Ellen Rothenberg is part of Exposed 2011. She lives in Chicago, Illinois.
Language is like a road, it cannot be perceived all at once because it unfolds in time, whether heard or read.
–Rebecca Solnit from Wanderlust
Reverse Vista juxtaposes the rhythms of language against the constant movement of bikers, runners, and pedestrians as they pass along the recreational path leading from the village of Stowe to Mt. Mansfield and back again. This continuous loop of movement towards the mountain and back, produces a kind of continuous present which made me think both of the writings of Gertrude Stein, her use of repetition and also Rebecca Solnit’s book of essays, Wanderlust, a meditation on the act and histories of walking.
Having walked sections of the Recreation Path during a research trip to Stowe, it seems that the path itself produces community – of shared landscapes, open vistas, and discreet exchanges. And it was this layered geography of exchange, movement and landscape that informs this work.
How can a square be nearer less farther. How can a little be in place of two larger. How can a distance be after all near a bridge not yet not yet always as if it had always been a bridge had been wider. Let us think let us think of how they said anything.
–Gertrude Stein from How to Write
Ideas for Reverse Vista evolved through conversations with curator Rachel Moore who provided the title for this work.
Social movements, politics, and history inform Ellen Rothenberg’s public projects and installations. Her work has been presented in the US and Europe at MNAC, Bucharest; Royal Festival Hall, London; Neues Museum Weserburg, Bremen; the ICA and Museum of Fine Arts, Boston; MCA, Chicago; and at CUNY’s James Gallery, NYC, among others. Selected awards include grants and fellowships from the National Endowment for the Arts, Rockefeller Foundation, the Bunting Institute at Radcliffe College and Harvard University, and the Illinois Arts Council. A professor at the School of the Art Institute, Rothenberg lives and works in Chicago.
ABOUT EXPOSED
For the past twenty years, the Helen Day Art Center has hosted an outdoor public art and sculpture exhibition called Exposed in Stowe, Vermont. Exposed hosts sculptures, site-specific installations, and participatory work from twenty-three national and international artists. the 2011 edition offers a series of Thursday night events by 12 video artists, writers, performers, and musicians accompany the exhibit. This exhibition and series of events is accompanied by cell phone audio tours, QR codes, walking tour maps, walkabouts, and a catalogue of the exhibit published by Kasini House Books. The exhibition will take place July 8th to October 8th, 2011.