Chapters
by Daniel Stuelpnagel
Chapter Eighteen
untitled # 370 (2006)
collection of Funk & Bolton, Attorneys (Baltimore)When I returned to my studio, I was prepared to embark on the project ahead, which was to develop additional works for the collection of Funk & Bolton. Continuing with the curatorial steps I had used a year earlier, and incorporating a number of landscapes rather than seascapes, I also developed new work especially for the office space, clearly inspired by the time in the islands and bringing a newly adapted color palette to the work.
untitled # 371 (2006)
collection of Funk & Bolton, Attorneys (Baltimore)More than ever, I was focused on integrating the art work with the space, providing a seamless experience for the employees and visitors in the spacious offices, so that a viewer could walk around the entire floor and experience a profound sense of travel and transition while still feeling grounded.
To orchestrate the balance, and have the art work play a powerful role, to facilitate creative thinking for those in the offices, I brought in several versions of the collection, viewed various paintings in the space, and got feedback at each stage of the process.
The client also wanted a large piece based on a postcard design I had done for an exhibition, a collage of scanned works on paper incorporating the map imagery and compass rose that had occupied much of my time in Maui, and in fact had become part of my works on paper since my travels in Spain.
They commissioned a nine by six foot painting on canvas based on my composition, which became my largest portable work to date.
untitled # 377 (2006)
collection of Funk & Bolton, Attorneys (Baltimore)It conveys something of the immensity of the travel experience, guided perhaps by unseen forces yet adhering to the directions apparent within our frame of reference, across oceans and clouds flying aloft, with a view to acquiring focus in the realm of global dislocation.
We rely on a compass, our own internal capability to find direction, through different experiences and orientations, to bring us to solid ground, so that we can look back on the adventure from a place of tranquility and understanding.
After spending the spring in Maui, I spent much of the summer in my Baltimore studio, until the collection was completed, shortly before my scheduled return trip to open the exhibition in Lahaina.
A short three weeks back on Maui, to conclude one of the longest wonderful endless summers of my life with a far away exhibition, and then back east where Funk & Bolton opened their latest additions to their collection of original art.
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