Styrofoam art has a life of its own

A little space has been cleared immediately inside the apartment door. From there, a path… A little space has been cleared immediately inside the apartment door. From there, a path begins, running the length of a long, bending hallway.

On either side of the path, jumbled piles of Styrofoam climb the walls. Some pieces appear to be scrap, from which chunks have been amputated around sketchy guidelines, and some of it appears to be partially complete or abandoned sculptures, their curving, painted surfaces jutting out here and there from the rubble.

This Styrofoam graveyard continues down a short flight of stairs, until it suddenly opens into a high-ceiling room full of curving, fluid sculptural forms that are bursting with the vibrancy of life.

Suspended from the ceiling, twisting male torsos morph at either end into curving tapers that fall to head level in the room. Standing on tables or lining the sidewalls, smaller abstract sculptures, solid in form, bright in color and glossy with fresh finish, appear to bend and move with geometric energy and flexibility.

This is the studio of artist Richard Claraval. And his sculptures will be on display in “CLARAVAL ABSTRACT,” his exhibit of nonfigurative sculpture and drawing, which opens tonight at the Spinning Plate Gallery.

The series of 20, roughly 3-foot-tall, nonfigurative sculptures are less emotional than his pieces that directly address the human form, which have been the subjects of his most recent exhibits, he said. However, he added, these works do have a “certain feeling and emotion, but it’s less connected to human experience.”

Here, Claraval has suppressed emotive biomorphic forms into issues of design and geometry, though there is still undoubtedly something emotive and lifelike about the way the polished forms seem to dramatically dance up out of their bases. The rounded or bulbous edges of some pieces almost seem to expand and contract with the action of breathing.

Claraval sites artists Jean Hans Arp and Constantin Brancusi — early 20th-century artists interested in organic, geometric and abstract sculpture — as his primary influences. Indicating a particular sculpture, a light-yellow piece that rises thickly out of its base to end in a tentacle-like tendril that twists into a squiggly O, Claraval says he’s trying to loosen up the more rigid ideas begun by artists like Arp.

These loose works, which are simply Styrofoam finished with several layers of concrete-mixed paint, all evolved from one form, Claraval said, and are a return to his college days when he began working with the medium while attending Indiana University of Pennsylvania.

Claraval has always preferred the Styrofoam medium because of its light weight and easily manipulable nature. He’s tried working in other media, but has found them to be less desirable. Styrofoam allows him to work quickly, producing one smaller-scale sculpture per week and larger ones at the rate of about one per month — which is a good thing, he said, because he has “millions of ideas,” and it allows him to work through them with maximum speed.

However, a mere two days before the opening of his show, many of the pieces are still unfinished.

“I always work like this,” Claraval said, “up all night and all day.” He’s excited about the show, and his energy will surely pick up in time to get everything finished for the big day.

Part of that finishing process includes naming the pieces. Gazing at a burgundy sculpture, bending and twisting gently to slowly rise into a rectangular form, he admits that none of the sculptures have titles yet, though he insists on naming them because he believes that people would rather own a work with a name than one with a series number.

For his first series, Claraval picked names out of science-fiction novels by authors like Arthur C. Clarke. For this series, he is thinking about using the names of the characters from “The Lord of the Rings.”

But regardless of whether you’re contemplating “Gandalf” or “Abstract number 2,” Claraval’s works are sure to strike a chord of interest and intrigue. As the cliche goes, what’s in a name?

These works are at once lifelike and geometric, solid and fluid, abstract and suggestive. They are a great reason to spend your Friday night at the gallery.

“CLARAVAL ABSTRACT”

Richard Claraval

Nov. 5 through 31

Spinning Plate Gallery

Corner of Friendship and Baum at Penn Circle

(412) 441-0194

Opening reception Friday 5th (Tonight) from 6 to 11 p.m.