One hundred vibrantly colored clay blocks sit waiting for visitors to mold them into whatever shapes they wish. This isn’t an art student’s dream, it’s Charles Long’s exhibition “100 lbs. of Clay” opening at the Wexner Center Friday. The theme of the piece, like the life of its creator, focuses on change.
“Most of the time art galleries tell you not to touch, but this piece really encourages the audience to participate,” said Erik Pepple, spokesman for the Wexner Center.
Forming a giant rectangle, six-foot-tall columns stretch the distance of “100 lbs. of Clay.” Each of these 20 columns has five shelves holding a one-pound colored clay block that visitors can sculpt. The result is a work that is always evolving.
Change has also been a constant for Charles Long, the creator of exhibit. He said his art career has taken him many places – not all of them good.
He performed plays in New York City’s East Village. He earned a master’s in sculpture from Yale. By 1995 he was a successful artist, living solely off grants from his pieces. But he turned away from art several years later, thinking his work lacked integrity.
While teaching at Harvard and trying to distance himself from the art world, Long came up with the idea for “100 lbs. of Clay.” In fact, it originally was a joke to a gallery owner.
“I thought, what if I get 100 pounds of clay and put it on the floor of the gallery? We’ll put it on the floor and see what happens,” said Long, a current professor at University of California, Riverside.
The joke developed into a reality and his Harvard students helped build the interactive creation.
Long said the hands-on nature of the piece is one of its most appealing features.
“In some people’s minds there is nothing greater than being able to go into a gallery and mess with art in some way,” he said.
But there is more to the work than molding colored clay. Like many of Long’s pieces, music plays an important role.
“A 100-CD disk changer came with the piece,” said Nancy Schindele, curatorial assistant for the piece at the Wexner Center.
So when visitors mold their artwork, 100 albums, including the one with the song inspiring the piece’s namesake, “A Hundred Pounds of Clay: The Best of Gene McDaniels,” will be echoing throughout the exhibit.
Long is again involved in the art scene – his abstract sculptures are on display at the Tanya Bonakdar Gallery in New York City. And while he no longer makes audience participation artwork, he said he still thinks “100 lbs. of Clay” is important.
“I do have hope in some sense that certain kids that have not been exposed to art get some exposure by seeing the piece,” Long said.
“100 lbs. of Clay” runs Friday, Jan. 26 through Sunday Apr. 15 in the lower level of the Wexner Center.
Jim Baird can be reached at [email protected].
