Spy Review: Poetic Sculpture and Revolution by Steve Parks

If you’re walking around downtown Easton between now and November Election Day, you may notice a phrase etched on the sidewalk. Don’t fret: It’s not partisan. And if it seems Greek to you, well, it’s actually Latin translated into English.

The artist responsible for this footnote phraseology says the words are part of her visual art medium borrowed from and inspired by “Metamorphoses,” the narrative poem by Ovid in the 8th century AD, designated as CE (Common Era) by secular Greeks.

So much for ancient history. In “The Bitter Pains,” the upstairs gallery show now at the Academy Art Museum, Julie Mills’ found-objects sculptural forms, many framed in unadorned lumber, are comprised almost entirely of architectural building blocks and the connective innards that only construction workers or hired repair personnel see up close.

To get down to the Greek part of it all, pause for a bit over the wood-framed duplex entitled “Medusa.” Her name is spelled out in an otherwise blank frame opposite a scrambled blue wire and ribbon tangle meant to suggest a mythological Gorgon with snakes in her scalp and a gaze that turns onlookers into stone.

There are far less threatening wall sculptures here that seem more protective than deadly. I’m thinking of a tiny piece on the opposite wall of a foam aqua-colored chunk of insulation that acts as an awning over a limp but seemingly alive flower pedal on a wooden ledge. I get it, I think. But I’m only guessing. And your guess may be as good as mine. Still, there’s more than meets the eye here.

Check out the words on the sidewalk and window at Washington and Dover Streets a couple of blocks away. It’s the empty corner storefront that the museum began using as a directive advertisement for current exhibitions starting with the epic Rauschenberg show last winter and spring. A window imprint wishes you good fortune: “May you love and gain your beloved,” it reads near the display of a sawhorse sculpture by Mills.

You’ll find more printed fragments of Ovid stanzas on the first step up toward the Waterfowl Building and on the plaza outside the museum entrance and, we’re told, elsewhere around downtown.

Meanwhile, just inside the first-floor Lederer Gallery, we caught up with the “Under the Mexican Sky: A Revolution in Photography” exhibit and you can, too, up until Oct. 11.

The revolution in question is the 1910-20 civil war led by Pancho Villa, among others, that overthrew the three-decade Valdez dictatorship. Long closed to outside influences, a newly free Mexico attracted the attention of artists of all stripes, including photographers drawn to the light and landscapes, as well as the long-stifled cultural life of the people. Chief among the American photographers is Edward Weston, whose black-and-white gelatin silver prints account for many of roughly 50 vintage photos in the exhibit.

A good place to start is with “Anita in Profile,” a pre-revolution shot by Italian silent film star Tina Modatti (1896) and one of the same title by Weston in 1924, post-revolution. Don’t miss his portrait of Diego Rivera, famed for leading the Mexican muralist freedom movement, next to one by Martin Munkacsi, a tight facial duet of Rivera with his wife and iconic fellow painter Frida Kahlo. And be sure to take in Modatti’s politically strident “Bandolier, Corn, Sickle.”

Among other foreigners drawn to Mexico was Henri Cartier-Bresson, the French artist and master of candid photography, represented here by “The Spider of Love” (1934). American photographer Helen Levitt, noted for her 1941 street scenes, shows us why in her “Ciudad de Mexico.” In an image that relates to border issues today is “Siesta of the Migrants,” by Manuel Alvarez Bravo, shot in the 1930s on the Mexican side, south of the Rio Grande.

On your way through, don’t bypass the alcove of photos from the Academy museum’s collection, including Brett Weston’s 1942 photo of his father, Edward, originally from Highland Park, Illinois. Two generations of gringo friends of our neighbors.

UPSTAIRS DOWNSTAIRS AT AAM

“The Bitter Pains,” Julie Wills’ sculptures with words, and “Under the Mexican Sky: A Revolution in Photography,” with images by Edward Weston and many others in the 1920s to ’40s; through Nov. 8 and Oct. 11, respectively; Academy Art Museum, 106 South St., Easton, academyartmuseum.org