The inaccessible art of Brad Howe

di Cynthia Penna

Small gems of mobiles and of kinetic art are partially hidden behind another sculptural form, in a play of “seen/not seen”, or specifically not overexposed to the view.
The last “exploration” of Brad Howe, internationally known Californian sculptor, is precisely that of preventing art from being immediately seen; or that of redeeming it from all that overabundance and profusion, from the great overdose of art that we have recently witnessed.
The play becomes a wholly mental and intellectual one: to rediscover the mind’s immense ability to linger in memory, in thought, or to explore new ways, new territories of reality.
It is no longer a matter of a superficial glance at something one owns and takes for granted.
A mobile totally secluded in a transparent plexi box has precisely that meaning: to invite the viewer to stop in front of the piece and start to explore it; to search for something else behind it and inside the crate. The plexi crate surrounds the internal body as in a sort of pregnancy, protecting it from the sight and from the touch. “Deprivato”from touching it, the viewer is invited to explore the sculpture with his own mind more then with eyes and fingers. The exploration of something which is not immediately “accessible”: a new way of looking at  art. The faded image of an object invites imagination to explore other worlds and other possibilities of the sight.
A steel “cage” containing another steel sculpture creates a sort of shield to protect the internal body, allowing the sight of it, but not the touch: “deprivato”,again, as well;  everything is “protected”, hidden and not immediately accessible. Many artists in the past and nowadays have dealt with the theme of the “cage”: from Alberto Giacometti to Anthony Gormley and thousands of others; one of the most celebrated art works by Giacometti is ”The Cage”, made of wood in 1930/31, now at the Moderna Museet of Stockholm; another sculpture to mention is “La Cage” made of  bronze in 1950 and owned by Giacometti Foundation in Paris. As the theme of the “grid” for painters, the theme of the “cage” for sculptors are very big challenges that, before or after in their carrier, they have to face and to deal with.The importance of the “cage” in sculpture is given by its significance as “transparent construction”; transparency and passing through are the biggest challenge for sculptors of any times; the same as the “grid” in painting, which  means “order in the chaos” or order of the space.
In his new show Howe presents many “branches” of his art to be explored.
Other sculptural forms are put in dialogue one each other so that one relates to the other in a play of different way of seeing: the reflection of one piece into another, pushes the viewer to experiment other ways of seeing, even turning around the piece and moving backward and forward to “see more and more”.
The core of the entire body of works is the interrelation between objects: one reflects the other in a sort of dance of shadows and colors; what seems to be a wall of colored steel covers and partially hides another piece of sculpture and so and so going on in this dance of bodies between seen and not seen accessible and inaccessible, reflections and disclosures.
The viewer engages himself in a dance with the sculpture: the dance of the senses: the sight, the movement, the visual perception.
Colors appear and disappear during the dance: suddenly a split or a hole opened into the sculpture  invites the viewer to look at inside and to get another perception of the sculpture itself.
Colors and forms are projected on to the steel body reflecting surfaces and the viewer is able to see what in reality does not exist at all; it‘s only reflection of light and colors; it’s a matter of visual perception, a matter of  new reality which is not true.
The external screen is hiding the real sculpture, the real soul of something, the reality behind it. The novelty in this kind of art is that behind an external object which shows itself to the sight and is immediately “reachable” or “accessible”, there is another piece of sculpture which represents the real core of it, the heart and soul of the external body, which is totally or partially inaccessible.
The challenge is to achieve the “not seen” and to discover the truth behind the facade.
A real new challenge in the way of making sculpture. ”Deprivato” as well.