I’m slowly trying to recover from a complete and total loss of data on my MacBook last week. I’m typically pretty good about backing up, but I have a few reasons (that I won’t explain here) why I hadn’t done a backup in about six weeks or so. Unfortunately the computer techs at NMU were not able to recover ANYTHING from my hard drive.
Beyond losing my music and any photos not uploaded onto Flickr, I lost a bulk of the research and writing I’d done about N. Cecelia Kettunen. It’s coming at a very bad time since the show of Kettunen’s work from the permanent collection is nearly done being installed, and I’d been working on the exhibition’s introductory panel that was shaping up nicely, and is now gone.
I went back to the Ishpeming Carnegie Library today to visit “The Universal Madonna” and check in on any progress the library had on researching Kettunen. A little reminder of what the “The Universal Madonna” looks like (and coincidentally is the only photo I seem to have of any of Kettunen’s paintings – that will change soon) :
I’d like to take a trip back to the library to search through the basement storage area for anything Kettunen-related, hopefully in the near future. There is quite a lot of documentation of Kettunen exhibiting and even selling paintings to the library. I also realized today that there are about 3 sketches for the “The Universal Madonna” in the museum’s collection. Since the exhibition is sort of meant to evolve and change over the next six months, I may get to a point where I find it necessary to show this painting with the sketches. I’m really hoping to treat the gallery as more of a research laboratory for this exhibition. Again, more photos will help explain this, which will be forthcoming.
Back to the text. I’ll continue to post it as I write. My blog is also a laboratory!
N. Cecelia Kettunen : Finding Place in Modernism
This exhibition of Ishpeming-native N. Cecilia Kettunen (1896-1992) represents a portion of more than 200 pieces donated by the artist to the museum’s permanent collection in 1988. This presentation of paintings, works on paper, sketches, photographs and ephemera are part of a larger research project currently underway on the life and work of the artist.
The pieces selected for this exhibition are meant to highlight the stylistic breadth of Kettunen during a career that spanned over 70 years. The title of the exhibition refers to the influence of the various styles associated with modernism on an artist working during the height of that period, as well the effect of geographical location on artistic production.
It’s not much, but not bad for a Saturday night.
