sweaters for Toy Vehicles falls within this context by contrasting seemingly innocent toy cars covered in pastel colored baby yarn with fish hooks, metal screws and glued fake eyes. The sweatered toy vehicles lie on the floor of a room forming a fanned-out cluster. Twelve-foot, crocheted-yarn string, attached to each vehicle, loops up to a screw inserted in the corner of the room 6 feet above the floor, suggesting that these creatures are being taken for a walk or pulled like fish out of the sea. Giving animal or human traits to our possessions – cars, boats, even power tools, is common practice. We are not sure what these tethered and hooked, fuzzy-yarned vehicles with evil-eyed tires are about. It is this humor, this ambiguity, this macabre surrealism that distinguishes the works of Alfonso Volo.

In addition to Reaction to Traction: The Works of Seven Artists, smaller works, relating to the Art On Wheels theme, by artists Donna Ioviero, Wes Olmsted and Julie Zabinski, will be installed in the Rockwell Hall 2nd Floor Display Case.

About the Burchfield-Penney Art Center

The Burchfield-Penney Art Center is a museum dedicated to the art and vision of Charles E. Burchfield and distinguished artists of Buffalo Niagara and Western New York State. Through its affiliation with Buffalo State College, the museum encourages learning and celebrates our richly creative and diverse community. For more information, call (716) 878-6011 osit www.burchfield-penney.org.

The Burchfield-Penney Art Center is supported in part with public funds from the New York State Council on the Arts and County of Erie. Additional operating support is provided by the Elizabeth Elser Doolittle Trust, the Mary A. H. Rumsey Foundation and the Burchfield-Penney's members.