*DuPont Circle, Sunday at Dawn* by Gordon Binder

When exploring a city or even just passing through by train, a kind of dichotomy is presented to the traveler. They might roll by newly developed, luxury apartment buildings and only moments later be presented with lost history haunting an abandoned neighborhood. This urban tension and diversity is what artists Gordon Binder and Beverly Logan invite viewers to explore in their duo exhibition From Washington to New York City (curated by Mary Higgins) on view from May 22nd to June 15th in the lower gallery. Cityscapes and skylines, memorials and monuments; All appear contemplative and grand through Binder’s luscious oil paintings and drawings. From the train, Logan has snapped thousands of pictures that accumulate in contrast to one another, presenting this dichotomy as a complete whole in each of her pieces.

As a gallery associate I had the pleasure of speaking with Gordon Binder and Beverly Logan about their current work on view, artistic process, and collaboration. For more information continue reading.

Where did the idea or concept for the show start?

Binder “Well, at a reception, Beverly told me, ‘Oh, we're doing the duo show coming up.’ I said ‘Oh my God! I didn't realize!’ So when we knew that we were going to be together, I said, ‘we should try to collaborate on some kind of a theme’. Many of the artists here, do some in the front [gallery], and some in the middle, unrelated, but I like the idea of collaborating. So we then kind of bounced ideas around. Beverly has taken thousands of pictures on the train ride back and forth to New York. I've done iconic buildings and landscapes in New York, and in Washington.”

Logan “It was a very natural thing, that he had the cities, and I have the in between.”

At what point in exploring either cities are you captivated by a moment? What factors of a scene inspire you?

Logan “Well, I have a thing that I do now, which is, because I'm interested in collage, I like to take pictures of people in the street and I've done that for a long time. I call them my characters. Every time I go to my database, there are these people who show up, and they're very real in my life. I can take a lot of those. That's what I would take pictures of mainly in New York, and then those characters go into whatever background or collage I want to make. So that's mainly looking for elements that go into a final collage rather than a perfect photograph.”

Binder “I look at buildings or just like the Dupont Circle fountain or Flat Iron, or the Empire State. I do streetscapes. And it just suddenly has to be interesting, the shapes of the forms and whatnot and the way they relate to one another. I do a lot of drawings [accumulating] in over 300 sketchbooks. Then I'll come back to home and sometimes [it will turn into] a painting or something like that, but it's what catches my eye. I have a background in architecture and so cityscapes really have a great appeal to me. I also do landscapes. Particularly, when you see something in a landscape like the fountain in Dupont Circle, that has great appeal. So I definitely [do] lots of drawings, then if I get so motivated, I will turn it into a painting. I consider my work in an expressionist mode, starting with what I see and developing the artwork from there, taking some liberties regarding composition, color, and so on.”

How did you get from architecture to where you are now?

Binder “I got a master's degree from the University of Michigan in 1972. I spent [the summer of 1971] working at the Council on Environmental Quality. So I’ve been in the environmental field. In the late 80s I was cleaning a cabinet out and I found all the drawing pads and supplies that I used when I was at the University of Michigan. This was before computers, so you would have to do the sketches to present your ideas. And so I said, ‘Oh, interesting’. I got a sketchbook and went out in Dupont Circle and started drawing simply. So I had some interest and involvement before the corporate. When I left EPA, and this was in early 93, I was exhausted. We had four years of intense activity, including the last two years where we had to defend everything against Sununu, Skinner, and Quayle. I had lunch with somebody, a colleague at EPA, who had been there earlier and had left the Ruckelshaus administration. We chatted a bit and she suggested I read What Color is Your Parachute?

Also, my aunt was a painter in New York in the 40s and 50s, into the 60s. And so whenever my family would visit, we would see her studio there, and we had a lot of her paintings at home. So, I said ‘let me try it’. I took some classes at the Corcoran with Lesley Exton, Mary Del Popolo, and then with Bill Christian Barry, who passed away, but he was a very well regarded artist. He was very encouraging. I took courses from him over about three or four years while I was still working, about once a week. And I started doing the work at home. When he saw some of my urban drawings and paintings, he said,‘you've got a subject matter that will last your lifetime’. It's a different part of your brain. I still was working and following environmental, energy, and climate related issues, which can be pretty heavy sometimes and this gave me something to do that is very different.”

What's your favorite part about your process?

Logan “Doing it. I don't know what else to say. I think it's a gift that I have something that no matter what else happens in my life, I have the availability to do this. I just got my master's degree. I mean, I always wanted to be an artist, but I never was. I took photographs my whole life. And then just a couple of years ago, I went to graduate school. So I think it's a wonderful gift and I think everybody has something that they do well. I have a thesis book I wrote for my MFA. The title of it was I Make Art because I Don't Play Golf. And that's really what it comes down to. It's what I do. And I think it's a gift that I can do it. Whatever the weather, whatever else is going on, I have a lovely studio, I take pictures, I've got a quarter of a million [pictures], I put them together, I make books. I'm lucky enough to have been accepted in this gallery that I can show the work. But that's what it's all about.”

Binder “For me, it’s when I finish something that I like. That is what gives me joy.”

How do you decide when you've finished a piece?

Logan “I never do. Well. That's it. That's a huge question. Sometimes it's time, and you just have to frame it and move on.”

Binder “After I’ve worked on something, if I like it [I decide it’s finished]. Occasionally, I will go back and touch something up. But most of the time, I sort of sign off on it if I'm happy. And there's some that I'm not so happy with, but I figure what the heck.”

What about your medium lends itself to capturing these cities? What about it translates best?

Binder “I think it's the shapes and the way they relate to one another that we see it in urban settings, streetscapes and so forth; You see buildings of all sorts. And if there's an interesting juxtaposition, spindles, a spiral, tall buildings, shorter buildings, whatever they may be…I take it in. There's a lot; It's like a composition.”

Logan “Well, I'm a photographer at heart. I don't even remember how I got into it. But I just love photography, I love the idea that I'm not creating things from a blank slate; I'm finding things. And that's what photography really is. It's taking this whole world and pinpointing things. And that sort of becomes, [having] to have a sense of composition and color and shapes and all of that. Then I believe you have to have a really strong history of photography, in terms of the art. Sometimes I'll have very mundane images, but there's a whole history around that with Stephen Shore and Eggleston. So I think you have to have all that knowledge and photography captures that best for me, because I don't start from nothing. I start with what's already there, and find what strikes me.”

*Georgetown Spires at Sunset* by Gordon Binder

When making your collages and trying to fit all this imagery and information into one piece, how do you decide when it's too much?

Logan “Well, that's the hard part. That's what it's all about; This is a brand new way of working. The first thing I did, when I started to make these, is I would say, ‘Oh, here's a picture of a building…I'll cut that out. Here's a picture of a train…I'll cut that out’. Then I put them together and they were pretty abstract looking. And they were not rectangular, they were all over the place. I realized, I have a note in my studio that says ‘trust the photograph,’ which means they're not just a collection of things. They're actually photographs. And I have to trust the photographer, the photograph, and work from that. So if I have a photograph of trash on a hill that I have coming out of a train, what is the story I want to tell about that trash? That's more important to me than trying to make up a story because I'm not a painter, and I'm not coming from nothing. So I have the trash and then I want to tell the story of it. Well, there's a home that's right there. So I'll stick that on. And the whole thing is this idea [that] we're living between these fabulous cities. It's almost a metaphor that we pass them so quickly. So I trust the photograph first. And then I build on the photograph of what makes it something that is going to affect people to understand, there's a luxury building here, and there's trash here, and they're listening to the train. And that's what that's all it is.”

Binder “The point you have depicted is the journey, from one place to another. You're taking all these different views. But, the point is that this is a journey from here to there, right back again. And you're seeing all this stuff when you're looking out the window and following the landscape of what's out there.”

Logan “And it's more than just a house here or a house there. It's the photographs, but [also] the combination, that makes the juxtaposition. It's like a dream in a way. I could look out the window and see a house and a 100th of a second later, that house is gone. So it's like a dream because the images flash by. I put [the phone camera] flushed up against the window and I just keep [taking photos]. I don't know what I'm getting. When I first started doing it, I would say ‘I didn't take that, the camera took it,’ but then it's in the editing. It's the editing that brings it all together. But it's like a dream. These things flash around. And that's the concept that I want to keep building on.”

I think that one of the most interesting things about the show is the contrast between these fast-paced moments versus the stillness of Binder’s work.

Logan “No, exactly. We got it. We are both working [with] the same thing. It's a metaphor for life. It's a journey. It's familiar to people here. They go back and forth all the time. And you know, Gordon is saying ‘these are the beautiful luscious things here’, and I'm saying ‘but there's a lot of trash.’”

What aspect of each other’s work in the show do you admire most?

Binder “That [she] really put all those things together in compositions that are attractive, and interesting. And then presented them in a very distinguished way. Their overall presentation struck me as quite significant.”

Logan “What I like about Gordon's is his handwriting, and I don't mean, literally his handwriting. I mean, when I look at those pictures of the taxi cabs, he has a style about them. I'm not a painter, so I don't know what the word is, but it's your style, but I call it his handwriting. Because I look at those and I go, ‘Yeah, that's what the cabs look like and that's what the city looks like.’ But it's of course, not like a photograph. It's not real. It's Gordon. That I love. That's you. It's very impressive.”

Binder “Actually looking at my handwriting, you wouldn't be able to read it.”

Logan “That's why I think we were really meshing because I'm [focused on] reality and Gordon [focuses on the] interpretation of reality. I would have a photograph of it, everybody would go ‘Yeah, I see that might be a pretty photograph,’ but with Gordon, it's a style and it's consistent in whatever he's doing.”

Audiences can catch the exhibition on the lower level of Studio Gallery from May 22nd to June 15th or view the online catalogue linked below.

veiw “From washington to new york city” online

From staff contributor Eleanor Leibfried.

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