Wednesday, October 6, 2004
2004 Eric Yake Kenagy Visiting Artist, wood sculptor and Holocaust survivor von Rydingsvard, offers public address on Oct. 21
GOSHEN, Ind. –
Sculptor Ursula von Rydingsvard creates metaphors in
wood.
Selected by the Goshen
College Art Department as the 2004 Eric Yake Kenagy Visiting
Artist, von Rydingsvard will give an illustrated presentation on
Oct. 21 at 7 p.m. in Rieth Recital Hall, Goshen College Music
Center.
Born in Germany in 1942,
von Rydingsvard spent her early childhood in Nazi labor camps and
later in refugee camps until her parents and their seven children
were able to immigrate to the United States in 1950.
For von Rydingsvard, wood became the
key to unlocking the autobiographical and ancestral content that
she has since transformed into metaphor. Her wood sculptures
resonate with a sense of history and human presence. Their varied
shapes and surfaces, while essentially abstract, suggest human
figure, landscape elements, household utensils and farm implements.
The titles and forms of her sculptures also recall the countryside
and tools familiar to her Polish farming family.
Sculpting mainly with
cedar since the mid-1970s, von Rydingsvard has developed a hybrid
technique that involves both constructing and carving her works.
The flexibility of her technique allows her to construct both
intimate and extremely large-scale work.
The contemporary
artist has gained national and international acclaim for her large
and distinctive wooden forms and was featured on the cover of
Sculpture Magazine in July
2003. Von Rydingsvard “combines primordial forms and highly
expressive content to produce haunting and monumental works of
uncommon power,” said Smithsonian Magazine.
Von
Rydingsvard’s work has been featured in museums such as the
Metropolitan Museum of Art, Whitney Museum of American Art, the
Walker Art Center and the Detroit Institute of Arts. A number of
private collectors, including Microsoft Corporation, have
commissioned outdoor pieces.
“Von
Rydingsvard is in the front rank of sculptors today,” said
Martin Friedman, director emeritus of the Walker Art Center.
“She is also a key figure in restoring to sculpture its sense
of craft.”
Von Rydingsvard studied
sculpture at Columbia University with Ronald Bladen, George
Sugarman and Jean Linder and now resides in New York
City.
Von Rydingsgard is the
18th Eric Yake Kenagy Visiting Artist Program speaker. The program
honors the late Eric Yake Kenagy, who was a gifted ceramics student
at Goshen College from 1984 until his death in 1986.
Goshen College,
established in 1894, is a four-year residential Christian liberal
arts college rooted in the Anabaptist-Mennonite tradition. The
college’s Christ-centered core values – passionate
learning, global citizenship, compassionate peacemaking and
servant-leadership – prepare students as leaders for the
church and world. Recognized for its unique Study-Service Term
program, Goshen has earned citations of excellence in
Barron’s Best Buys in Education, “Colleges of
Distinction,” “Making a Difference College Guide”
and U.S.News & World Report’s
“America’s Best Colleges” edition, which named
Goshen a “least debt college.” Visit https://www.goshen.edu. - by Melanie
Histand Editors: For more information, contact Jodi
H. Beyeler at (574) 535-7572 or jodihb@goshen.edu. ###