TAMPA MUSEUM ADDRESSES CONTEMPORARY SOCIAL ISSUES

Friday, 20 July 2007 01:42

Tampa, FL – The Tampa Museum of Art presents American Detritus: Andrew Junge, a unique exhibition that addresses two contemporary social issues facing America and the world – global warming and the war in Iraq. The exhibition features a full-scale replica of a Hummer vehicle, on view in the museum’s Center Gallery through September 16, 2007.

Interim Executive Director Ken Rollins brought the exhibition to the Tampa Museum of Art and states, “When I first saw the Hummer in a storage facility in Sarasota, it spoke to me in a very powerful way. As a Vietnam Veteran, I immediately connected with the ghost-like image of this chariot of death and destruction. At the same time, I realized this war-making vehicle has been adopted by our consumer culture; the vehicle’s enormous gas consumption has become a significant contributor to global warming. On further reflection, the discarded Styrofoam – or polystyrene – from which the sculpture is made, will not disintegrate for more than 1,000 years. I recalled that the combination of polystyrene and gasoline is what is referred to as ‘jellied gasoline’ or napalm, an agent of death in Vietnam. This powerful work of art speaks to many issues, historical and present day, which are of great concern to people in this county and throughout the world.”

Junge created this unique full-scale replica of a Hummer as part of a grant funded project where he made art from material he recycled from a garbage dumpsite in San Francisco. Junge handcrafted the Hummer from Styrofoam bricks made from thousands of individual pieces of shaped polystyrene, glued together and then shaved or sanded down, cut with a hot-wire tool, or skinned with a sheet of polystyrene veneer. The vehicle is 17 feet long, 6 feet high, and over 8 feet wide. Junge made the Hummer as an example of how the artmaking process can be a force in recycling trash. Junge has stated he wishes, “To examine found objects and materials, to invest them with new life, and to acknowledge their presence in the world. My aim is to turn the lowest form of human productivity, trash, into the highest form of productivity, art, – a kind of modern alchemy.” Junge’s sculpture also stands as a memorial and symbol of the Iraq war. He says, “It is a symbol of an oil-guzzling machine at a time when American soldiers are dying to secure oil-rich Iraq. And ironically, Styrofoam is made from oil.”

This work of art was most recently seen at Greene Contemporary in Sarasota, FL, this past March and with Lincart, San Francisco, at the SCOPE Miami Art Fair in December 2006. The June/July 2007 issue of Art in America magazine features the American Detritus: Andrew Junge exhibition.

Three additional exhibitions open this month at the Tampa Museum of Art that feature contemporary crafts, sculpture and photography: Color: Ten African American Artists, on view July 21 – September 23, 2007, National Sculpture Society 74^th Annual Awards Exhibition, on view July 21 – September 30, 2007, and The Big Picture: 2006 Photographer Laureate Steven S. Gregory, on view July 28 – September 16, 2007.

ABOUT THE TAMPA MUSEUM OF ART
The Tampa Museum of Art is conducting a capital fundraising campaign to build a new facility that will consist of approximately 68,000 square feet. Architect Stanley Saitowitz of San Francisco, CA, has been selected to design the new museum facility located in Curtis Hixon Park in downtown Tampa. Funding for the new facility will come from both the public and private sectors of the community. Visit The Tampa Museum of Art at : http://www.tampagov.net/dept_Tampa_Museum_of_Art/index.asp