Deep Storage: The Arsenal of Memory
New Works Laboratory: A Partnership Between 911 Media Arts Center and the Henry Art Gallery
Jacob Lawrence: Painting LifeRoni Horn: Earth Grows Thick
Stroum Gallery
November 13, 1997 – February 1, 1998
The title of the exhibition, “Earth Grow Thick”, was taken from a line in Emily Dickinson’s poem No. 352, “For Earths, grow thick as/ Berries.” Between 1992 and 1994, American artist Roni Horn created a series of sculptures and installations inspired by her readings of Dickinson’s letters and poems. Fascinated with Dickinson’s solitary lifestyle and her poetry’s ability to create an intense sense of presence, Horn began to work on a series of minimal, metal forms in which Dickinson’s words are embedded. Horn created these works to achieve a confluence of ‘invisible and non-visible,’ of physical and mental sensuousness. The scattered lettered cubes of “How Dickinson Stayed Home” to the groups of metal stakes that comprise complete poems in the series “When Dickinson Shut Her Eyes,” placed the viewer in dynamic relationship to the words. “Untitled (Gun)” consists of lettered cubes stacked to create a line by Dickinson, while the “Key and Cue” works display the first line of many of her poems.