Sunday afternoon, the final works arrived at the gallery in Boonton. I was working the entire day at the Designers Showhouse of New Jersey in Saddle River so I was unable to preview the work in person until Monday when the show would be hung. Monday arrived and the first part of the curation was easy. There are a limited amount of outlets in the gallery and this show had 7 video installations by Helene Mukhtar. Even with a limited amount of outlets you still want the placement to allow the entire show to look it’s best.
Once the placement of the videos where chosen the difficult but fun part of the curation began. How do you put together the works of two totally different artists and make the gallery look great?
Carole McDermott’s four Yellow Expansion paintings were the first to be installed on the back wall. With great expansion this draws you into the gallery.
Then on the south wall we installed Helene Mukhtar’s Dancers 1, 2 and 3. I hung these lower than I normally would so the viewer could interact with the movement of the vibrant colors.
We continued with a diptych of Carole McDermott’s and the movement continued until we came to the very end which is something I call the knot. The last available wall space. The space that ties the whole show together. I did something highly unorthodox. I hung Helene Mukhtar’s 36 x 36, Dancers 6, my favorite piece, an inch above Carole McDermott’s 36 x 36, Heat Strike, my assistant’s favorite piece, thus making a vertical diptych of two entirely seperate paintings that were not meant to go together. This gives the viewer “Color and Rhythm”.
I truly love what I do. I remember my New York City landlord used to say while he was watching me curate a show, it appeared as if I was “waltzing with the works of art”.
Come see my latest work, COLOR AND RHYTHM.
Scott A. Broadfoot
