In conjunction with the 1992 Democratic National Convention, tagged the "Year of the Woman," Graupe-Pillard was commissioned to deliver a massive installation at the Port Authority Bus Terminal in Manhattan. A full range of her figures and motifs were on view.
Consistently tapped for public art projects (which along with teaching helped support Graupe-Pillard financially), her commissions for Shearson Lehman American Express, AT&T and New Jersey Transit led to an exploration and construction of freestanding sculptures. Her accomplishments in that field earned her an invitation to teach at the National Academy Museum, where she directed the Edwin Austin Abbey Mural Fellowship Workshop for eight years.
The period of 1990-1993 marked the period when Graupe-Pillard devoted herself to perhaps one of her best known and widely exhibited series. Nowhere to Go: One Family's Experience dug into Graupe-Pillard's examination of the Holocaust. It was mounted at both the New Jersey State Museum in Trenton and at Rider University. Comprised of ten identical pastel on canvas cut-outs, it employed the shape of a crouching figure intently examining something in its hand. The outlined individual served to encompass a range of symbolic scenes. Family letters, photographs, and oral histories culled from her parents served as the emotional armature. The names of over seventy relatives who perished in the death camps were integrated via text. In Family Tree, Graupe-Pillard engages the viewer with photographs collaged onto a backdrop of Yahrzeit candles, the traditional way Jews observe the anniversary of a death. In these circumstances, the exact dates are unknown. The totality goes beyond the specific to speak to the horrors of "modern genocide," from Cambodia to Rwanda.
The Keyhole series can be viewed as the beginning of a "formal" incorporation of photography into the work, with the computer as an essential part of the practice. Through its use, Graupe-Pillard engages in major mash-ups with elements she finds from "scavenging through art books." All are assessed through the lens of the camera--and then combined with Graupe-Pillard's own creative history.
In 2001, Graupe-Pillard was impacted by two major events. The near-death of her husband, and the attack on the World Trade Center. Once again, she turned to her art to process the experiences. The result was the Manipulation/Disintegration/Displaced series. Forms became splintered, as they broke apart. Shapes were configured and reconfigured. Up close, they read as abstract jigsaw puzzles of colors and contours. Upon stepping back, they become narratives about the shattered lives of refugees in Darfur, Afghanistan, Iraq, and Gaza.
When I visited Graupe-Pillard at her studio, Fallout: The Confetti of War was on the floor waiting to be stretched. Recently completed, the source photo captured a car bombing incident in the Middle East. It will be shown in 2015 at the Carl Hammer Gallery in Chicago, as part of a solo show.
Using contemporary technology to expand her vocabulary, Graupe-Pillard developed Interventions--It Can't Happen Here. She conjured scenarios that were particularly powerful, and that now feel prescient in light of the street scenes in Ferguson, Missouri.
The digital prints, which are processed either in color or black and white, speak to fear, xenophobia, the role of the media in war, and truth versus reality. The trauma of 9/11 unleashed a full range of reactions from the American people--from the desire for revenge to a call for reflection. Graupe-Pillard takes on the specter of Gitmo and Abu Ghraib, the issue of detention and torture, and places them in our own backyard. Given Graupe-Pillard's familial link to Nazi history and the question of individual culpability, perhaps there is an unconscious link. Graupe-Pillard challenges the viewer. She is artist as provocateur asking, "As an ordinary citizen, do you think this is right? What action will you take?"
During my visit, our conversation turned from her work to a look back on the trajectory of her career and art world trends. Graupe-Pillard recounted, "I was exhibiting regularly, every two years, in New York City and Europe. I was in fairs and had collectors from private and corporate collections. Then in 1987, the market crashed. By that time, I began doing public art projects. I continued to show in the East Village at Hal Bromm Gallery. Later, in Soho at Donahue/Sosinski, and in Chelsea at The Proposition." Reflecting upon the difficult road of being an artist, Graupe-Pillard maintained, "A career in art is like a wave. It's up and down. I was lucky, and one thing led to another. You need people who really respond to the work; someone who trusts their own judgment and has the power to give you a show. You've got to stick with it, for as long as you can do it."
Continuing with a discourse about ageism in the gallery scene, Graupe-Pillard noted, "I no longer want to go to a lot of openings and schmooze. I don't actively solicit galleries, even though I think I'm in the most fertile period of my work." She sighs and adds, "Think of Titian and Goya in their nineties. Monet is a good example. When people ignore older artists, I think it's limiting. Many older artists keep growing."
Graupe-Pillard regularly engages a wide audience with her latest output-- via Facebook--specifically sharing her self-insertions into art works from ancient Greece to Rodin and Benglis. The comments about her latest exploits are gleeful.
Graupe-Pillard related, "I'm always thinking about a lot of things. I'm constantly working. As an artist, I don't consider the saleability of the paintings. The work is a commentary on the age I have lived in. I am a documentarian, recording the critical moments of my life and those of society."
As Graupe-Pillard repeated throughout our conversation, "In the end, the work has a life of its own."
Photo courtesy of the artist
This article is from the series "Evolution of an Artist"(Note: You can view every article as one long page if you sign up as an Advocate Member, or higher).
