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The Poetics of Atmosphere: Lorna Simpson's Cloudscape and Other Works from the Collection

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Space

Dates

Artists have long been preoccupied with the sky; through depictions of the atmosphere, they elicit new understandings of corporeality and transcendence. This exhibition presents Lorna Simpson’s video Cloudscape (2004) in dialogue with selected works from the Colby Museum’s permanent collection that reference weightlessness and presence through meteorological imagery.

A figure in a trench coat emerging from a cloud.
Portrait of Lorna Simpson.

About Lorna Simpson

Related Media

Installation view
Image of a man surrounded by smoke and clouds.

Selected Works

Sally Egbert

Abstract painting with colorful, dynamic shapes on a purple and gray background.

Vincent Andrew Hartgen

Abstract painting depicting swirling blues and whites with dark angular brushstrokes.

Alexander Calder

Kinetic sculpture with metal rods and colorful abstract shapes.

Charles E. Burchfield

Landscape painting with a foreground of beige and greens, middle section of plant-like brushstrokes, and background of colorful trees and sky.

Henry Ossawa Tanner

Monochrome etching of people in a small sailboat on a body of water.

Julie Mehretu

Abstract artwork with intricate black and gray line patterns on a white background.

Arthur Wesley Dow

Abstract landscape with clouds, distant land, and a patch of blue water.

Installation Views

  • Framed abstract and landscape artworks on two white gallery walls with a wooden bench in the center
  • Gallery wall with three colorful artworks, a white hanging mobile, and a wooden bench in the foreground
  • Dark gallery room with video projection of a figure in a suit standing in fog, with black benches in front
  • Exhibition title wall with introductory text and white hanging mobile nearby

Installation view of The Poetics of Atmosphere: Lorna Simpson’s Cloudscape and Other Works from the Collection, Davis Gallery, Colby College Museum of Art, Waterville, Maine, 2022. Photo: Luc Demers

Installation view of The Poetics of Atmosphere: Lorna Simpson’s Cloudscape and Other Works from the Collection, Davis Gallery, Colby College Museum of Art, Waterville, Maine, 2022. Photo: Luc Demers

Installation view of The Poetics of Atmosphere: Lorna Simpson’s Cloudscape and Other Works from the Collection, Davis Gallery, Colby College Museum of Art, Waterville, Maine, 2022. Photo: Luc Demers

Installation view of The Poetics of Atmosphere: Lorna Simpson’s Cloudscape and Other Works from the Collection, Davis Gallery, Colby College Museum of Art, Waterville, Maine, 2022. Photo: Luc Demers