We can criticize and kvetch all we want, but in the end, we must face the truth: We absolutely delight in the fruits of the packaging, in the billions of dollars that make sure things look just right. Sure it’s wasteful, but who can deny the allure of a glistening pile of, say, empty presents in a Macy’s window display? This mystery of packaging?its textures and vibrance, its ability to seduce the eye?is perhaps what compels Christo and Jeanne-Claude to wrap, artistically speaking.
If not by its pure accessibility, sheer curiosity should drive you to visit the National Gallery’s new exhibition, Christo and Jeanne-Claude in the Vogel Collection. To the uninformed observer, the collection seems like the work of moneyed madmen: ribbons of hot pink cloth encircling islands, castles draped in shimmering silk, saffron fabric billowing between verdant valleys. Aside from its downright absurdity, the collection also gives the impression of being an enormous waste of financial, material and human resources. After all, what on earth would motivate someone to wrap a coastline? Even if it made sense, why spend 30 years preparing to do it? And how much does this crap cost anyway?
These questions, along with numerous others, become a part of the struggle that takes place when viewing the Vogel Collection. The struggle arises in trying to reconcile the many elements of Christo and Jeanne-Claude’s vision, to not shake your head and walk away, to consider the exhibit objectively, to allow it the grace of being, yes, art. However, for this to happen, one must first stretch beyond the parameters of conventional art forms and secondly, try to appreciate the development, from conception to completion, instead of the final work itself. Otherwise, Christo and Jeanne-Claude can all too easily seem like the greatest living nutcases of the art world.
Christo Javacheff was born in Bulgaria in 1933 and studied art until he moved to Paris on a commission in 1958. There he met Jeanne-Claude de Guillebon, his partner for life in the creation of an oeuvre of artwork that would shatter every code of artistic conduct. Their first in a series of never-ending wrapping projects involved a collection entitled simply, “Wrapped Objects.” Along with earnings from sketches, these amorphous shapes wrapped in sturdy brown paper and tied with plain white string earned them the capital for 40 years of ongoing projects.
They have since sought to defy traditional conventions of form by using swaths of luminescent fabric to stretch, embrace and drape hundreds of miles of natural as well as man-made structures. This fleeting quality is exemplified in the astonishing fact that the installations themselves, which often take several decades to complete, exist in completion for as little as two weeks. The artistic value thus emerges as a fusion of the ephemeral and the aesthetic, the evolution of a work and its impression on memory.
The development of each installation?the 60 collages, scale models and sketches of the sites themselves?provides the fodder for the actual exhibit. One is likely to feel swindled by this fact, as the seemingly more important finished wrappings, captured in a series of large glossy photographs, are assembled in a line outside the exhibit entrance. They offer brilliant images of a wrapped Reichstag, a fertile wrapped valley and groves of wrapped trees. In Valley Curtain (Rifle, Colorado 1970-72), 12,780 square feet of a glorious nylon sunset billows seven miles from Highway 325. In other photographs, the artists pitched their luminous cloth over everyday objects, as seen in Umbrellas (Japan, US 1984-91). In this shot, a collection of beach umbrellas (made of fabric themselves), are re-wrapped in a bright blue. These, among several others, reveal the fruition of Christo and Jeanne-Claude’s labors?a beauty both bizarre and transient. Perhaps, the organizers of the collection placed the finished products outside the exhibit to act as lures to the public. If this is the case, it works. Most of the photographs are simply so shocking in scope that you feel compelled to wander into the adjacent rooms to achieve some kind of understanding of them.
Inside, the inner workings of Christo and Jeanne-Claude’s genius (or delusion) are revealed. And they are (admittedly, disappointingly) rational. Every project, both complete and in-progress, is arranged in a series of sketches that explain the choice and course of action for a particular site. These include all of the calculations that go into, say, choosing which of 89 possible rivers in the United States made the cut to get wrapped. In this specific project, Over the River, Project for Arkansas River, Colorado (which begin nine years ago and has yet to be completed), Christo and Jeanne-Claude traversed 14,000 miles of rushing waters in search of the perfect contours to strike just the right balance of crag and cloud.
Settling on a 6.7-mile strip of the Arkansas River, they began the necessary protocol: conferencing with engineers, ensuring safety for the environment, consulting topographical maps, building life-size prototypes, etc. The actual wrapping will involve stretching pre-sewn panels of iridescent fabric about 20 feet above the river bed. Like most of the fabric used in Christo and Jeanne-Claude’s wrappings, the panels will not block the sky for those rafting downriver. From their perspective, the fabric will be transparent. If you stand on a cliff overlooking the river, however, the fabric will become opaque. This illusion and interplay of light is at the heart of the Arkansas River project. The final wrapping, due for completion sometime in July of 2004, will exist for 14 days of short-lived splendor.
In another sketch, one of a completed project, you see the plans for Running Fence (Sonoma and Marin Counties, 1972-76). This four-year project involved constructing 20 miles of cloth fence from the small inland town of Cotati, to the Pacific coast. The panels of fabric, bought wholesale from a defunct air-bag company, snaked through the valleys of the Californian wine-country in a sort of enchanted S-curve. The desired effect, what Christo and Jeanne-Claude labeled as “an obstructive membrana,” was a sort of other-worldliness, an alteration in our view of the natural. Observers commented on the peculiar way the panels seemed to change as you walked along the fence despite their identical weave. Others likened Running Fence to chanting a kind of mantra. This harmonious response to the exhibit, however, belies the unbelievable legwork of the artists in carrying out the project. From Cotati to Bodega Bay, Christo and Jeanne-Claude had to first get the consent of no less than 59 ranchers living in the region to use their land. After sealing the locals’ approval, the artists joined in 42 months of collaborative efforts during which they attended 18 public hearings, three sessions at the Superior Court of California and signing a 450-page Environmental Impact Report on the temporary use of the hills, sky and ocean. And for what? To drape 200,000 meters of white nylon over 20 miles of fence.
If you are still skeptical of the exhibit’s environmental value, then consider this: All of the materials are recycled. Funding comes from the sale of Christo’s preliminary drawings. Every site provides work for thousands of people. As frivolous as it seems, Christo and Jeanne-Claude have used their artwork in many utilitarian ways. If all else fails, think of the incredible bureaucratic obstacles that had to be navigated to complete these cosmic ventures, and pay these passionate 70-year-olds some respect.
Christo and Jeanne-Claude in the Vogel Collection is showing in the East Building of the National Gallery of Art through June 23.
