“Artemis, Acrobats, Divas and Dancers” Art of Nancy Spero
I think all artists who seek to have their work shown or published, seek to communicate a private idea of theirs within a public forum. Art blurs the distinctions between the private and the public; private thoughts are embodied in public art, and public art inspires private thought in the public who view it.
As an art student, Nancy Spero had qualms about becoming an artist because she feared that artists were of no use to society. I think that is why all of her work has a political statement, or some sort of social commentary behind it. Through her work, she communicates messages, in the hope that they will provoke thought in her viewers. Thus she, as an artist, is of great use to society, since a thoughtful, informed public has the potential to change the world.
Of her art, Nancy Spero says, “I guess maybe my art can be said to be a protest. I don’t know if it’s railing against the world or something, but I am protesting, and as an artist I am privileged to create things the way I think they should be, because that gets out my message to the world. I am interested in messages, and if people want to take something from it, I am thrilled, of course.” Through her art, stamped with her very private point of view, she hopes to affect the public.
Nancy Spero has a repertoire of over five hundred figures that she has created and amassed over her fifty-year career in the arts. The figures that appear in mosaics along the walls of the Lincoln Center subway station were chosen out of these five hundred, and arranged in a dance-like procession. Her figures are inspired mostly by Ancient Egyptian images, and include performers of many types. There is movement in the figures as you view the procession from the window of a departing train car. It’s almost as if they are putting on a show for you as you pass them.
Thus the mosaics are perfectly suited to Lincoln Center, but they also represent a lifetime of work. The multicultural, female figures, poised and athletic, emphasize tolerance and equality, not just simply performers at Lincoln Center. There is depth and meaning to the public exhibit, beyond it’s obvious representation. Nancy Spero says, “I like to think that I have all layers of conceptual in the art, that it’s easily read, but on the other hand, I do hope that it’s more complicated, and that it’s not just one easy read.” It is up to us to interpret for ourselves the messages she, and other artists, offer us in their public works of art, knowing that the art does contain a private moment of the artist’s mind.
Source:
quotations taken from video clips and biography on:
http://www.pbs.org/art21/artists/spero/index.html
Theresa Raniolo
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Cultural Map
"The Original Topography of Manhattan Island from the Battery to 155th Street" From Report on the Social Statistics of Cities, Compiled by George E. Waring, Jr., United States. Census Office, Part I, 1886. (Perry-Castañeda Library Map Collection, University of Texas-Austin)
