Vaticinium Ex Eventu
12’ 3” x 3’ 10” x 3’ 10
Cast Concrete, powder coated steel, wood, resin, hardware
2019
2019 FSP/Jerome Fellow
Artist Statement
The sculptures and installations I make often incorporate lace, cast forms and mixed media. The lace provides a structural balance between negative and positive space where forms are light but are capable of supporting themselves and the weight of other materials. The cast objects take the shape of tools, architectural components, infrastructure and the human body. I work with these motifs because we understand them to intrinsically embody structure, weight and stability. When rendered in lace, they create a visual tension. Lace neither conceals nor fully reveals and I expand this duality in my forms in order to convey a relationship between strength and beauty. The development of this body of work came at a time when I felt a need to make something beautiful that would reflect some of the complex contradictions that life presents.
In, Vaticinium Ex Eventu, the sculpture at Franconia, concrete lace forms are combined with steel and wood. A lace column capital and beam are combined with a torso that invokes a human presence with a nod to classical sculpture. These elements along with a tree trunk both support and are supported by rebar, a structural element that is normally hidden within concrete. The rebar, as the linear element that holds all of these forms in relation to each other, is akin to the lines in a flow chart or time-line. All of the elements are bound to each other and are interconnected, interdependent. Sculpturally, the concrete lace forms are tactile and delicate. The rebar, a strong supportive element, is bent and chaotic in places. The tree trunk is a major supportive element even as it ceases to live. Conceptually, these forms suggest both an inherent balance and tension between things that rise and are built upon other things. They indicate both the beauty and chaos that is inherent in our human condition, in our built environment and our relationship to the world.
The title, Vaticinium Ex Eventu translates in English to “a prophesy for an event after the fact.” This idea brings to mind the tensions between predicting the future and the power of hindsight. It contemplates the impossibility of linear progress.
Betsy Alwin
Born: Minneapolis, MN, USA, 1973
Resides: Minnetrista, MN, USA
Education
MFA, Illinois State University, 2001
BFA, MNSU, 1997