RIVER FUGUES are a series of individually unique projects exploring the interdependency of people,
industry and rivers. All River Fugues entail regional research, recording images and narratives with video and audio which
are later edited into fugues and integrated into sculptural installations. My reason
for using the fugue is because of its flexibility as a conceptual framework which
can be applied to any set of components one is trying to integrate, be they sounds,
voices, narratives or images.
Moving the Water(s): Ashokan Fugues 2014 & 2019
Cue Art Foundation, 2014
It is an elegy to the people of the Catskills who lost their land and homes through
eminent domain for the building of the Ashokan Reservoir, which supplies drinking
water for New York City through its aqueduct system.
Using the musical structure of a fugue, the piece is “composed” to be played by a
trio of videos projected inside the two water towers and from the one surveyor’s transit.
In creating Moving the Water(s): Ashokan Fugues, I began with the idea of imagining
what it would be like to see inside the NYC water towers and watch the rise and fall
with daily usage of the water coming from the Catskills.
To accomplish this, I used an underwater camera to shoot a video of water filling
up and emptying out of an industrial sink in an old apartment building, built in 1919,
just two years after the NYC aqueduct system. A green ball animates the water currents
and becomes the visual thread linking the movement of water from the Catskills down
to NYC. This video was then rear-projected onto the translucent tank walls of the
two water towers in the Ashokan Fugues installation at CUE and the Kleinert/James
Center for the Arts.
In the dedication ceremony for the completion of the NYC aqueduct system, the mayor
of New York City referred to the chief engineer, Waldo Smith, as a magician because
his accomplishment of this major engineering feat was considered nothing short of
magical. Subsequently, footage of a magician performing tricks with empty cups and
green balls appears throughout the multiple channels of video projections in Moving
the Water(s): Ashokan Fugues.
Madelon Powers Art Gallery - 2019
Ashokan Fugues was adapted for a site-specific exhibition in the Madelon Powers Art Gallery at East
Stroudsburg University. Although the impetus for Ashokan Fugues came from the Ashokan
Reservoir near my studio in upstate New York, access to clean water and issues related
to displacement in order to provide water elsewhere are just as relevant in East Stroudsburg.
To accomplish this, I used an underwater camera to shoot a video of water filling
up and emptying out of an industrial sink in an old apartment building, built in 1919,
just two years after the NYC aqueduct system. A green ball animates the water currents
and becomes the visual thread linking the movement of water from the Catskills down
to NYC. This video was then rear-projected onto the translucent tank walls of the
two water towers in the Ashokan Fugues installation at CUE and the Kleinert/James
Center for the Arts.
In the dedication ceremony for the completion of the NYC aqueduct system, the mayor
of New York City referred to the chief engineer, Waldo Smith, as a magician because
his accomplishment of this major engineering feat was considered nothing short of
magical. Subsequently, footage of a magician performing tricks with empty cups and
green balls appears throughout the multiple channels of video projections in Moving
the Water(s): Ashokan Fugues.
Madelon Powers Art Gallery - 2019
Ashokan Fugues was adapted for a site-specific exhibition in the Madelon Powers Art Gallery at East
Stroudsburg University. Although the impetus for Ashokan Fugues came from the Ashokan
Reservoir near my studio in upstate New York, access to clean water and issues related
to displacement in order to provide water elsewhere are just as relevant in East Stroudsburg.
Moving the Waters: Croton Fugues - 2017
Solo Exhibition
Curated by Arezoo Moseni
Croton Fugues was inspired by the 2017 celebration of the centennial anniversary of New York City’s
aqueduct system, and the location of the Mid-Manhattan Library across the street from
the site of the former Croton Distribution Reservoir, the first reservoir in New York
City.
When that reservoir became inadequate for supplying NYC with water for its growing
population, the city looked north to the Catskills for its water. The Croton Distribution
Reservoir was then destroyed and the current New York City Public Library was built
over the site instead.
The layers of this history were reflected in the windows of the Mid-Manhattan Library
across the street.
This project seeks to entice the viewer into imagining and investigating the history
of NYC’s water supply system through the accumulated layering of the experience of
exploring these windows. Focusing on the Croton Reservoir, photographs and video stills
from my onsite research and documentation were layered with archival images from the
NYPL digital files to form large panels of archival prints on canvas and paper. Inspired
by paintings of India’s Deccan Court in the 16 and 17th century, these panels break down images into sections of narratives, abstractions
and repetitive patterns.
Panels of large archival prints on canvas were suspended in the street level windows
of the Mid-Manhattan Library’s Corner Room along Fifth Avenue and East 40th Street, with different views to the inside and out. Additional prints on paper were
installed in glass cabinets and vitrines inside the Corner Room. Additional window
texts referred viewers to web links for videos, extending their experience in yet
another dimension.
Moving the Waters: Croton Fugues
Weblinks:
New York Public Library: Margaret Cogswell Moving Waters Croton Fugues Art Corner
Room Exhibition Series
MOVING THE WATERS: CROTON FUGUES (MAGICIAN CLIPS)
This project seeks to entice the viewer into imagining and investigating the history
of NYC’s water supply system through the accumulated layering of the experience of
exploring these windows. Focusing on the Croton Reservoir, photographs and video stills
from my onsite research and documentation were layered with archival images from the
NYPL digital files to form large panels of archival prints on canvas and paper. Inspired
by paintings of India’s Deccan Court in the 16 and 17th century, these panels break down images into sections of narratives, abstractions
and repetitive patterns.
Panels of large archival prints on canvas were suspended in the street level windows
of the Mid-Manhattan Library’s Corner Room along Fifth Avenue and East 40th Street, with different views to the inside and out. Additional prints on paper were
installed in glass cabinets and vitrines inside the Corner Room. Additional window
texts referred viewers to web links for videos, extending their experience in yet
another dimension.
Moving the Waters: Croton Fugues
Weblinks:
New York Public Library: Margaret Cogswell Moving Waters Croton Fugues Art Corner
Room Exhibition Series
MOVING THE WATERS: CROTON FUGUES (MAGICIAN CLIPS)
Mississippi River Fugues (2008)
Art Museum of the University of Memphis
Curated by Leslie Luebbers, Director
Each of the five buoys (6 to 14 ft. high) houses an oscillating motor and video projector
in the top section. Oscillating 90 degrees, video images move across the surrounding
walls and form a visual fugue exploring the haunting history, poignant beauty and
delicate balance found in the interdependence of the lives of people in the Delta,
the cotton industry and Mississippi River.
For more information:
https://vimeo.com/user9646797
View from a Puddle
December 2019-January 2020
In an effort to engage with the world of the salamanders, frogs and beetles that the
biologists and botanists were researching, Cogswell sought to shift her perspectives
by using a small GoPro camera to shoot footage underwater in ponds and puddles, and
at ground level while hiking along mountain paths.
The residency at mhProjects enabled Cogswell to experiment with assembling some of
these drawings and videos from Mountain Lake into an immersive installation on view
now, while at the same time developing new works on paper.
About collaborating with artist Margaret Cogswell on Views from a Puddle, JoAnne McFarland
writes: I see and hear in the prismatic syncopation of Margaret's videos a kind of
code—if only we would listen, if only we had courage to act on the most urgent issue
we face—climate change: raging fires, extreme drought, torrential rains. My poem,
My Broken French, deals with rains of many kinds: longing, grief, resignation, and
probes the psyche from different angles, just as Margaret offers views of the world
from a puddle. The scroll that carries the opening stanzas of My Broken French, in
French/English couplets soaked with passion, complements Margaret's delicately wrought
earth–toned drawings.
Margaret Cogswell is a mixed-media installation artist residing in New York and a
recipient of numerous awards including the John Simon Guggenheim Fellowship, Pollock-Krasner
Foundation and New York Foundation for the Arts. Since 2003, the main focus of Cogswell's
work has been an ongoing series of mixed-media RIVER FUGUES installation projects
exploring the interdependency of people, industry and rivers. Selected exhibitions
include: Moving the Water(s): Croton Fugues, Mid-Manhattan Library of New York Public
Library, NYC (2017); Water Soundings, Zendai Zhujiajiao Art Museum, China (2014);
Moving the Water(s): Ashokan Fugues and Wyoming River Fugues at CUE Art Foundation,
NYC (2014); Wyoming River Fugues, Art Museum, University of Wyoming, Laramie (2012);
Mississippi River Fugues, Art Museum, University of Memphis, Tennessee (2008); Hudson
River Fugues at Tang Museum, Skidmore College, Saratoga Springs, NY, (group 2009-2010);
River Fugues at BOZAR Centre for Fine Arts, Brussels, Belgium, Monaco Ministry of
Culture and Chicago Field Museum (group exhibition, 2007-09). www.margaretcogswell.net
About collaborating with artist Margaret Cogswell on Views from a Puddle, JoAnne McFarland
writes: I see and hear in the prismatic syncopation of Margaret's videos a kind of
code—if only we would listen, if only we had courage to act on the most urgent issue
we face—climate change: raging fires, extreme drought, torrential rains. My poem,
My Broken French, deals with rains of many kinds: longing, grief, resignation, and
probes the psyche from different angles, just as Margaret offers views of the world
from a puddle. The scroll that carries the opening stanzas of My Broken French, in
French/English couplets soaked with passion, complements Margaret's delicately wrought
earth–toned drawings.
Margaret Cogswell is a mixed-media installation artist residing in New York and a
recipient of numerous awards including the John Simon Guggenheim Fellowship, Pollock-Krasner
Foundation and New York Foundation for the Arts. Since 2003, the main focus of Cogswell's
work has been an ongoing series of mixed-media RIVER FUGUES installation projects
exploring the interdependency of people, industry and rivers. Selected exhibitions
include: Moving the Water(s): Croton Fugues, Mid-Manhattan Library of New York Public
Library, NYC (2017); Water Soundings, Zendai Zhujiajiao Art Museum, China (2014);
Moving the Water(s): Ashokan Fugues and Wyoming River Fugues at CUE Art Foundation,
NYC (2014); Wyoming River Fugues, Art Museum, University of Wyoming, Laramie (2012);
Mississippi River Fugues, Art Museum, University of Memphis, Tennessee (2008); Hudson
River Fugues at Tang Museum, Skidmore College, Saratoga Springs, NY, (group 2009-2010);
River Fugues at BOZAR Centre for Fine Arts, Brussels, Belgium, Monaco Ministry of
Culture and Chicago Field Museum (group exhibition, 2007-09). www.margaretcogswell.net
Wyoming River Fugues 2012
Solo Exhibition
Curated by Susan Moldenhauer, Director & Chief Curator
Of particular interest are water rights and issues related to river water usage including
irrigation and mining.
The Wyoming River Fugues installation is comprised of video projected from three surveyor’s
transits; video projected onto the floor of a stock tank; and a bucket of light which
moves almost imperceptibly slowly 50 feet diagonally across the gallery space.
Surveyor’s transits, normally determining division of land and access to water, serve
as a vehicle for exploring the historical and cultural landscape of Wyoming through
video projections moving across the surrounding walls.
Research in Wyoming led to the introduction to flood irrigation and the use of an
orange tarp to “move the water”. Concealing and revealing, much like the cape of a
magician, the orange tarp and a magician were subsequently incorporated into the installation
videos. Their presence became a means to reference the diversions of waters by irrigation,
mining, the creation of reservoirs, dams, and other efforts.
Narrative fugues were created from interviews with individuals around the state and
presented through portable DVD players mounted amidst wall drawings of the rivers
of Wyoming. Participants included Arapaho and Shoshone elders, botanists, composers,
archaeologists, ecologists, hydrologists, philosophers, ranchers, environmentalists,
historians, poets, and scientists with the extraction industries.
Many of these same individuals later participated in a 2-day symposium organized by
the Art Museum in conjunction with the Wyoming River Fugues exhibition. Never Drink
Water Downstream: Factual Tales and Artful Musing on Wyoming Water focused on water
issues including pollution, sustainability, water rights and climate change.
For more information:
https://vimeo.com/338582153
Art Museum Gallery interview video: 6:28 mins.
Research in Wyoming led to the introduction to flood irrigation and the use of an
orange tarp to “move the water”. Concealing and revealing, much like the cape of a
magician, the orange tarp and a magician were subsequently incorporated into the installation
videos. Their presence became a means to reference the diversions of waters by irrigation,
mining, the creation of reservoirs, dams, and other efforts.
Narrative fugues were created from interviews with individuals around the state and
presented through portable DVD players mounted amidst wall drawings of the rivers
of Wyoming. Participants included Arapaho and Shoshone elders, botanists, composers,
archaeologists, ecologists, hydrologists, philosophers, ranchers, environmentalists,
historians, poets, and scientists with the extraction industries.
Many of these same individuals later participated in a 2-day symposium organized by
the Art Museum in conjunction with the Wyoming River Fugues exhibition. Never Drink
Water Downstream: Factual Tales and Artful Musing on Wyoming Water focused on water
issues including pollution, sustainability, water rights and climate change.
For more information:
https://vimeo.com/338582153
Art Museum Gallery interview video: 6:28 mins.
Zhujiajiao River Poems - 2014
http://margaretcogswell.net/project_info/156
Solo Exhibition
Living and working in a Ming Dynasty building on the Cao Gong River with all the overlays
of both ancient history and contemporary life offered a unique experience for a newcomer
to China and rare opportunity to observe its relationship to its water and its rivers.
In Zhujiajiao, the rivers and canals are public waterways. Not only beautiful to look
at, they also serve as arteries in the life of the surrounding communities and towns.
These rivers are used for everything including fishing, boating, hauling construction
materials, washing clothes, mops, food, and more.
Teahouses, restaurants, parks, as well as private homes, line these waterways, and
are always filled with people whose lives are dependent on different uses of the water,
for survival as well as for the pleasure that it gives them.
Watching the river while working in my studio or taking long walks through the town,
I looked for links to China’s history and culture through the details of objects,
food, music, and movements in daily life or rituals. I began to notice the reoccurring
movements in different activities – like the rowing of the boats, the movement of
a Taiji master’s hands, the motions of harvesting snails with long bamboo poles, the
movement of the water after a passing boat. I would catch fragments of traditional
songs, whiffs of smoke from the cooking of food, and smells of fish frying on open
flames. These observations formed a point of departure for both my drawings and my
video as I strove to capture the essence of this experience along the river- perhaps
like writing a visual poem instead of a newspaper article.
Teahouses, restaurants, parks, as well as private homes, line these waterways, and
are always filled with people whose lives are dependent on different uses of the water,
for survival as well as for the pleasure that it gives them.
Watching the river while working in my studio or taking long walks through the town,
I looked for links to China’s history and culture through the details of objects,
food, music, and movements in daily life or rituals. I began to notice the reoccurring
movements in different activities – like the rowing of the boats, the movement of
a Taiji master’s hands, the motions of harvesting snails with long bamboo poles, the
movement of the water after a passing boat. I would catch fragments of traditional
songs, whiffs of smoke from the cooking of food, and smells of fish frying on open
flames. These observations formed a point of departure for both my drawings and my
video as I strove to capture the essence of this experience along the river- perhaps
like writing a visual poem instead of a newspaper article.
