April 7, 2010 Corcoran College of Art + Design: Take Your Dream And Cut It In Half
Corcoran College of Art & Design 25th Annual Print Portfolio
Take Your Dream and Cut it in Half
March 24–April 3, 2010
Civilian Art Projects
1019 7th Street NW, Washington, DC 20001
Remember when you were a sophomore in college, your ideas about the world still not quite ripe and your mind easily impressionable? (For me, I seem to be permanently in this stage of my life.) At school – regardless of whether you were studying business, art, literature, or music – your primary concern was to satisfy the professors you admired and make Mom and Dad proud.
That being said, when entering this one-room exhibit comprised of 32 prints by students (both undergraduate and graduate) and faculty of Corcoran College of Art + Design, the academic environment that birthed this body of work is pretty apparent. All prints, approximately 9 by 12 inches (give or take) and arranged either landscape or portrait, are framed using almost identical wooden frames. The homogenous formatting tells me one thing: these prints were created with the purpose of a print exchange in mind. Not that there’s anything wrong with print exchanges – I would be lying if I said I hadn’t taken part in my fair share of those in my lifetime. In fact, the sheer range in voice and style throughout these prints, given the strict parameters, is impressive. It seems that despite the vast array of viewpoints (32 to be exact), the body of work seems to represent the institution that is Corcoran’s printmaking department as a whole, as opposed to allowing each individual’s voice shine through. Regardless of imagery, subject matter, and print medium, the show participants adhere strictly to the specific size given to them, with not a single one branching into the third (or fourth) dimension or beyond the size constraints. Few, if any, ventured into the realm of texture or a print material outside of Rives BFK. Clare Winslow’s “Kenyetta”, a screen printed memorial of sorts, stands out in its maximization of medium, creating a bit of trompe l’oeil with its translucent layers. Another screen print, this one by Frank C. Pappas, shows the United States Capitol – expertly convincing me that it could easily be an etching. “Real Life Is So Black And White”, a photolithograph by Tracy Pilzer, realistically depicts a color television in a black and white wheat field. Had I not taken a closer look, I would have missed that the color television was, in actuality, cut out and affixed onto the print itself (letting me spend the rest of my evening wondering what lie below the cut-out TV).
At the end, despite numerous memorable prints, there’s an undeniable undercurrent of obligation, as is the case with all academic-based exhibits. The talent exhibited through this collection of prints by Corcoran College of Art + Design is indeed formidable, though not quite shown to its full potential.
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