Severin’s Choice: Harriette Lawler

“Guitar Walk” — copper, nickel, aluminum — 46 x 36 x 19 cm

“String Band” series by Harriette Lawler:

Music is communication that crosses the fabricated or artificial divisions of nations and ethnic
groups. My “String Band” series of abstracted string instruments is a tribute to the harmony,
beauty, and joy that music brings to people. Music draws people closer together and erases the
boundaries that we humans have created to separate ourselves.

Harriette LAWLER

“12 String Tango” — copper, nickel, aluminum — 45 x 34 x 23 cm

Harriette Lawler, short reviews of work
Newark, New Jersey — Star-Ledger, August 2000
From a review of “The Mask: Magic or Menace” exhibition — written by Dan Bischoff:

The most beautiful of theses masks is Harriette Lawler’s “Cacophony,” a frilled piece of copper whose “strings” serve as metal legs. It is a companion piece to “Symphony,” the two representing the duality of Jewish symphony orchestra musicians in Nazi concentration camps. Cacophony is on loan from the Holocaust Resource Center in Manhasset, N.Y.

“Bass Riff Romp” — copper, nickel, aluminum —43 x 42 x 18 cm

Idstein, Germany — Idsteiner Zeitung — May 2013
From a review of a Third Paradigm exhibition — written by Susanne Gross:

Originally from the U.S. artist Harriette Lawler presented a sculpture. Her “Ghost Dancers” are made of corrugated aluminum. Copper wire marks the heads, arms and legs of the dancers. Their fluttering robes combine a haunting way with the four anonymous people. They stretch their hands swinging to the right and their dancing legs move in the air. The figures seem to move, yet are stable and balanced in their ghostly dance.

“Guitar and Child” — copper, nickel, aluminum — 46 x 29 x 28 cm

Jemez Springs, New Mexico — Jemez Daily Post, June 2015
From a review of the “Threading Forever” exhibition — written by Myra Maher:

Harriette Lawler shapes metal; dream-like, shimmering and vibrating. It is evocative, sophisticated and fun! The strings of a guitar curve impossibly away from the guitar; yet because of that, you can see them dancing, and actually hear the music. Other shapes with no obvious reference make you smile at the light-play on their curved surfaces, so that they appear to undulate before your eyes. Then reflect on the fact that this undulating, shimmering thing is cut from one, flat sheet of metal.

“Flight of the Wiry Split Lute” — copper, nickel, aluminum — 44 x 27 x 34 cm

Harriette Lawler’s “String Band” series are some of the best visual representation of music in art history, related to the cutting edge Birds in Space by Brancusi. They are a memento that the essence of music is similar to the essence of the human being: the search for beauty and harmony, the flight towards the hierarchy of light and the mystery of the angelic beings. Lawler’s amazing instruments, half real-half imaginary, are in the same time “Ghost Dancers’’ who imagine a cosmic story about purity, passion, faith, communion and ardent ideals in a world full of moral horrors and disasters.
(Constantin Severin)

“Conjoined Balalaikas” — copper, nickel, aluminum — 38 x 44 x 25 cm

“Brown Feathered Banjo I” — copper, nickel, aluminum — 40 x 33 x 27 cm

“Brown Feathered Banjo II” — copper, nickel, aluminum — 34 x 31 x 27 cm

“Brown Feathered Banjo III” — copper, nickel, aluminum — 58.5 x 27 x 27 cm

Harriette Lawler

Harriette Lawler, sculptor

Selected Exhibitions and Commissions

2016 — Joule/Jewel: The Art of Work, 6-person group show. June, Mesa Library Gallery, Los Alamos, NM, USA.
2015 — Threading Forever, 4-person show. June, Mesa Library Gallery, Los Alamos, New Mexico, USA.
2014 — The Art of Woman, juried group show. Virginia Erdie Fine Art Gallery, October, Miami, Florida, USA.
2013 — Galerie Kaplanka, group show. June, Protivin, Czech Republic.
— Speicher Gallery, group show. May, Idstein, Germany.
2011 — Privatsphären, 8-person show. October, Rearte Gallery, Vienna, Austria.
— 18 Days, juried group show. February, Center for Contemporary Arts, Santa Fe, NM.
— NM State Bar: my sculpture “Secrets: Hidden Dreams of the Two” featured on cover of the official magazine
of the NM State Bar, June 22, 2011 issue.
2010 — Planet Earth Planet Art, featured artist, published March by MIRCA of Skogas, Sweden.
— NM State Bar: my sculpture “Stance” featured on cover of the official magazine of the NM State Bar, November 29, 2010 issue.
2009 — Earth Narratives, 2-person show. August, Matrix Fine Art Gallery, Albuquerque, NM.
— Corrections, juried international show, artist and curator. March, SomArts Cultural Center, San Francisco, CA.
— “Waterfall of the New Moon” sculpture purchased by the City of Albuquerque Public Art Program
2008 — Shelter In Place, juried group show, artist and curator. August, Mission Street Gallery, Jemez Springs, NM.
2007 — Journey, invitational. November, Iron Willow Gallery, Canõn, NM, USA.
— 2 Pi R: Artists in the Round, 4-person show. July, SomArts Cultural center, San Francisco, CA.
2007 — Jemez In Focus: 20 Perspectives, juried invitational. April, Sandoval County Historical Society,
Bernalillo, NM.
2006 — Luminescence: A Light in the Dark, juried invitational. December, Art Jemez Gallery, Jemez Springs, NM.
— Art Jemez, New Mexico artists’ cooperative, 2006-2011. Co-founder, co-director, curator and events coordinator. Jemez Springs, NM.
2001 — The Long Road Home, solo show. September -November, KAOS Gallery, Wilmington, VT.
2000 — The Mask : Magic Or Menace, juried invitational. July, City Without Walls Gallery, Newark, NJ.
1999 — Holocaust Resource Center, solo installation, 12 sculptures. 8/1999 – 8/2001. Five piecespurchased by the Center for permanent display. Manhasset, Long Island, NY, USA.
— B.J. Spoke Gallery, invitational. September, Art League of Long Island, Huntington, NY.
1996 — Passing Through Again, solo show. May, Jemez Views Gallery, Jemez Springs, NM.
1993 — Five In The Jemez Invitational. August, Jemez Views Gallery, Jemez Springs, NM.
— Salon Des Refuse, invitational. March, Gallery at the Rep, Santa Fe, NM.
— Sculpture New Mexico, invitational. February, Santa Fe Community College, Santa Fe, NM.
1992 — Fuller Lodge Art Center, invitational. March. New Mexico Sculptors Guild, Los Alamos, NM.
— Abstract /Abstraction, juried group show. March, Kimo Gallery, Albuquerque, NM.
1991 — Time And Place, 12-person juried invitational. August, United Albuquerque Artists, Dartmouth Gallery, Albuquerque, NM.
— ¡Magnifico!, juried group show. May, Albuquerque Convention Center, Albuquerque, NM.
1984 — Hoboken Heroes, juried invitational. November, Private loft, Hoboken, NJ.
1989 — Reptilian Hearts, commission for Snapshots, Inc. February, NYC.
1981 — Hermas Out! II, sculpture commission for Just William. March, NYC, shipped to London, UK.
1980 — Hermas Out! I, sculpture installation for Just William, Inc. September, Los Angeles, CA.
1977 — Passing Through, 3-person show. June, Matters of the Art Gallery (MOTA), Baton Rouge, LA

Education

Parsons New School — 1984, NYC.
New York University — 1982, NYC.
Louisiana State University — 1974, BFA, Baton Rouge, LA.

Bio

Originally from Louisiana, Ms. Lawler currently resides in New Mexico, USA.
She also lived and worked in New York City for 20 years. During her career, she
has also curated and organized many group exhibitions, taught children’s art classes
in NY, and co-founded and co-directed two artists cooperatives: Matters of the Art in Louisiana and Art Jemez in New Mexico.

Selected Art Direction/Publishing

“Drifting . . . Art & Poetry Explorations” — book, 2013, art editor/designer/participant.
“Estuary: A Confluence of Art & Poetry” — book, 2012, art editor/designer/participant, winner of Saboteur Award
for 2013 Best Mixed Anthology at London Book Club.
“Gateway : An Artists’ Time Capsule” — project book, 2012, art editor/designer. “Privatsphären” — Vienna
exhibition book, 2011, designer.
Popular Mechanics Magazine/Hearst Publications — NYC. 1997 – 2003, associate art director, recipient of
American Design awards.
Village Voice Publishing — NYC. February 1988 – June 1989, computer systems operations manager. 1977-1980,
art staff.
Rolling Stone Magazine/Straight Arrow Publishing — NYC. 1980 – 1988, production manager/art staff.

Artist Statement
My work relates to the changing mental, spiritual, and emotional landscapes that we traverse in life. Spaces are defined to convey a particular realm of existence, quest, gesture, moment in time, or saga, reflecting the dichotomies of life: order/chaos, refinement/rawness, the primal/the intellect, tranquility/turbulence. Pieces are often cut from one flat sheet of metal, torched, and then the sculpture pulled out into a 3D work. This process produces a fluid quality, which transforms the metal’s natural rigidity. Most works represent passages through hardships or transitions. However, in some work, the calmness and harmony achieved after these difficult transits are expressed. Color in my work is brought about by torching or oxidizing/weathering the materials, particularly copper and steel. Thus in a very literal fashion, I also ‘paint’ with fire and water.

Contact and Websites

PO Box 161, Jemez Springs, NM 87025, 575.829.4567
hlawler@moonandmountain.org
http://www.moonandmountain.org
http://3rdparadigm.net