Ronnie Crutchfield's comments on Martha Wilson exhibition

(Ronnie's comments)

Looking at Martha Wilson’s earlier works was simply extraordinary. I enjoyed the way she played with her subject matter, making them into some sort of a new reality. Her interest of transformative change was clearly evident as she, in my opinion, adds a little sarcasm to age, gender, and social identities. Personas were important to her, they became a medium for her, so to speak. Works like her enactments of the wives of former Presidents George W. H. Bush and Ronald Reagan  said to be pushing the boundaries of exhibition and display practice.  The displays of the work of some of the artists she worked with at the time says a lot too. These people were people who understood her mindset and made me feel like her work was meant for her time. It was radical, and Wilson had so much appreciation for the parody, humor and irony behind personality. In her most recent works, Wilson  moves to a very in-depth political ground where she allows ‘time’ to become a factor. Role Playing and self-portraiture was a great way for Martha’s work to go. Now one see’s her continuing to be the subject of her own subjectivity. In was intrigued and pleased with Wilson’s project Growing Old. For me , it shows that we as individuals  may pay so much attention to our identity that we are blind to the spaces between ourselves and others, which triggers irony, judgment , and miscommunication.

Margaret Halquist on Martha Wilson

[Margaret wasn't able to post this, for some reason, so I'm doing it for her.]

Martha Wilson had an interesting less obvious idea of awareness as an undertone of her artwork. While it noticeably displayed her opinions towards feminism and identity there was a constant question of dedication of character. It was humorous when she said she dressed up as a guy and got kicked out of the men’s bathroom there seemed to be a wanting of something more. She dipped into each character, dressing up as each individual a woman is expected to be and plays the part. For example in her performance where she is stretching and doing “yoga” she says she want to be unaware of her unawareness. This is extremely ironic because even though yoga works as a meditative state for a lot of people, it takes some practice to get there. In the beginning it is just uncomfortable. And I think she learned that through all of her experiences, making herself uncomfortable by going to each extreme and having nothing fit.

 She gives other people extreme exposure of her physical appearance and issues of the ego. She took pictures of herself and conducted different experiences of how people perceive her and what she personally has become. A lot of people probably look up to her without any body modifications and say “wow! She has accepted her aging process! Not many people can do that.” But I don’t think she has, I think she’s obviously used to it in a way but her displaying her vulnerability would only be as powerful if she continued to feel vulnerable.

Overall I think the exhibit was a success. Her use of character and awareness of societies expectations played through in the beginning of her work and then you could tell she gave up on it further through, and just trying to be just something other then what she has become.

Martha Wilson

Martha Wilson's work deals with identity in a way I've rarely seen before. As I was lucky enough to be able to experience both her current work, as well as the work she made in her youth, I was interested in the change of direction. Her investigation began as somebody else, utilizing costume and performance to examine other people. Later in life, as she aged, she seems to turn the investigation on herself, exploring her appearance and her insecurities. Her content is extremely relatable, as everybody deals with these issues but it's rare that they are addressed in the brave way that she addresses them.

Martha Wilson

When I first came into the gallery space at Inova, I wasn't really sure where to start and just started from left to right. This started me off at the archive of works from Franklin Furnace and I was really confused on how this was Wilson's work until I realized that she was just the director of this and chose these specific pieces to go side by side her own show. I didn't get to piece that together until I finally made my way around the entire thing and ended up at the beginning as my last stop. I thought it was interesting to piece everything together after I had seen it all, not knowing what I was looking at or the content of her work. Left to my own thoughts, I couldn't find a general theme because the variety of media used was so large and I couldn't quite pinpoint one solid idea underlying each piece. I had to accept it as what it was in front of me, which even then, I couldn't quite understand what the back story was. It wasn't until after reading the description of the show and learning a bit more about her and her views that I was able to gain somewhat of an understanding on the content that she was addressing and dealing with. It may have been because I had no idea what it was about until after seeing all of the work and talking about it at the Portrait Society, but I felt that there was somewhat of a disconnect in the two gallery shows. I felt a barrier between the work and I at Inova, whereas at the Portrait Society, I felt like I was able to come to a complete understanding of what she was really saying and that I was able to engage and connect with her work. I'm not sure, however, that I would have came to the same conclusion had we not discussed it in such depth, which is neither here nor there, but something to take note of.

Martha Wilson

First off, sorry this is so late!!!!!!!

Anyways I enjoyed the exhibition. I didn't really fully understand what was going on with all of the works on display but I enjoyed what I did understand. I personally preferred her works at Portrait Society over at Inova. It may be because I personally am not a big fan of performance art. I really loved her piece at the Portrait Society of her with text over saying something to the effect of I have become what I feared most. I really feel as though she is embracing how she has aged and accepted what she has become.

So what I loved about Martha Wilson is that she used hummer in much of her stuff. I would be sitting there watching her videos when she impersonated people giggling. It was great getting to see her stuff from the past and prescient as well she kept her sense of hummer as she got older. She changed some of her stuff through and went with a more raw excretion. she didnt dress up as much. Her image with the legs are the last to go was so funny. She was creative and interesting and I very much enjoyed her stuff.

Martha Wilson thoughts

   To me, Martha Wilson is a very courageous women. Not many women (or men for that matter), will be brave enough to show the world exactly who they are, what they are or what they have become. Very few artists can give a sense of "who they are" just by the show they provide to a gallery. Martha did.  Taking in all of her works, from the start of her career to her latest series, was a opportunity many don't get to do when viewing an artist. This opportunity really allowed for me to get a sense of who she is as a women and as an artist. To me, Martha Wilson came off as a very comedic, political and courageous person.  I think the most powerful piece that I saw of her's was the video/photo of her "becoming her own worst fear" at Portrait Society. This piece really shows the younger Martha's thinking of herself becoming older and how becoming older is in the back of everyone's mind, even if we don't like to think about it. Martha really brings this idea to the light and allows herself to be subjected to discussions of getting older (and maybe uglier) as her life goes on.

My favorite part of this piece was not in the "I have become my own worst fear" but in the large smile she is presenting. I thought of this as almost reassurance that it will be okay to get older. Yes, we may be scared of getting older, wrinklier, and grayer but you are still yourself.