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PERSPECTIVE: "Post-Revolutionary Selections" at the Powel House Museum
City Paper welcomes guest Critical Mass columnist Jonathan Wallis, assistant professor of art history at Moore College of Art and Design. His column, "Perspective," runs monthly in this space, bringing a critical eye to a visual art scene that continues to thrive in Philadelphia. Questions? E-mail Wallis at jswallis@gmail.com. >>>KNOCK ON THE big wooden door at 244 S. Third St. and you can enter a museum filled with artistic, curatorial and historical wonder. "Post-Revolutionary Selections from the Powel House Moving Image Archive, 1888- 2089" (through May 8), a collaborative artistic project at the Powel House Museum, invites viewers to time-travel to actual and imagined pasts and futures, connecting with over 300 years of site-specific history inside one of Philadelphia's most famous and treasured historical landmarks. The experience is that of a "meta-museum," where a potential future archive of moving images is "returned" to the present for contemplation and complication of the written and unwritten, and real and imagined history and future of the Powel House. "Post-Revolutionary Selections" is the brainchild of Robert Wuilfe, founding curator of Landmarks Contemporary Projects at the Philadelphia Society for the Preservation of Landmarks. Created in 2006, Wuilfe's experimental program involves the confluence of contemporary art/culture and historical sites in Philadelphia, and from the looks of the museum-wide video installation at the Powel House, Wuilfe has a knack for matching artistic temperaments with historic spaces. "Post-Revolutionary Selections" is the product of two artists, Nadia Hironaka and Matthew Suib, who have been working collaboratively for several years now. Their current detour into an existing historical site has produced a museum experience that is provocative yet accessible, and conceptually and formally balanced with the existing site. This is one example of Philadelphia's potential to produce its own unique brand of critical art within contemporary culture; one that turns to its own talented artists and curators, and rich cultural resources and history. The Powel House is a story of change, loss and renewal. Built by the merchant and shipmaster Charles Stedman in 1765, the home was purchased by Samuel Powel in 1769. Powel, a native Philadelphian, was mayor before and after the Revolutionary War, and he saw the city go from British occupation to American independence. His house was a hub of high society at the time; he and his wife, Elizabeth Willing, entertained grandly — Washington, Adams, Franklin and Lafayette all passed through its doors. Later, in the early 20th century, the house was converted into a commercial space for a Russian horsehair and bristle business and most of its architectural interior was sold off (portions went to the Philadelphia Museum of Art). The house was then almost lost to demolition, but the Philadelphia Society for the Preservation of Landmarks saved it in 1931. Its early past as a domestic abode is now a re-created present, and much of the in-between years are reconsidered in the current installation. Wuilfe has written a very informative brochure with many critical insights to accompany the project that can be picked up when you visit the museum (an exhibition catalog is slated for publication this summer). Jonathan Burton, resident historian at the Powel House Museum, is there at all times (in fact, he answers the door when you arrive), and his knowledge of the museum's holdings and the house's history is impressive. Hironaka and Suib have placed a flat-screen TV and a clean, austere white bench in each of the four main rooms accessible to the public. The videos in these rooms relate to both the original function of the interior spaces during the time they were occupied by Powel's family, while also evoking later lost histories — whether these are in the actual past or part of a "future past." The Dickensian journeying in A Christmas Carol is transcribed artistically onto the spirit of the Powel House through the work of Hironaka and Suib. Both rooms on the first floor evoke effects of an imagined time when the house loses its human presence and nature's organic powers take control of the space. Pigeons do "what they do best" all over one room and plants grow through the seams of floorboards in time-lapse footage in the other (even a worm inches its way across the floor at one point). Through digital effects the interiors become dilapidated, with cracking paint and mildew on the walls. The videos present a version of the Powel house not unlike Life After People, where plants and animals "take back" a realm of previous human habitation. Subtle touches in the museum's rooms themselves make these virtual images more tangible — a few blades of grass sprout through the floorboards in the front parlor, and some faux pigeon droppings drip from windowsills and other ledges in the back parlor. Hironaka and Suib's sensitivity to the earlier history of the space within the current artistic transformation is one of the strongest and most compelling aspects of the installation, and the result is an energizing artistic and historical synergy. The presence of their work enhances the desire to examine and absorb the museum's existing architecture and artifacts, as well as the cultural and historical interests and endeavors of its previous occupants. It turns a distant, fading American history into a more intimate experience that illuminates its closeness to our own recent and present realities — nowhere more so than in the second-floor dining room, where clips of radical revolutionary interviews from the 1960s are digitally manipulated to look as if they were filmed in the room itself — they mix with the museum's silhouette portraits of famous figures from America's earlier Revolution that hang on the surrounding walls. Colonial America becomes less of an idealized history and more a tangible past of actual men and women not so different from ourselves, and we ponder how notions of oppression and revolution have evolved over 200 years. Looking at the portraits, furniture and other ephemera, and walking through the rooms and on the staircases all becomes more intense. The process works in reverse, too. The age of the house — its smells, creaky stairs and floorboards and antique objects push energy into the video installations. Entering the drawing room is both marvelous and uncanny — the presence of the video amid Georgian architectural decorations reminded me of the strange temporal juxtaposition in Stanley Kubrick's final scene in 2001: A Space Odyssey, where David Bowman's space capsule sits in a similar period room. Placed near an antique piano and harp, the flat-screen video supplies the music for absent musicians (Elizabeth Willing Powel would entertain guests here). Accelerating visually through images of the room, as the music rises in pitch, the video reaches near total abstraction. What makes this particular installation so fascinating is that the drawing room at the Powel House is a copy of itself; the original was sold to the Philadelphia Museum of Art when the home was converted to a warehouse in the early 20th century, and this version is based off the PMA's reconstruction. Notions of simulacra abound. "Post-Revolutionary Selections" demonstrates the innovative artistic projects possible within Philadelphia's own city borders when local artists, curators, historical sites and public organizations team together. It was Ben Franklin who, at the signing of the Declaration of Independence (not too far from the house), stated, "We must all hang together, or we will surely all hang together." While not the dire and ominous situation of a political revolution, the civic dedication to homegrown, publicly accessible, collaborative art production evident in the Powel House Museum does, nevertheless, inspire a form of Philadelphia artistic independence. PREVIOUSLY >> PERSPECTIVE: "Dead Flowers" at Vox Populi Harry and Harrietta Falloff Posted 2010-04-28 16:17:23
PERSPECTIVE: "Post-Revolutionary Selections" at the Powel House Museum
>>>KNOCK ON THE big wooden door at 244 S. Third St. and you can enter a museum filled with artistic, curatorial and historical wonder.
"Post-Revolutionary Selections from the Powel House Moving Image Archive, 1888- 2089" (through May 8), a collaborative artistic project at the Powel House Museum, invites viewers to time-travel to actual and imagined pasts and futures, connecting with over 300 years of site-specific history inside one of Philadelphia's most famous and treasured historical landmarks.
The experience is that of a "meta-museum," where a potential future archive of moving images is "returned" to the present for contemplation and complication of the written and unwritten, and real and imagined history and future of the Powel House.
"Post-Revolutionary Selections" is the brainchild of Robert Wuilfe, founding curator of Landmarks Contemporary Projects at the Philadelphia Society for the Preservation of Landmarks. Created in 2006, Wuilfe's experimental program involves the confluence of contemporary art/culture and historical sites in Philadelphia, and from the looks of the museum-wide video installation at the Powel House, Wuilfe has a knack for matching artistic temperaments with historic spaces.
"Post-Revolutionary Selections" is the product of two artists, Nadia Hironaka and Matthew Suib, who have been working collaboratively for several years now. Their current detour into an existing historical site has produced a museum experience that is provocative yet accessible, and conceptually and formally balanced with the existing site. This is one example of Philadelphia's potential to produce its own unique brand of critical art within contemporary culture; one that turns to its own talented artists and curators, and rich cultural resources and history.
The Powel House is a story of change, loss and renewal. Built by the merchant and shipmaster Charles Stedman in 1765, the home was purchased by Samuel Powel in 1769. Powel, a native Philadelphian, was mayor before and after the Revolutionary War, and he saw the city go from British occupation to American independence. His house was a hub of high society at the time; he and his wife, Elizabeth Willing, entertained grandly — Washington, Adams, Franklin and Lafayette all passed through its doors. Later, in the early 20th century, the house was converted into a commercial space for a Russian horsehair and bristle business and most of its architectural interior was sold off (portions went to the Philadelphia Museum of Art). The house was then almost lost to demolition, but the Philadelphia Society for the Preservation of Landmarks saved it in 1931.
Its early past as a domestic abode is now a re-created present, and much of the in-between years are reconsidered in the current installation. Wuilfe has written a very informative brochure with many critical insights to accompany the project that can be picked up when you visit the museum (an exhibition catalog is slated for publication this summer).
Jonathan Burton, resident historian at the Powel House Museum, is there at all times (in fact, he answers the door when you arrive), and his knowledge of the museum's holdings and the house's history is impressive.
Hironaka and Suib have placed a flat-screen TV and a clean, austere white bench in each of the four main rooms accessible to the public. The videos in these rooms relate to both the original function of the interior spaces during the time they were occupied by Powel's family, while also evoking later lost histories — whether these are in the actual past or part of a "future past."
The Dickensian journeying in A Christmas Carol is transcribed artistically onto the spirit of the Powel House through the work of Hironaka and Suib. Both rooms on the first floor evoke effects of an imagined time when the house loses its human presence and nature's organic powers take control of the space. Pigeons do "what they do best" all over one room and plants grow through the seams of floorboards in time-lapse footage in the other (even a worm inches its way across the floor at one point).
Through digital effects the interiors become dilapidated, with cracking paint and mildew on the walls. The videos present a version of the Powel house not unlike Life After People, where plants and animals "take back" a realm of previous human habitation. Subtle touches in the museum's rooms themselves make these virtual images more tangible — a few blades of grass sprout through the floorboards in the front parlor, and some faux pigeon droppings drip from windowsills and other ledges in the back parlor.
Hironaka and Suib's sensitivity to the earlier history of the space within the current artistic transformation is one of the strongest and most compelling aspects of the installation, and the result is an energizing artistic and historical synergy. The presence of their work enhances the desire to examine and absorb the museum's existing architecture and artifacts, as well as the cultural and historical interests and endeavors of its previous occupants.
It turns a distant, fading American history into a more intimate experience that illuminates its closeness to our own recent and present realities — nowhere more so than in the second-floor dining room, where clips of radical revolutionary interviews from the 1960s are digitally manipulated to look as if they were filmed in the room itself — they mix with the museum's silhouette portraits of famous figures from America's earlier Revolution that hang on the surrounding walls. Colonial America becomes less of an idealized history and more a tangible past of actual men and women not so different from ourselves, and we ponder how notions of oppression and revolution have evolved over 200 years. Looking at the portraits, furniture and other ephemera, and walking through the rooms and on the staircases all becomes more intense.
The process works in reverse, too. The age of the house — its smells, creaky stairs and floorboards and antique objects push energy into the video installations. Entering the drawing room is both marvelous and uncanny — the presence of the video amid Georgian architectural decorations reminded me of the strange temporal juxtaposition in Stanley Kubrick's final scene in 2001: A Space Odyssey, where David Bowman's space capsule sits in a similar period room. Placed near an antique piano and harp, the flat-screen video supplies the music for absent musicians (Elizabeth Willing Powel would entertain guests here). Accelerating visually through images of the room, as the music rises in pitch, the video reaches near total abstraction.
What makes this particular installation so fascinating is that the drawing room at the Powel House is a copy of itself; the original was sold to the Philadelphia Museum of Art when the home was converted to a warehouse in the early 20th century, and this version is based off the PMA's reconstruction. Notions of simulacra abound.
"Post-Revolutionary Selections" demonstrates the innovative artistic projects possible within Philadelphia's own city borders when local artists, curators, historical sites and public organizations team together. It was Ben Franklin who, at the signing of the Declaration of Independence (not too far from the house), stated, "We must all hang together, or we will surely all hang together." While not the dire and ominous situation of a political revolution, the civic dedication to homegrown, publicly accessible, collaborative art production evident in the Powel House Museum does, nevertheless, inspire a form of Philadelphia artistic independence.
PREVIOUSLY >> PERSPECTIVE: "Dead Flowers" at Vox Populi
"....provocative yet accessible, and conceptually and formally balanced with the existing site. This is one example of Philadelphia's potential to produce its own unique brand of critical art within contemporary culture; one that turns to its own talented artists and curators, and rich cultural resources and history." Frenz fest much? How many times can you mention PMA in this wind bag of an article. Wee know u didn't pay by the column inch for this gem shitpaper. Put us to sleep why don't cha assistant prof of noise and drone. Wee are so excited now wee are going to run over to that musty colonial art museum that;s really just a olde house and see the equally snorie work of these 2 insiderz. They got the bucks to du this from taxpayer dough, oh!!!!!!!!!! Whaddatown, sillytowne!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! U have heaped on everything that addz fuel to the flames of the smoldering rep of the arts in this town. Ben Franklin, colonial houses, Post-revolution, and some faux pigeon droppings. Love the bold face, not. Keep up the good work. U will kill this place completely eventually.
I am so happy to see the Powel House getting this renewed attention through these creative projects. Residents of Philadelphia are very lucky indeed to have such a rich culture around them. Dont take it for granted!
So Critical Mass columnist Jonathan Wallis, assistant professor of art history at Moore College of Art and Design thinks a pile of pigeon droppings is art? He doesn't know history either. He misquotes Franklin. How can he get that famous quote wrong? "if we do not hang together we will all hang separately", not "if we do not hang together we will all hang together". What a clueless windbag indeed. And this is a professor? Tenured? It is a disgrace what Landmarks has allowed mister W. to do repeatedly in this, one of the most important historic houses in Philadelphia. The vast majority of people who visit the historic sites here do not expect or appreciate the insults, desecration and trashing of them and our history. The Pew Charitable Trust and Landmarks board of directors should be run out of town tarred and feathered for sponsoring this anti social so-called art. That money could have been spent to paint the real interior of the house, Mr. W., while site manager, let it fall apart. Could have paid for advertising to bring the public there. Could have spent the money on a real exhibit on history. Obviously Mr. W. has been trying for some time to turn this once beautiful house into the wreck he always arranges it to be portrayed as, and wishes it to be. He and his fellow travelers are consumed with contempt for American history and any art that inspires or gives pleasure. City Paper should get someone with a little intelligence to contribute to your rag or you can go the way of the Ink.
I did misquote Franklin, as you indicate. Thank you for making that correction.
Dear Harry/Harrietta and Jacque, Without dismissing your concerns or engaging in a flame-war, I would like to make clear that the Landmarks Contemporary Projects program has been envisioned as a program that is passionate about both history and critical contemporary art. It has provided opportunities for many regional artists as well as introduced an immense new audience to the importance of historic sites. To dismiss the work of the last few years (done almost entirely without funding), is to disregard the dedication of a vast array of artists, performers, scholars, board members, students and volunteers who have chosen to dedicate themselves to finding new ways to preserve the past for future generations and reach out to new communities. I would be more than happy to buy either of you a cup of coffee and discuss your concerns in person and tell you more about the program (and I'm sure our Executive Director and a board member or two would be happy to tag along). You are obviously passionate about what you believe in, and I believe we share many of the same goals. I hope to have the opportunity to show you that we are ultimately on the same side. One of the goals of this program is dialogue. Please contact me if you'd like to talk. Sincerely, Robert Wuilfe Curator of Contemporary Projects Philadelphia Society for the Preservation of Landmarks
I'm surprised that a program that encourages artists and art viewers, many of whom would not otherwise visit the Powel House, to actively engage with this site and its history would be seen as desecrating that very history. That reflective and critical engagement might manifest itself differently for an artist than it would for an historian, but that doesn't make it less valid, nor does it make it necessarily less reverential, thoughtful, or respectful. I've found the Landmarks Contemporary Projects I've seen to be some of the most interesting art I've seen in the city, in no small part because of the dialogue between site and art, gallery walls being often a rather dead space for working with concept and meaning. I've learned a lot about Philadelphia's history in the process. I'd ask of those who feel that historic houses be treated solely with traditional historic house programming, and audiences, whether those who created that history--the Powel family, guests George Washington, Benjamin Franklin, etc.--would rather have the house enshrined to tours, or would rather see a range of activities evolving, challenging the status quo in a way that befits the revolutionary history of the house and bringing in a wider range of visitors to interact with American and Philadelphia history in their own ways.
"....thinks a pile of pigeon droppings is art?" Typical uneducated, knee-jerk reaction (see Giuliani, Jesse Helms, etc). Please educate us as to what art SHOULD be, Jacque.
It' s a wonderful project ! I like the video works of Nadia Hironaka and Matthew Suib . For more informations about an italian past exhibitions "MNEMOSYNE - The Atlas of images" see the website : www.camillaboemio.com and http://blog.panorama.it/culturaesocieta/2009/05/26/mnemocyne-latlante-delle-immagini-i-video/ CAMILLA BOEMIO critic and curator
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