The concept of “positive fragmentation” existed long before the exhibition at the Bellevue Art Museum. The term was coined by the feminist art critic Lucy Lippard, in her 1978 essay, Making Something from Nothing. Lippard’s essay dissects the disparity in male and female representation in high art. Lippard notes that art produced by women tends to be labeled as hobbyist and nothing more by those discussing high art. She goes on to state that the same can be said for certain art mediums, specifically printmaking, as it is seen as replicable and, thus, less rare or valuable. With Lippard’s idea here in mind, there is a clear intersection for female artists whose primary medium is printmaking, who have gone almost entirely overlooked because of this. Enter “positive fragmentation,” a term Lippard uses to describe the aesthetic of these artists and what their work accomplishes. “Positive fragmentation” is described as eclectic, bombastic, the “collage aesthetic,” and Lippard posits that it lends itself incredibly well to marginalized artists because of its inherent willingness to deconstruct and then reconstruct the notions of high and low art. The exhibit Positive Fragmentation, bearing the same name as Lippard’s theory, aims to the ideas she had outlined, showcasing over 200 prints by 21 contemporary women printmakers that demonstrate the sheer power of the medium, totally averting the preconceived notion that prints are incapable of being expressive and unique.
The exhibition is found on the third floor of the Bellevue Art Museum (BAM), a sprawling space lined wall-to-wall with prints from remarkable artists such as Betye Saar, Wendy Red Star, Louise Bourgeois, and many more. Exhibiting so many pieces in a relatively small space is a difficult task. For many other gallery spaces, the exhibition would have felt confusing and hectic, yet the BAM handles it incredibly well. There is a good flow to the gallery, with the pieces displayed in groups of several smaller subcategories: time, bodies, art history, meaning, subtext, and critique. With this method of display, the viewer feels a sense of cohesion, and it makes the task of displaying such a sheer number of pieces much less daunting. BAM is a smaller space, but this is by no means a negative quality. To an exhibition such as Positive Fragmentation, such a small and intimate setting lends itself well. It makes the exhibition feel all the more personal like the viewer has a greater opportunity to connect with the art, and it neatly avoids the hollow or empty feeling that certain larger spaces often have.
Photo courtesy of Coco Allred