1. We are ALL vessels capable of compassion.
2. We are all equal. We share our humanity.
- Maren Hassinger
Three large vessels framed in wire and clad in sheer fabric sway ethereally from the ceiling of the Gallery, two woven wire rope equivalents rest below feet firmly planted on the ground. Hassinger looks to the vessel for its rich history and symbolism, for its resonance with the human body. Scale brings these objects in direct communication with the viewer, while their anthropomorphic design sparks a sense of recognition.
Hassinger observes that "vessel" is a term often ascribed to women. She asks that we free ourselves from the traditional limitations of that label, using her work to expand its meaning: "I believe that the word 'people' does not make the distinction of race, or gender, or class, or origin of any sort." Hassinger shares the space with young artists, former students. By creating a platform where young and old, established and emerging, work together side by side equally, the project itself reinforces these signals of humanity. In the qualities shared by these vessels, and between us, we see our commonality writ large. We are indeed all Vessels.
MAREN HASSINGER (b. 1947, Los Angeles, CA) lives and works in New York. She received her BA from Bennington College and her MFA in Fiber Structure from the University of California, Los Angeles. She has exhibited widely in both the United States and abroad with recent public installations, Monument, in Washington, D.C. through the Smithsonian's American Women's History Initiative and Nature, Sweet Nature, at the Aspen Art Museum, slated to travel to the Oklahoma Contemporary, Oklahoma City. Her work is also on view in the exhibition, Knotted, Torn, Scattered: Sculpture after Abstract Expressionism, at the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, NYC. She will have a solo exhibition at Dia Bridgehampton later this year. Her work was recently featured in the inaugural installation of the newly renovated Museum of Modern Art; in Duro Olowu's exhibition, Seeing Chicago, at the Museum of Contemporary Art Chicago; Monuments at Marcus Garvey Park in partnership with the Studio Museum in Harlem, and in solo presentations at the Boca Raton Museum of Art, the Baltimore Museum of Art, and the Spelman College Museum of Art, Atlanta. Hassinger is the recipient of many awards and honors including grants from the Louis Comfort Tiffany Foundation, Pollock-Krasner Foundation, Gottlieb Foundation, Anonymous was a Woman, and a Lifetime Achievement Award from the Women's Caucus for the Arts. Her work can be found in the permanent collections of the Art Institute of Chicago; the Hammer Museum, Los Angeles; the Los Angeles County Museum of Art; the Museum of Modern Art, NYC; the Studio Museum in Harlem, NYC; the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, NYC; and the Whitney Museum of American Art, NYC, among others.
