When I first encountered the work of sculptor Jenene Nagy in her
2005 solo exhibition Backyard Icing, her project hinged on the
intimacy of its scale and on the artist’s acute attention to detail.
Those sculptures, which were the result of an artist residency at
Pacific Northwest College of Art (PNCA), were inscrutable forms made of
dried house paint, foam, nails, and pushpins. It was nearly impossible
to determine if they resembled elaborately decorated cakes or miniature
arctic tableaus, but their sensuous materiality and vibrant colors were
fascinating enough to make such interpretations superfluous.
Interestingly, since that show at PNCA, the scope of Nagy’s
ambitions has grown exponentially larger. In 2006, she co-foundedTilt
Gallery and Project Space with her husband, Josh Smith, in the
EverettStation Lofts. Over the past two years, its programming has
become an increasingly reliable source for challenging,
installation-oriented art.
As an artist, Nagy’s reach has similarly swelled. In place of
Backyard Icing‘s diminutive sculptures, her recent work has been
marked by sprawling, site-specific installations that are painted
directly onto the gallery wall and seamlessly extend into
three-dimensional forms. As such, they embody both the flatness of the
pictorial plane and the depth of the sculptural object. Other local
artists have been tilling this ground of late—including Stephanie
Robison and David Eckard in last year’s Liveries (summer stock)
show—but Nagy’s handling manages to be the most formally
uncomplicated, but conceptually satisfying of the group.
After mounting similar installations in the Jesse Hayward-curated
group show The Hook Up and a solo exhibition at Linfield College
last fall, Nagy presents her most fully realized environmental work,
“s/plit,” in her recently opened APEX show at the Portland Art Museum.
A jagged form is painted in purple latex paint across two gallery
walls, while drywall extensions encroach into the space and even creep
up one wall. In “s/plit,” Nagy has added a series of neon lights:
clusters of white arrow-like triangles that seem to spur a viewer
through the gallery. As these lights’ cords snake down the front of the
sheetrock to electrical outlets, they work in tandem with the bare
two-by-fours that prop up the panels and the conspicuous paint drips to
remind the viewer that this is a built environment. Like a theater
backdrop or amusement park set, Nagy’s installation is only meant to
scan as a convincingly natural environment; it breaks down as
artificial under weightier scrutiny. But this tension is what makes
walking through “s/plit” so engaging and joyful: It’s like walking onto
a stage where the set design is cast in the starring role.