THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1994, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: SUNDAY, June 5, 1994 TAG: 9406030120
SECTION: DAILY BREAK PAGE: G6 EDITION: FINAL
SOURCE: BY VIRGINIA VAN HORN, SPECIAL TO THE DAILY BREAK
DATELINE: 940605 LENGTH: Medium
``Come into my parlor,'' said the spider to the fly. Like the unfortunate insect, the wary viewer is tempted to enter an uncanny but inviting realm through a dark mouth. Gray and black mesh fabric is draped over curved copper tubing to form a large, mottled maw. As viewers duck under the final drape, they enter a shadowed forest of the imagination and comes face to face with the exhibition's central character. This large, red and purple ``butterfly,'' a relief sculpture, is made from layers of felt, thin sheet metal and copper tubing. Within its multiple felt petals, the figure resembles a rose with wings.
{REST} A second ``butterfly'' relief hangs on the wall to the left, flanked by two tall, felt-and-metal sculptures whose shapes suggest both trees and hooded guardians.
Cloud-like felt hammocks are draped across one corner of the room. In the opposite corner, three shaggy, jute-covered steps lead up to a felt grotto. On its raised platform (with connotations of an altar), the cavernous sculpture stands as a kind of magical destination, with light beckoning from within.
A grove of slinky metal coils hangs between the two corners, facing a group of three elfish figures leaping in mid-air.
To the right of the entrance, a series of tall, black-and-white, felt arches or ribs lead into a second smaller gallery lined with furry, felt panels. These panels are lit from behind in a flickering pattern of multicolored lights; first dark, then bright with mysterious fires. The enclosure suggests a cave, a sanctuary, a stomach. Like Jonah and the whale, the viewer is swallowed and spit out again.
Cornett's sculptures are only part of the total experience. Wade's theatrical lighting creates a constantly changing array of colored lights and shadows in the darkened gallery. Controlled by the semi-chance operations of a computer, the red, rose, yellow, and turquoise spotlights flash on and off in variable, unpredictable cycles.
Bestor's electronic musical score accompanies the three-dimensional objects. Also incorporating computer-controlled elements of chance, his eerie composition includes random notes, chimes, bells and percussion. Its shivery sound is suggestive of alien communication, a cross between whale songs and the private chatter of cosmic machines.
In a sense, ``Cycles'' is a high-tech fairy tale - Hansel and Gretel lost in a microchip forest. It's the story of mythic journeys, of travels and transformations. Like the fairy tale, in which horrifying events are strangely reassuring, the installation's mood is spooky and delightful.
The archetypal rite of passage is restaged with a carnival atmosphere. It evokes sensations as sweetly ephemeral as cotton candy, as giddy and disorienting as a fun house mirror.
``Cycles'' is a trip through the tunnel of love in more ways than one. According to early feminist art theory, art that involved the use of soft, organic layers and central-core imagery was inherently ``female.'' That view was reinforced by Freud's theory that described as representative of female sexuality ``all subjects as share with them the property of enclosing a space or are capable of acting as a receptacles such as pits, hollows and caves.''
Cornett's sculptures typically include sensuous layers of felt surrounding a central focus or opening. Her ``butterfly'' relief sculptures relate to Judy Chicago's use of the butterfly image as symbolic of women's vital anatomy in her great feminist installation, ``The Dinner Party.''
From this point of view, Cornett's sculptures are clearly part of a tradition in art that refers specifically to the female body. The corner grotto and the ``butterfly'' reliefs are representations of this; in opposition to them are the masculine standing figures.
The passage into the small side gallery, with its visceral, fibrous walls, is the passage into the womb. It is a powerful concept - maybe too powerful. Like sex in real life, the sexual aspect of the work, once recognized, is overwhelming. Once seen in sexual terms, it is difficult to perceive the work in any other way.
The ``Cycles'' then seem primarily menstrual, and the final impression ends up closer to ``The Joy of Sex'' than to the eternal cycles of the cosmos. by CNB