Judy Pfaff

Wild Rose

September 21, 2008-May 8, 2009

Wild Rose (Working Title) was constructed in the gallery by the artist and her four assistants, Jamie, Carol, Atsuko and Sarturo during a period of 14 days and nights. Truckloads of materials and tools were brought in from the Pfaff studios in the mid-Hudson Valley in order to execute the sculpture. Essentially, the gallery became Pfaff's studio. The completed sculpture charged the “vertical gallery” like a chaotic storm of whirling debris, as it cascaded down from the ceiling and was tethered to the sidewalls by hooks, brackets and cables. Pfaff is known for her inventive use of materials. Wild Rose incorporated painted and expanded foam, bent and constructed steel, rubber tubing, tree roots, grapevine, fake flowers, string, wire, black aluminum foil, a scrim made of tape; fluorescent, neon and black lights. The gallery walls were painted delicate shades of yellow and blue suggesting transitions from day to night, the changing seasons and the passage of time. At the end of the exhibition on May 8, the sculpture was dismantled. The materials were carefully organized and packed into trucks. Many will be recycled into other sculptures. But Wild Rose is unique and will never be reconstructed in this way again.