Big doings in a small medium

6C - The Daily Iowan - Iowa City, Iowa - Thursday, September 25, 2008

80 hours

By ELIZABETH TIMMINSelizabeth-timmins@uiowa.edu

Amy Cutler’s work may besmall, but her prestige is not.

The native New Yorker’sgouache-on-paper narrativesare displayed in the perma-nent collection of the Museumof Modern Art, span the pagesof Artforum, have been com-pared with the works of HenryDarger, and were included inthe 2004 Whitney Biennial.

Gouache is a paint usedmuch like a watercolor, but itcontains more pigment andwhen layered, it producesopacity.

Cutler — scheduled to lec-ture today at 8 p.m. in W151Pappajohn Business Building— acquires inspiration fromeveryday life: a subway ride,current news, and items fromother cultures. She’ll takewhat she hears or sees and lether imagination take over tocreate a detailed painting.

Quirky, mysterious, her nar-ratives thrive on tension.Although each painting tells adifferent story, the fictionalworld of her pieces often fea-ture women in obscure situa-tions.

“The work invites you inbecause it’s narrative andillustrative, so the viewer feelscomfortable with that,” Cutlersaid. “And then once you enterthe realm of the charactersthere is always something alittle off, psychologically.”

The paintings are “snap-shots of a larger scenario,” shesaid. She believes the ambigui-ty of each illustration allowsthe viewer to step in with heror his own associations to thepiece.

Cutler attributes her successto consistency, hard work, andluck.

In 2000, her persistence paidoff, and she exhibited her workin the Drawing Center in NewYork, a goal she set for herselfafter graduating from college.Leslie Tonkonow Artworks +Projects, a New York gallery,has represented Cutler sincethen.

She has painted gouachenarratives on paper since col-lege, at the Cooper UnionSchool of Art, while studyingunder Susan Chrysler White,now the UI Art School’s head ofpainting and drawing.

However, Cutler has notalways used gouache. After shediscovered she was allergic tooil paints, she began experi-menting with alternativemethods. That explorationeventually led to the use ofgouache, an opaque materialthat absorbs rather thanreflects light, creating a mattelook. The nature of the medi-um allows her to create small-scaled, precise paintings.

White praises Cutler’sstrong work ethic and vision,and she noted that Cutler’spaintings were quite distinc-tive when she first createdthem. Since then, other artistshave used the intimate narra-tion that Cutler helped to pio-neer.

“I think in the last 10 or 15years, works on paper havebeen given as much impor-tance as the more muscularpaintings on canvas,” Whitesaid.

The UI faculty memberbelieves that Cutler has beencentral to the resurgence ofdrawing and works on paper inthe art community.

“I think that this youngergeneration of artists has madethis real inroad with works onpaper,” she said. “It isn’t abouttransforming it later into alarger work.”

Past graduate students haveasked Cutler to visit Iowa Cityand lecture, White said, butbecause of commitments, Cut-ler had been unable to come.

In this visit to Iowa City,Cutler will not only give a freelecture to the public, she willalso meet one-on-one withgraduate painting students intheir studios.

White believes that peoplewill be quite interested in Cut-ler’s work.

“This is stuff they don’t getto see that often,” White said.The public lecture and in-classforum allow people to ask Cut-ler questions about her art-work and understand theprocess.

“I like the idea of mixing itup and having younger artiststhat the graduate students feel

real kinship to, and I think it’simportant for them to seesomeone making work andbecoming very, very successfulin doing so,” White said.

Big doings in asmall mediumNew York-basedartist Amy Cutlerwill talk about hergouache narrativestoday at 8 p.m.

ARTWORK“Passage,” 2005, Amy Cutler, Gouache on paper

ARTWORKAmy Cutler’s “Trial” (2004) is one of her many narrative gouache illustrations.Cutler will lecture today at 8 p.m. about her work with gouache — a type of heav-ily pigmented paint used like watercolor to produce an opaque effect.

LECTUREAmy Cutler

When: 8 p.m. today Where: W151 Pappajohn

Business BuildingAdmission: Free

ARTWORK“Elephant Ferries,” 2006, Amy Cutler, Gouache on paper