Studio Call: Nari Ward

St udio Ca ll [j o u r n a l of Con t em p or ar y Af rican Art Nar i War d Nari Ward works out of a large, second floor studio on the eastside of New York's 125th Street. For a sculptor and installation artist who often works on a large scale, his studio is surprisingly, hardly cluttered. In the center of the space sits his work- inprogress , a three- piece project in which he has transformed found Christmas trees into a sculpture by burning them, wrapping them up, then coating them in sugar. The piece has been in the making for three year s. A few other pieces hang around the studio. Most of Ward's pieces are either in collections or traveling exhibitions. Aft er nearly a decade of making or assembling objects in three dimensions, however the artists wants to give more time to drawing, a trend one finds among other contemporary artists as well. From Anish Kapoor to Kara Walker, artists are no longer limiting themselves to the socalled major forms; the large painting or monumental sculpture. Chris Ofili is working in watercolors as well as his large, dung and acrylic paintings. Kcho no longer simply makes his boat pieces; he now draws them as well. Even those who work in new media such as Elke Krystufek, are moving between the forms, often returning to drawing and works on paper while working nevertheless in the media that we most identify them with. The reasons for artists' sustained interest in drawing are often not m erely aesthetic but strategic and logistical as well: drawings are easier to maneuver around, store, or transport for exhibitions. Even more importantly, they are easier to place in collections. Because we are not used to drawings from War d , one looks forward to them with a certain excitement: what would they look Olu Oguibe like? Wou l d they remind us formally of his well- wrought multiple pieces and assemblages, Uke Idle Drift and Iron Heavens? Or will they simply explore those concepts that have preoccupied him , without much visual reference to the works we know? Wou l d they come in same scale as his sculptures and installations, or will they come modest and intimate, so small they draw us in and en velope us? The Questions remain to be answered because the artist is not readyyet to show his drawings. War d sits back at his small, equally uncluttered desk against a large window that looks out on 125th Street, and talks about his favorite artists: his friends Leonardo Drew and David Hammons, his dealer leffrey Deit ch of Deit ch Projects, his experiences with audiences who occasionally get very emotionally before his pieces, his very fruitful and deeply spiritual period working at the Shaker retreat in upstate New York, which he also recounts in a recent issue of The Art lournal [Spring 1998]. He talks about his mother who brought him and his siblings to the Unit ed States from lamaica when he was a child, and about his father some of whose favorite religious hymns have inspired his sculptures and installations. He talks about his wife and two children. An d he Fall/ Wint er 1998 Nk a»3 5 Above: Peace Keeper, 1996, mixed media installation. Below: Amazing Grace, 1995, mixed media installation. ...