Art on the Rooftop
Art on the Rooftop is a free exhibit of public sculpture in the William T. Evjue Rooftop Gardens for the enjoyment of our visitors. The exhibit began as an outdoor pilot project in 2014 to help showcase the rooftop as another “must see” Madison destination. It has since become an annual program with artwork changing each year.
The 2023 Sculptures
Steve Feren, Fitchburg, Wisconsin— Illumination
Feren’s concrete and glass work is concerned with the persistence of life and with the miracle of discovery and creation. This all is given voice through the physical and nonphysical phenomenon of the light. “The eye was made by the light, for the light, so that the inner light may emerge to meet the outer light,” Goethe, Theory of Color. Feren’s hobbled Moose is at a pivotal moment of ringing the bell and finding illumination after a long lone journey with many wrong paths. All through his trials and tribulations light still emerges from his weary form. The end or the beginning?
Luke Achterberg, Onalaska, Wisconsin— Bedecked Billow
Achterberg explores the subcultures of Americana found in automotive customizing, style writing, calligraphy, graffiti, comic books, and snow/skateboarding. The first letter of the title of the sculpture, “Bedecked Billow” reflects a highly stylized calligraphy/graffiti letter “B.” This work is in the “B” series of artwork created in a style he calls “Super Sleek.”
Geoffrey Hoffman, Madison, Wisconsin—75th
75th is a fabricated stainless-steel sculpture created as a birthday gift for Hoffman’s mother. Each of the three curved faces represents 25 years. Although constructed from sheet metal, it appears as a solid form. It doesn’t look heavy or light. It’s just there, reflecting its surroundings and looking like it will exist forever.
(Fabrication assistance from Oscar Lozano, Sergio Lozano, Randal Banuelos, Marc Peterson, Amber Swisher, and Dejan Velickovic.)
Andrew Arvanetes, Kankakee, Illinois—Belvedere
Arvanetes’ sculptures have always been object-oriented and narrative with mechanical and architectural details. “Belvedere” is a word derived from two Italian words meaning “beautiful view.” For the artist this sculpture represents a gathering of groups of people and was created as a response to the isolation caused by covid. By using universal visual elements, like the house shapes on the upper section, viewers can create their own narrative based on their personal experiences.
Andrew Arvanetes, Kankakee, Illinois—Full Circle
“Full Circle” is fabricated from aluminum painted with bright ‘safety orange’. Arvanetes says “Full Circle” refers to his journey over the years living and working in many locations and now, his latest and final move, bringing him back to where he grew up. Here he finds family and friends.
Art Industry, Curator
Art Industry (Rosemary Bodolay and Dale Malner), an exhibition design firm, grew out of an involvement with public art activity and museum exhibition preparation. Principals, Dale Malner and Rosemary Bodolay specialize in both commercial and non-commercial exhibition projects. Art Industry has curated a number of art exhibitions in the Madison area including Cache (2011), Non-Stop (2014), and co-curated Art on the Rooftop (2019 & 2020). As artists, Dale and Rosemary have exhibited individually in venues across North America and Europe. Art Industry projects also include designing exhibitions for commercial clients nationally and internationally.
The 2022 Sculptures
Raymond Katz, Pontiac Michigan — “Flight”
The manipulation of form in space to create visual balance, using rhythm, action and movement, combine to create compositions that convey the implied energy found in his work, and expressed in his current installation “Flight.” The sculpture alludes to an evolutionary process that we all commonly share in the human experience. The active forms that are brought together represent the flux of life, and embrace transformative concepts such as evolution, metamorphosis and transcendence.
Hilde DeBruyne, Cumming, Iowa — “Circle of Trust”
“Circle of Trust” is a simple, balanced geometric composition of circles in metal. It grew out of the artist’s fascination with the shape of a circle being found throughout nature and in different cultures, religions, and art expressions. Our first doodles as children are circular motions that turn into a full circle when we reach the age of three. There is no better symbol of completeness than a circle: an endless line used to symbolize eternity and unity. Looking closer at the sculpture, however, one can notice that the circle is imperfect and has been broken: a metaphor for our relationship with Mother Nature.
Sunghee Min, Roseville, Minnesota — “Triangle Play I”
“Triangle Play I” is a fabricated steel sculpture constructed by repeating triangle shapes into an orderly configuration. The interplay between positive and negative space in the sculpture offers changing forms by shifting perspectives. The two cubes stacked corner to corner defies weight which is inherent in the metal material and appears weightless. The triangle motif is inspired by the recognizable shape of triangles in flags, especially party flags that are associated with celebratory events and festivities. The piece is intended to convey a sense of excitement and participation.
Sunghee Min, Roseville, Minnesota — “Triangle Play II”
“Triangle Play II” is a fabricated steel sculpture. This piece was a part of a series, Triangle Play, which I’ve been working on for the past few years. The initial structure was made before the pandemic began. I was completing the piece in the midst of the pandemic lock-down, George Floyd incident that took place near my studio in the spring of 2020 and made intuitive changes in the process because I wanted the piece to be an object that resonates with the events of that year. The smaller triangles cutting into the larger triangles were added after the structure was initially created. The purpose was to alter the equilibrium of the piece as designed.
ml duffy, Washington DC — “Low-Poly Open Heart—REDI”
The “Low-Poly Open Heart” sculpture series was created from missing my wife while she was on a museum trip to Japan. She is a woman who wears her heart on her sleeve and I have come to realize over the years that, although a soft sentiment, love takes an industrial amount of strength, endurance, and toughness; hence the materials of heavily-welded aluminum diamond plate and tractor enamel. The polygons of the digital Heart were triangulated using an advanced algorithm, offset, then cut with an industrial laser. Sculpturally, I am interested in the play between inside/outside, front/back, color/texture, form/meaning, concept/context.
Madison Arts Commission, Curator
The Madison Arts Commission (MAC) is an 11-member citizen commission appointed by the Mayor to advise the City about matters of arts and culture. MAC’s mission is to foster arts appreciation by initiating partnerships, developing new audiences, and sponsoring diverse artistic activities by emerging and established artists and arts organizations while preserving Madison’s rich artistic tradition. To support a full creative life for all, The Madison Arts Commission commits to championing policies and practices of cultural equity that empower a just, inclusive, equitable city.
The 2020 Sculptures
Gail Simpson and Aristotle Georgiades of Actual Size Artworks, Stoughton, WI– “Turning”
This custom clear fiberglass and steel sculpture is a spiraling circular form designed in response to the architecture of Monona Terrace, and to the qualities of light and shadow present in the space. An additional inspiration is Vladimir Tatlin’s influential sculpture Monument to the Third International, which was a proposal for a transparent building that would house public functions, conferences, and information centers, and although it was never built it remains an idealistic, forward-looking visual statement about public space and urban life.
Steve Feren, Fitchburg, WI—“Timekeeper”
Feren’s concrete and glass work is concerned with the persistence of life and with the miracle of discovery and creation. This all is given voice through the physical and nonphysical phenomenon of the light. “The eye was made by the light, for the light, so that the inner light may emerge to meet the outer light.” Goethe, Theory of Color.
Michael Burns, MB Metalworks, Madison, WI—“They 1 & They 2”
The They figures are spare, haiku-style glimpses of universal forms. The eye looks to the negative spaces and the mind works to fill in the blanks. They 1 is an ambiguous look at the human form. It is not meant to capture detail or nuance but to somehow capture with a few bold lines something about who we are without regard to gender, politics, or anything specific. They 2 is another sketch of a vaguely human shape. Benign, abstract, not quite comical but timeless, it is meant to suggest a possible dream figure or paleo type being.
Andrew Arvanetes, DeKalb, IL—“Mobile Home”
Arvanetes says because of his formal approach to fabrication, rational functionality might be expected in his sculptures. “On the contrary, the combination of physical scale, personal references and visual details often results in a whimsical and absurd reality.” Constructed of painted aluminum, “Mobile Home” suggests motion and uses some of the artist’s favorite visual references arranged in a quirky composition.
David Wells, Curator
David Wells is currently the Director of the Edgewood College Art Gallery exhibition program and college art collections. He’s also Director of Ernest Hüpeden’s Painted Forest, a restored folk art site and study center in northwest Sauk County. An articulate jurist, Wells has been invited to curate a number of WI regional competitions – Beloit & Vicinity Art Exhibition, Arts West Wisconsin, Northeast WI Art Annual, and several university student exhibits. And he served on numerous jury panels, been a frequent lecturer, guest artist/ critic at UW Madison and numerous other universities.
The 2019 Sculptures
Peter Krsko, Wonewoc, WI — “Arbori”
This site-specific composition builds upon his previous studies of relationships between humans and nature. The conflict within this sculpture arises from the combination of the cubic lattice that divides the space into regular pattern and the organic tree-inspired topography of the outer boundary. The lumber material will start as bright yellow pine and with time will slowly change into grey. The sculpture is partially inspired by the architecture at each installation, and was built on site at Monona Terrace.
Luke William Achterberg, Onalaska, WI — “Baculus”
Baculus explores relationships between fine art and the artist’s experiences in subcultures of Americana, namely automotive customization, graffiti, comic books, skate/snowboarding, and street art. Achterberg continually plays with balance, both physical and aesthetic, creating a visual smoothness or sleekness, what he calls “Super Sleek.”
Michael Young, Chicago, IL — “Terning”
Young works with hardy materials like aluminum, bronze, and stainless steel transform transitory moments into timeless sculpture. His abstract style aims for emotional connection – harmony, growth, energy, and unity- while remaining personally meaningful to each viewer. From a sapling bending in the wind to a friendly exchange between old friends, his work reflects the interconnection of environments.
John Himmelfarb, Spring Green, WI — “International Leader”
This work is an evolution of the artist’s 50-year fascination with the way people make marks to communicate words when speaking them is not an option, as in the case of hieroglyphics, pictographics, and petroglyphics. This very rectilinear style reflects Himmelfarb’s experience in Korea some years ago, where he remembers that signage letter forms used a preponderance of right angles and had mass, not just line.
Sam Spiczka, Sauk Rapids, MN — “Standing Knife Edge” and “Helios Emergent”
When Spiczka looks at a natural creation, such as a bone, shell or tree, he is struck by the anomalies and variations found in an object that appears symmetrical at first glance. The sculpture is inspired by this conflict between an ideal state and an imperfect reality, when life aspires to perfection but is forced to adapt into a more irregular and complex form when it encounters an indifferent environment. In it one can find both the chaos of growth and the geometry of perfection.
Tim Jorgensen and Carissa Heinrichs, Madison, WI — “Point of Reference”
Point of Reference is the form of a plumb bob, a weighted tool used to determine if an object or construction is vertical. This is one of three nearly identical sculptures that will be installed in different locations in the Midwest. With intentions of separating them as far apart from each other, they function to triangulate a region as a reference point of individual perceptions. The broken cartography that adorns the surface of the sculpture alludes to the idea of the disjointed interpretations of one another’s perspective.
David Wells, Curator
David Wells serves as Gallery Director at Edgewood College, in charge of the art gallery exhibition program and college collections. He is also Artistic Director of GLEAM: Art in a New Light for Olbrich Botanical Gardens in Madison. Wells has pursued interdisciplinary interests as a curator, arts administrator and practicing artist for over 35 years. David founded Curators Conversations Wisconsin, serves on the Wisconsin Visual Arts Achievement Awards selection panel (Museum of Wisconsin Art) and recently juried the 2016 Northeast Wisconsin Art Annual (Neville Public Museum, Green Bay) and Wisconsin Artwest 2017 (L.E. Phillips Memorial Library, Eau Claire).
The 2018 Sculptures
BILHENRY WALKER – “Cosmic Slot” and “Solo Spyro”
BILHENRY WALKER introduced light into his first paintings in 1968, having been influenced by SoCal Art-and-Technology gurus, Robert Irwin and Doug Wheeler. He has continued this modest exploration into the 21st century using both neon and LED-flex as his current lighting source. In 2013 WALKER began creating sculptures using LED-flex as a means of capturing the interior essence of his biologically inspired forms. Light appears to fill the entire interiors, limited only by their exterior shapes. Several of these pieces are or have been on display at the Artisan Forge Sculpture Park in Eau Claire , WI. Others were recently exhibited at the Gallery of Wisconsin Art in West Bend WI.
STEVE FISCHER – “Holy Big Bird”
STEVE FISCHER has been creating sculptures in Cor-ten Steel, Stainless Steel and Aluminum since the mid 70’s. His seductive ribbons of steel defy the hardness of the metal he fabricates with such perfection. He is a master welder with the technique to create seamless forms which float effortlessly in the air. Many of Fischer’s available pieces can be viewed at his “Sculpture Farm” in SE Wisconsin by appointment.
PETER LUNDBERG – “All Dressed Up” and “Growth”
PETER LUNDBERG’S sculptures are a view into his unconscious mind, a landscape of very primitive things, rudimentary elements of life, nature, science, spirituality and passion. For both the maker and viewer, sculpture, like music, carries a beat, a pulsing motion directed to and from the soul that when reveled in takes us into dreamlike states of mind. This state leads to questions and answers, uncovering mysteries, which ultimately give meaning to life’s journey. Lundberg is an internationally famous sculptor whose work is in collections in Australia, Sweden, Germany, China and throughout the USA.
JOHN E. BANNON – “Boolean Still Life”
JOHN E. BANNON used a Boolean data set in the composition of a sphere intersecting a cube. The vertical element represents a stem in the depiction of a flower in a pot and, at the same time, symbolizes the connection in the relationship of mathematics and nature. By presenting universal elements of visual perception from an aesthetically unique point of view, I work to create an experience that will open the viewer’s mind to inspiration and new ways of thinking. Born in 1966, from Arlington Heights, Illinois and now residing in Chicago, Bannon is a multi-media visual artist and educator whose work is seen in public and private collections worldwide. An adjunct assistant professor at the school of the art institute of Chicago, he earned a BFA degree in painting in 1990 from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign and an MFA degree in studio from the school of the Art Institute of Chicago in 2002.
David Wells, Curator
David Wells serves as Gallery Director at Edgewood College, in charge of the art gallery exhibition program and college collections. He is also Artistic Director of GLEAM: Art in a New Light for Olbrich Botanical Gardens in Madison. Wells has pursued interdisciplinary interests as a curator, arts administrator and practicing artist for over 35 years. David founded Curators Conversations Wisconsin, serves on the Wisconsin Visual Arts Achievement Awards selection panel (Museum of Wisconsin Art) and recently juried the 2016 Northeast Wisconsin Art Annual (Neville Public Museum, Green Bay) and Wisconsin Artwest 2017 (L.E. Phillips Memorial Library, Eau Claire).
The 2017 Sculptures
Sam Spiczka, Sauk Rapids, MN- “Nexus” and “Threshold”
Both Nexus, on Olin Terrace, and Threshold, on the rooftop, foreshadow the feeling of delving deeper into a place, and therefore into oneself. Spiczka emphasizes vulnerability in his forms, an emotive knowing that there is a black void beneath us which can either swallow us whole or bring us into bloom. The sculptures show that we can either ignore this reality or open ourselves up to it.
Jeremy Rudd, Dyersville, IA- “Onward and Upward”
Onward and Upward presents the collision of the man-made and the natural world. The planar form of the piece represents a rising cycle through time. Although made of wood, the natural qualities and tendencies have been stripped away to be made useful. Topped with a small wheel and arm, this sculpture represents the world of agriculture.
Bruce Niemi, Kenosha, WI- “Transition” and “The Glorious Ascent”
The fluidity of a hard surface is emphasized in Transition and Glorious Ascent. Niemi intends for each viewer to experience each sculpture in a different way based on their individual backgrounds. These two sculptures are meant to display the sense of beauty and wonder of the heavens and earth.
Bounnak Thammavong, Kingston, IL- “Sproutling”
Thammavong uses his Asian-American heritage to create a visual poetry that emphasizes the aesthetic significance rather than a specific meaning in his work. Sproutling is an abstract representation of a maple seed. Seed of vibrant earth-red rusted steel, and leaves of shimmering brushed stainless. The metals speak to the decay of a withering plant; giving way to the promised hope of renewed life; peaking from an enigmatic seed.
Gerald Siciliano, Brooklyn NY- “JC#2 (Homage Series 1)”
JC#2 draws from the past, present, and future to establish a personal dialogue. This work is the second in a series of sculptures made in homage to others who have come before. A reinvention of John Chamberlain’s colorful metal sculptures made from crushed cars, Siciliano updates Chamberlain’s ideas by recycling discarded plastic bumper covers that contrast hard and soft imagery.
David Wells, Curator
David Wells serves as Gallery Director at Edgewood College, in charge of the art gallery exhibition program and college collections. He is also Artistic Director of GLEAM: Art in a New Light for Olbrich Botanical Gardens in Madison. Wells has pursued interdisciplinary interests as a curator, arts administrator and practicing artist for over 35 years. David founded Curators Conversations Wisconsin, serves on the Wisconsin Visual Arts Achievement Awards selection panel (Museum of Wisconsin Art) and recently juried the 2016 Northeast Wisconsin Art Annual (Neville Public Museum, Green Bay) and Wisconsin Artwest 2017 (L.E. Phillips Memorial Library, Eau Claire).