LISA & SCOTT CYLINDER
ABOUT THE ARTIST
We met as students in 1984 at Tyler School of Art in Philadelphia, both studying Jewelry & Metals, connecting over cigarettes, music, and a shared interest in making. Lisa graduated in 1985 and spent a year in Providence working in the jewelry industry while Scott finished at Tyler that year. Scott attended Graduate school at SUNY New Paltz (NY) while Lisa honed her skills working for various craftspeople while Scott worked towards achieving an MFA.
After Scott graduated, we got married and started a jewelry production business in 1988. While working part-time jobs, we developed our business and moved back to Pennsylvania, close to where we were both raised. After 10 years of focusing mostly on production work, we decided to reduce that aspect to dedicate more time to creating One-Of-A-Kind Art Jewelry. During this period, we had two children and were renovating our second house.
Our relationship is founded on collaboration in our roles as makers, parents, and partners. We have largely set aside personal egos to focus on achieving mutual objectives. Despite our differing styles and preferences, we have successfully created a life where the results of our efforts represent a blend of both our ideas and skill sets.
In 2018, we relocated to Maine to achieve a higher quality of life, which had been a longstanding aspiration for both of us. Outside of our time in the studio (the Wedge), we frequently engage in hiking, mushroom foraging, gardening, cycling, swimming, and kayaking.
ARTIST STATEMENT
The concept for this body of work is twofold; First, it references the Muse of Epic Poetry and Music with a nod to Greek Mythology. Second, it is a reference to the musical instrument used in both the circus and the carousel, an air powered pipe organ that is familiar in both arenas. As we approached this work, it was with an eye towards these sources. The basis for most of the pieces are vintage brass wind parts from trumpets, French horns and trombones, creating a specific yet small menu for us to choose from in the creation of this body of work.
“The founding of the Modern Circus was a result of the collapse of the Roman Empire” reads the plaque at the beginning of the Ringling Brothers Circus Museum, a profound and fraught idea to us. That environment was created from the ashes of a fallen empire, where nomadic and age-old Arts could be carried on not in a specific place, but everywhere, as people’s lives were thrown asunder. We have found this metaphor very meaningful, especially today, as we have recently witnessed the end of the golden age of the Circus in America and, what we believe to be the beginning of the end of the American Empire.
The pieces themselves are an homage to the fantastical creatures that run through mythology, the Circus and carousel animals, the latter two being in our wheelhouse, us having a penchant for things from the 20th Century, including the found parts we harvest for our works. The imagery is joyous in its interpretations, but also there is an underlying menace, as the creatures depicted are either threatening or subjugated by man. Both mythology and the circus pose the idea of either Gods helping or hindering humans or humans being kind and cruel to the captive animals.
The concept is multi-level and we did not always adhere strictly to that idea but rather played loosely with the rich imagery and ideas that were generated by this concept. Past references and homage have always played a strong role in what we create, and here it is no different. Calder and Picasso foremost, but also Dumbo, Fellini and the many rich circus Films of the past, Ray Bradbury’s “Something Wicked This Way Comes”, and the images that are conjured and depicted in ancient Greek Art and stories. The appeal and draw to these resources has always been in our periphery, and with “Calliope” we have tried to create and bundle these into a coherent, metaphorical and playful whole.