RUSSELL
CROTTY
LANDSCAPE
WORKS

"An Astronomy of Dreams"
Solo exhibition at Hosfelt Gallery, San Francisco, CA
July - August 2023

For many years Russell's work was astronomical in theme, yet evolved into singular episodic fragments of his observations of the natural and man made world that relate seemingly small yet momentous moments: wandering mountains, climbing rocks and trees, treks down backroads of bucolic ranch lands, or journeys to extraordinary spots along the coast and wilderness areas.

sea gazing

The sea stacks at Blues in Northern California

Drawing begins with direct, intimate exploration of the landscape and making on-site field notes in personal sketchbooks. These observations are then translated onto globes, books or single drawings, some containing text, often a hybrid of rant and prose (which he refers to as "bad poetry"), worked directly into the drawn landscape, creating texture and striation. The text sometimes refers to Russell's experience with the land, trees or rocks – other times it is found text from such sources as real estate ads or magazines, or a commentary on his concern for the ever increasing degradation of the coastline.

sea gazing

PANORAMA DRAWINGS

sea gazing

"Observing the full moon with a small telescope and binoculars and nice warm eyes after an arduous day of hiking and scrambling on the magnificent sandstone formations at Piedra Blanca, surrounded by high chaparral and the ridges of Haddock and Thorn Point to the north with the moonrise here at Piedra Blanca, from the recent geological time of the sandstone to the pits and scars of deep time on our nearest neighbor, the history of our solar system is staring us in the face. As the stunning globe rises it illuminates the Sespe Wilderness with a special light far away from the artificial light pollution of the auto malls and sports fields, of the schools that look more like insecticide factories rather than the centers of education. Without the Moon it would be hard to imagine the Earth would be habitable for humans, we are lucky but take our unique planet for granted extracting far more resources than the world can handle with a lust for unending progress. As we observe we see the ejecta blankets from the impact crater Tycho to the dark beauty of Oceanus Procellarum, there is much beauty to absorb. Under different phase illumination there is a lifetime of features to observe, the Triesnecker Rilles, the craterlets on the floor of Clavius and unlike viewing the Milky Way on a dark moonless night the Moon feels vastly more relatable than the vaster reaches outside our solar system. Beyond our solar system we are finding lots of planets orbiting other stars but so far none are like Earth, perhaps in time we may find something similar. Our solar system resides in the outer burbs of our galaxy, not quite country folk but close, in a subarm - the Orion Spur - inside a major arm - the Perseus Arm - so let's not get too excited about our importance in the scheme of things cosmic. The next nearest galaxy to the Milky Way is the Andromeda Galaxy much larger than ours and 2.5 million light years away and the next one out M33 the great face-on spiral in Triangulum is 2.7 million light years out and on and on. And our Sun will expand in a few billion years and engulf the inner solar system including Earth. Back here at Piedra Blanca we look beyond the formations as we picnic and observe the moon through a small telescope with stacked filters to dull the intense light as we feel a part of the whole thing but also a melancholy as we take into account the damage we have wrought to our world in a very short amount of time and we are not slowing down. Our tiny planet is indeed as Carl Sagan put it a pale blue dot, a pale blue dot, a pale blue dot, a pale blue dot."

sea gazing

Work in progress on "Illuminations at Piedra Blanca". At left is the text that runs through the landscape.

GLOBE DRAWINGS

2010 solo exhibition "Globes, Drawings and Books" at Michel Soskine, Inc., Madrid, Spain

Installation in the 2011 exhibition “Aligned with the Coast” at Galerie Suzanne Tarasieve, Paris, France

Four Panoramas, 2010
20 x 60 inches open, 10 pages
pencil, ink and gouache on paper in linen covered book

Russell's installation of landscape books and globes within the 2011 group exhibition "Revealed: Turner Contemporary Opens" at Turner Contemporary, Margate, England

For the grand opening and inaugural exhibition at the Turner Contemporary, Russell made several new pieces specifically for the show. The new pieces ruminated about an earlier trip he had taken to Margate and his treks along the coast there.

Auriga Over Western Ridges, 2008-2020
12 inch diameter globe
ink and watercolor on paper on fiberglass sphere

Nightfall Matilija Wilderness, 2007-2019
24 inch diameter globe
ink and watercolor on paper on fiberglass sphere

Triangulum-Andromeda Over Lookout Mountain, 2012-2020
12 inch diameter
ink and gouache on paper on fiberglass sphere

note: globes are not intended to spin when installed

Vandenberg, 2013-2019
12 inch diameter
ink and gouache on paper on fiberglass sphere

"Around the Vast Blue" was created specifically for the 2015 group exhibition "TAHOE: A Visual History" at the Nevada Museum of Art, who invited Russell to Lake Tahoe to do research, including a boat trip far out onto the lake where Russell sketched the lake's enormous vistas, while Laura Gruenther took panoramic photos of the same. Back in the studio, Russell used the sketches and panoramas for determining fairly precise placement and details of the landforms. Thus, the unusual perspective feels to be always from the position of sitting on the lake, closest to the Nevada side – where hundreds of trees have been rendered – while the other side of the globe depicts the California shoreline from a great distance.

"Around the Vast Blue" 2013, a 60 inch diameter globe drawing created for the 2015 exhibition "TAHOE: A Visual History" at the Nevada Museum of Art.

Work in progress in the studio on "Around the Vast Blue" 2013


Striations of text on "Around the Vast Blue" are the writings of Mark Twain from "Roughing It," describing his first journey to Lake Tahoe.


"TAHOE: A Visual History" a 2015 group exhibition at the Nevada Museum of Art, Reno, Nevada.

"Around the Vast Blue" in the 2019 group exhibition "Between Them" at Hosfelt Gallery, San Francisco, CA

In 2007, Russell was commissioned by the ART in Embassies Program of the U.S. Department of State to create site-specific work for the new US Embassy in Beijing, China. They asked for an array of globes to hang in an atrium of the public building. Russell created three large globes (36, 48 and 60 inches in diameter) depicting landscapes of California: the southern Sierra Nevada, the rolling hills of the coastal range, and the wild mustard that grows along the coast.

Installation of globes at the US Embassy in Beijing, China.

Point Saint George

2013: Russell Crotty globe installation inside The Bergfeld Building at Hall Wines in Napa, California

"The Bergfeld Array" – a group of six of Russell’s signature California landscape globes – is in the collection of Hall Wines, St. Helena, California and installed in their Peterson-Bergfeld Building. Having grown up in Marin and Mendocino, Russell captures the essence of northern California from the vineyards and coastlines, to the inner coastal range, to the grand Sierra ridges above the Owens Valley. The spherical shapes create a symbiotic dialogue with the architecture of the historic building, giving definition to the open space of the vaulted ceiling ~ while the surround of warm wood and filtered natural light creates a dramatic backdrop that sets off the colors, textures and luminescence of the globes ~ a decidedly calm and optimistic spacial experience.

Into the Sespe Wilderness

2013: During installation of "The Bergfeld Array" in the Berfeld Building at Hall Wines, St Helena, CA.

© 2010-2024, RUSSELL CROTTY. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.   |   SITE DESIGN LAURA GRUENTHER DESIGN