An exhibit of artist with macular degeneration just happened to be on view when I returned to Gotham to visit friends and museums in April.
Listen
In March, a university student contacted me for an interview. She was writing her thesis on artists with Stargardts disease and was looking for subjects to talk about their experience. In the course of our communications, she asked if, during my upcoming trip to NYC, I would be viewing the Vision and Arts Project exhibit What Was Once Familiar?
“Who?” I had never heard of the Vision and Arts Project.
She explained that The Vision & Art Project gives greater visibility to the overlooked influence of macular degeneration on historical and contemporary artists. Founded in 2013, VAP is an initiative of The American Macular Degeneration Foundation. This would be their tenth annual exhibit.
“What?! These are my people! And I have never heard of them!?” Amazing. The exhibit at the National Arts club in Gramercy Park was my first stop on my first day.
All the artists were of great interest to me, but I am going to focus on just two.
Robert Birmelin‘s paintings were the first I encountered. The Morning of September 11th, 2001 8:45 AM pre-macular demonstrates Birmelin’s talent for photo realism that becomes haunting after reading the title. Painted in 2002, it is a powerful expression of time, place and mood. By employing photo realistic accuracy, he contrasts droll everyday routine with the impact of historical tragedy.
His complex post macular Two in One and The Red Room both 2020 are expressionistic images that also captures time, place and feeling with inventive distortion and color that becomes immersive as I unravel their compositions.
Both his pre and post macular paintings were very accomplished, but knowing that he had to adapt his technique due to the limits of his visual impairment deeply affected me. It is a reaction I might not understand if I was not also post macular.
The video shows some small landscapes but it was the monkeys the “spoke” to me. Having made some Flora with Simians in 2011 (see on page 2), I was intrigued by his subject matter. It appears that he resolved his impairment by working large.
I now know that the landscapes were post macular disease. Their size might be because they were done in situ. I will investigate further. See VAP page with video
Viewing the paintings was meaningful to me in a visceral way. Now, researching and writing about the artists has only deepened that experience. I highly recommend Alice Madttison’s insightful overview Freedom from Specificity, written for the exhibit catalog. It explores in greater depth what I have only touched on here. On view March 20 to April 22, 2024.
It was a pleasure and a privilege to be with you at this exhibition, as you explored some of the mysteries of pre and post-macular painting.. my sense was that there are few easy generalizations to be made about the differences, although size, content, perspective, and expressivity (florid style and use of. Colour) were often involved in the transition. It would be inspiring to pursue a number of separate case studies of the artists, including letters they wrote, where and why they participated in exhibitions, or perhaps to interview their colleagues and family members.