I went to Kathy Butterly’s studio last night and saw her new work in process. She makes intensely considered, worked and reworked sculptures. Her sculpture has the crystalline beauty of a finely crafted object of an ancient aristorcrac as well as fleshy folds of human bodies – a being, a world, a universe that you can hold in the palm of your hand.

The new work I saw in process will possibly be simpler than the past work with less high-keyed colors. The shape of one, that had just begun, reminded me of Umberto Boccioni’s – Unique Forms of Continuity (1913), an interesting connection since her work mostly veers away from the corpus of high modernism and does not highlight the values of speed, as did the Futurists.

Seeing the work also reaffirmed in me the idea that artists should work the way that they work – small or large, refined or rough, no matter – but absolutely no second guessing, no trend-spotting, no “right” way.

I also saw some incredible new paintings by her husband, Tom Burkhardt.  I have planned to concentrate on sculptors only in this section of the site, but wanted to mention him because his paintings are so good. Both of them show at Tibor de Nagy.

Kathy Butterly

Kathy Butterly

Kathy Butterly