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Amy Stacey Curtis

array I

2018

Wood, acrylic, vinyl, audience

Each of 2 shelves: 1 1/4 x 104 3/4 x 1 1/8 inches (3.2 x 266.1 x 2.9 cm)
Each of 99 cubes: 7/8 x 7/8 x 7/8 inches (2.2 x 2.2 x 2.2 cm)
Vinyl: 8 x 30 inches (20.3 x 76.2 cm)
Top shelf at: 59 inches (149.9 cm)
Bottom shelf at: 56 inches (142.2 cm)
Signed and dated on reverse of top shelf in graphite
(Inventory #30241)

Exhibited June 22, 2019 – July 26, 2019

Amy Stacey Curtis is the Maine Arts Commission’s 2005 and 2017 Individual Artist Fellow For Visual Art and the recipient of numerous grants including those from the Berkshire Taconic Community Foundation, the Foundation for Contemporary Arts, and the Robert Rauschenberg Foundation. From 1998 to 2016, Curtis completed an 18-year commitment to interactive installation art, 9 solo-biennial exhibits of large-in-scope, participatory works in 9 vast mill spaces throughout Maine. In the end, Curtis mounted 81 installations in 8 Maine towns while cleaning by hand each historic space (averaging 25,000 square feet). Each solo biennial was a 22-month process exploring a different theme, inviting audience to perpetuate and resolve each exhibit’s 9 unique works. Curtis has exhibited interactive installation internationally, while her conceptual/process drawings are in many collections including Bates College Museum of Art, Colby College Museum of Art, Ogunquit Museum of American Art, and Portland Museum of Art. She has a large upcoming solo exhibition at the University of New Hampshire Museum of Art. Born 1970 in Beverly, Massachusetts, Curtis resides in Lyman, Maine.

Amy Stacey Curtis
array I, 2019
Wood, acrylic, vinyl, audience
Each of 2 shelves: 104.75 x 1.25 x 1.125 inches
Each of 99 cubes: .875 x .875 x .875 inches
Vinyl: 8 x 30 inches
Top shelf at: 59 inches B
ottom shelf at: 56 inches
Signed and dated on reverse of top shelf in graphite
Ninety-nine white cubes, each hand-embossed with a number, and 2 white, 99-cube, cube shelves (cube shelves keep cubes equally-spaced and easy-tograsp/-place), wall-installed, one over the other.

At start of exhibit, all 99 cubes fill upper shelf, while lower shelf empty. Cubes on upper shelf are placed in order “1” through “99”, left-to-right. Instructions (as much a part of installation as other elements):
Place cubes on lower shelf in random order.
When all cubes reach lower shelf, place cubes on upper shelf in order. When all cubes reach upper shelf, place cubes on lower shelf in random order… If unsure in what direction cubes are moving, choose.

Note: Audience does not always follow instructions/interprets instructions; this is part of the art.

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Amy Stacey Curtis (born 1970, Beverly, Massachusetts) is an installation artist focusing on participatory works. The Maine Arts Commission’s 2005 and 2017 Individual Artist Fellow For Visual Art and the recipient of numerous grants including those from Berkshire Taconic Community Foundation, Foundation for Contemporary Arts, Robert Rauschenberg Foundation, and Samuel I. Newhouse Foundation, Curtis has exhibited interactive art internationally.

Curtis initiates each of her works which are then perpetuated and resolved by audience. For each installation, Curtis instigates a desired vision through provided guidance. Then, by relinquishing these concepts to her collaborative audience, her work sometimes proceeds in unanticipated ways. These uncontrollable unknowns are likewise crucial components of her work.

From 1998 to 2016, Curtis completed an 18-year project, 9 solo-biennial exhibits of large-in-scope, interactive art in 9 vast mill spaces throughout Maine. In the end, Curtis mounted 81 participatory installations while cleaning by hand each historic space (averaging 25,000 square feet). Each solo biennial was a 22-month process exploring a different, predetermined theme, inviting audience to activate each exhibit’s 9 unique works.

After Curtis’s 18-year project was finished, she had been working toward new interactive projects for 5 weeks in her studio, when she was debilitated by a neurological illness. After 2 psychiatric wards, the start of severe movement and speech disorder, and 15 months of unknowns, it was finally determined that Curtis’s brain had been attacked by untreated Lyme Disease.

Since the start of her disability in March 2017, Curtis has been moving forward and exhibiting new interactive concepts with help from assistants, curators, and the arts community. Curtis works from Lyman, Maine.

Related Information

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