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Jóhann Eyfells at
The Corcoran
Confronting Nature: Icelandic Art
of the 20th Century
October 14 - November 26 2001
http://www.corcoran.org/exhibitions/Iceland/index.htm
JÓHANN
EYFELLS, 1923
Jóhann Eyfells studied architecture and art in the United States
from 1945 to 1953. He worked as an architect, artist, and teacher in Iceland
and the United States until 1969, when he took up permanent residence in
Florida, as an artist and professor of art at the University of Central
Florida.
In 1960 Eyfells began to produce abstract sculptures based on his
experiments in chemistry and physics and utilizing the various
transformational properties of metals, in particular aluminum, iron and
copper. His name for these works, “Receptual Cubes,” is based on his concept
of receptualism, a theory he has developed to explain the essence of his
work. Receptualism intertwines three systems into one, the scientific,
philosophical and the mystical. For Eyfells there are no boundaries
separating the three.
In their diversity of surface appearance these works resemble nature itself,
especially lava formations of various kinds, and the artist has remarked
that he has no objections to his own sculptures being mistaken for nature’s
craftsmanship. His production technique closely follows natural processes,
for example, the congealing of molten lava which in effect creates art on
the same principles as the forces of nature. The technique that Eyfells has
pioneered involves melting metal under all different conditions and adding
to them natural materials that affect the outcome. In their molten
state the metals are then poured into casts which have been dug into the
ground, often using large earthmoving equipment. The interaction of soil,
metal, other materials, temperature, gravity and the like determine the
final result. This represents a kind of compromise between the artist’s
energy and that of nature itself, the co-creator of the works. Eyfells’
artworks may be described as the product of systematic coincidences.
When their processing is complete, the works are overturned so that they
take on the shape of the excavation in which they have been cast. These
“overturnings,” as he calls them, deal in particular with the interaction of
material properties, visibility, and time. The latter concept –
documentation of the creative act within time – is a fundamental aspect of
his art.
- Audur Ólafsdóttir |
