Martha Whittington is a sculptor who has, at times, lost herself in the tactile, dramatic properties of her medium, falling in love with material for material's sake. In her solo show at the Museum of Contemporary Art of Georgia, "deus ex machina," the artist pulls off a far more satisfying feat, creating a fully-realized world. The sculptural vignettes she has crafted are like pieces of a theatrical tableaux that comes alive when a viewer enters the space.
Funny, ominous and creepy, the exhibition employs a relatively bare-bones array of materials: stainless steel, wool felt, leather and unstained wood to evoke a vivid, multi-dimensional world — Joseph Beuys meets Home Depot. Whittington has filled the gallery space with a series of work stations, tall ladders, wheeled devices and tools that conjure up a place where mysterious actions unfold.
As the inscription on the gallery's far wall makes clear, "deus ex machina" is about work. Written on that wall in antiquated script is the phrase "recalling the moment when machines became gods and workers became machines." The words conjure up all manner of dystopian science fiction, from George Orwell's "1984" to the 1927 Fritz Lang German-Expressionist film "Metropolis," in which workers are soulless machines resigned to a life of perpetual labor.
It is clear from the spartan work stations, tools and presence of some task-master overseer, that the workers in this place are living a joyless life of repetitive and possibly forced labor. A "Containment Fence," made of cotton string and hung on one wall, suggests a prison of sorts, or perhaps even a self-imposed trap that these industrious workers have woven themselves. Whittington summons up a world that mixes references to Industrial Age past and some grim future in which workers wear strange garb to do even stranger activities involving stainless steel balls, wood and repetitive knot-making.
It does not appear to be a happy place. An "Overseer Cart," suggests the unseen labors are cruelly monitored. The cart boasts a wooden platform on wheels with a small bench where some unseen foreman sits. Next to the seat is a round metal circle like the kind of massive key ring sported by janitors, apartment landlords or jailers. Dozens of round metal pieces on the ring suggest the human lives under the overseer's control.
A series of four canvas "Changing Screens" set up in the gallery with a wooden bench behind each summon up the idea of a locker room where workers change into their workaday garb. Hung on the wall behind each screen is a uniform "Wearable Objects," for the task at hand: cotton webbing belts, heavy felt aprons, or in one case a metal mesh backpack that looks like something a beekeeper might sport. In videos hung inside heavy wool felt cases, the "work" in question is shown, like some tutorial for each laborer's specific task. The black and white videos show hands performing bizarre gestures: knot tying, wood smoothing, the careful handling of a stainless steel ball.
Whittington's point is well-suited to our own age: Many of us work at jobs whose end result is unclear, full of tedium, routine and labor detached from creativity. To an occupant of the past surveying our own world, our labors — hunched over keyboards typing frantically away at some mysterious task — would probably seem just as bizarre as the ones evoked in "deus ex machina."
The Bottom Line: An Atlanta sculptor conjures up an impressively vivid world in beautifully evocative details and craftsmanship.
Art Review
"Martha Whittington: deus ex machina"
Through Oct. 6. 10 a.m.-5 p.m. Tuesdays-Saturdays. Free for members and U.S. military with ID; $5 for non-members; $1 for students and seniors. The Museum of Contemporary Art of Georgia, 75 Bennett Street, Suite A2, NW, Atlanta. 404-367-8700, www.mocaga.org.
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