From humble origins, glorious cardboard sculptures

LAKEVILLE — To most people, cardboard is a bland material that is used to ship packages. To Millerton-based Henry Klimowicz, it’s a medium that allows him to create breathtaking works of art while sharing the message that “all things can be redeemed.”His pieces are currently on display at The Hotchkiss School’s Tremaine Gallery through Feb. 2, with an artist’s reception scheduled for Saturday, Jan. 7, from 4 to 6 p.m.Klimowicz has worked exclusively with cardboard since 1986, when his small Brooklyn apartment and lack of tools forced him to take a creative turn with his art.“How could I still be a sculptor? A glue gun and a utility knife were two things I had, and access to cardboard was available,” he said. “I started to draw people sleeping on the subway as I headed to the Museum of Natural History, where I would draw dioramas. I’d then go back to my tiny bedroom and make these sculptures to combine the two.”Almost three decades later, Klimowicz is still using a glue gun and utility knife to create his pieces. The only addition he’s made to his toolbox are pieces of wire, which he occasionally uses as a supportive element.“In my early work, wire was important for formality,” he said. “I think of the pieces as schoolchildren who need to sit up straight. If they were all wiggly, it seemed to me the viewer wouldn’t give it enough respect. But now I’m losing that. I don’t have that rigidity anymore; but I haven’t lost the formality.”Klimowicz started working in 2007 on the series of pieces that are on display in the Tremaine Gallery. He had taken a break from sculpting to raise his daughter until then. He decided to stick with cardboard upon his return to the art world, and said he enjoys the “personal experience” the material allows viewers to have with his creations.“The work is inviting because it’s a simple material; there’s nothing off-putting,” he said. “I don’t think it pushes people away. They can move into the work and find something in it for themselves.”He generally starts his process by building small models of forms to test shapes and see how they would fit into larger patterns. Some of the shapes vary in size, while others are uniform. As these puzzle pieces come together, they organically become a sculpture.“I don’t do drawings beforehand. I don’t have preconceived ideas of what it’s going to look like,” he said. “I’m usually pretty happy with the surprises of it. That’s important to me. It keeps me interested.”Many of his sculptures are quite large, including a site-specific installation at Tremaine that is comprised of long cardboard tubes hanging from the gallery’s ceiling. Klimowicz was inspired by the space; he based the sculpture on the ceiling’s rectangles and is using the gallery’s windows to shine sunlight through the tubes. “I can see the piece going somewhere else,” he said. “But it’s quite unique to this space.” Also unique to Hotchkiss is a spiral that descends three stories from a cupola at the top of the building.Much of Klimowicz’s cardboard comes from Herrington’s in Millerton. In fact, most of the cardboard used for the sticks in the site-specific installation was obtained from the lumber supplier/hardware store. Klimowicz also likes to work with the boxes that are recycled from Millerton’s Irving Farm Coffee House, as well as the lettuce boxes from Sky Farm, which is located on the artist’s Millerton property.“I could buy cardboard, but it wouldn’t have the ultimate transformation that I’m looking for. I want it to go from nothing to something. If a piece is here, it’s because of what I’ve done to it,” he said.Klimowicz will also be artist-in-residence at Hotchkiss this month, conducting workshops and creating artwork with students. He expects to have three levels of interaction with the students, ranging from smaller projects that act as an introduction to sculpture to working one-on-one with independent art students who will learn new techniques for their own work.In addition to his work with cardboard, Klimowicz runs a gallery called The Re Institute out of the former dairy barn on his property, which he transformed into a studio space. The shows are held during the summer. According to his mission statement, “the primary goal of The Re Institute is to promote and enrich new perspectives, understandings and insights in the arts within this unique and historical rural landscape.”The Tremaine Gallery at The Hotchkiss School is open Monday through Saturday from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m., and Sunday from noon to 4 p.m. For more information, call 860-435-3663 or visit www.hotchkiss.org/arts.