david ebony's 
new york top ten

Beverly Semmes 
at michael klein
October 26 - November 30, 1996 
This is Beverly Semmes' year. Last summer 
she had a show at the Virginia Museum of 
Fine Arts in Richmond; in the spring, a new 
Semmes installation will open at the Wexner 
Center for the Arts in Columbus, Ohio. To 
this add the impressive Semmes installation 
at Michael Klein in New York--an enormous 
dress made of billowing yards of silvery 
material filling a large part of the 
gallery space. The glitzy gown slowly rises 
up and down on mechanical pulleys attached 
to the 12-foot ceiling. Semmes is 
preoccupied with scale, and her work is a 
big tribute to woman power. 
Rounding out the exhibition, several large 
and beautiful, terra-cotta vessels painted 
pink and placed on the floor look like 
thimbles for a giant seamstress. The woman 
of Semmes' imagination may be "every 
woman," but like the long-lost dress that 
once adorned the sacred statue of Athena in 
the Parthenon of ancient Athens, this 
outfit was made for a goddess.

Back to Reviews 1996 Archives

PREVIOUS

NEXT