Arthur Simms “Throughline”

Shoot the Lobster

[Image:John the Baptist "Prisoner of the Earth" (1992-1993) rope, wood, glue, metal, screws, bongos, 85 x 44 x 23 in.]

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Curated by Marquita Flowers

Throughline presents six works by Arthur Simms from the 1990s which highlight the extensive threads, literal and metaphorical, that Simms has drawn in his practice across continents, place and time.

Using a core set of materials in his sculptures such as rope, wood, found and ephemeral objects, Simms has developed a language of linear and abstract connections that have sustained his practice over several decades. The language enacted in Simms’s rope sculptures is one of entanglements, abundance, loss and transformation. Found materials and wood are used to build armatures, or foundations, and various types of rope are then feverishly tied, bound, and wrapped giving the foundation a new skin. Each knot transforms the veiled objects into a forest of warps and lines creating new nebulae.

Influenced by his current position in the world or memories of specific events, Simms’s drawing practice takes on its own taxonomy. Combining visual renderings to almost meticulous didactic titles, the drawings become markers of Simms’s life and history. He includes markers of his ancestral line, by signing all of the drawings on view with the moniker Chester Arthur, an homage to his late father.

Throughline creates a dialogue of drawn and physical lines; the sculptures and drawings warp and move collaboratively.

Arthur Simms (b. 1961) emigrated to Brooklyn, New York in 1969. He received his Masters Degree and Bachelor of Arts from Brooklyn College. He has exhibited nationally and internationally, including representing the country of Jamaica in the 49th Venice Biennial in 2001. He recently was a participant in the 58th Venice Biennial in the Chiesa di Santa Maria delle Penitenti, Venice in 2019. Other venues have included Musée International des Arts Modestes, The Irish Museum of Modern Art, Brooklyn Museum, Neuberger Museum, American Academy of Arts and Letters, MOMA P.S.1, American Academy in Rome, and the Queens Museum. Numerous awards have included the Rome Prize Fellowship, Academy Award from the American Academy of Arts and Letters, Creative Capital Grant, Guggenheim Fellowship, Louis Comfort Tiffany Award, Residency from the Irish Museum of Modern Art in Dublin, Residency at the New Roots Foundation in Antigua, Guatemala, Residency at Campo Garzon in Garzon, Uruguay, New York Foundation for the Arts Fellowship, Rockefeller Foundation Bellagio Residency Fellowship, Joan Mitchell Foundation Grant, S.J. Weiler Fund Award and the Pollock-Krasner Grant.