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Gloria Vanderbilt is a modern “Renaissance woman”. She has been successful in her endeavors in all of the arts: visual, performing, and literary. An artist, actress, and writer, she has won awards in all three fields. But it is as an artist that she is represented at Grounds For Sculpture. She began her series of Plexiglas constructions, entitled Dream Boxes, in 1996 and since that time, they have been exhibited widely throughout the United States. These works are incredibly beautiful yet slightly disturbing; like dreams themselves, they are filled with mystery. Large plastic cubes enclose found objects such as dolls’ heads, wishbones, and other common items. These everyday materials, not the usual stuff of high and serious art, stand alone as structured, volumetric statements. Vanderbilt’s provocative and imaginative art urges the viewer to think as well as to appreciate.
Born in New York City, Gloria Vanderbilt spent most of her childhood in Europe, before returning to the United States to attend Miss Porter’s School in Farmington, Connecticut, and the Mary C. Wheeler School in Providence, Rhode Island. She pursued her art education at the Art Students League and the Neighborhood Playhouse, both in New York City. She had her first one-person exhibition of paintings at the Bertha Schaafer Gallery in 1952. Her collages of drawing, painting, fabric and decoupage were shown at the Hammer Gallery in 1969. So popular and inspirational were they that Johnny Carson turned his Tonight show over to the exhibition. Memory, one of her collages, was issued as a stamp by the United Nations to commemorate the World Health Organization and UNICEF. Vanderbilt has received numerous awards, including an honorary Doctorate of Fine Arts at Moore College of Art in Philadelphia and the International Fine Arts College in Miami, Florida. As well, she has been the recipient of the National Society of Arts & Letters Gold Medal of Merit and the Anti-Defamation League Woman of Achievement Award.. Continuing her career as a visual artist, she had an exhibition of her paintings that went on view in the spring of this year.
“As you look at Heart’s Desire, project yourself into the fairy tale world of Dream Box. What it means to me may not be what it means to you…that you will have to discover for yourself.”
Other works by Gloria Vanderbilt currently on view in the sculpture park:
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Heart's Desire, 2008
plexiglass construction
6' x 6' x 6'
Courtesy of The Sculpture Foundation, Inc.
Photo: Ricardo Barros.com |
