Field Trip: Paul Sutinen's Sculpture in the Form of a Building
Excerpt from an article by Lisa Radon in Ultra, June 9, 2009.
Recently I had the occasion to pay a visit to Paul Sutinen at Marylhurst University. After we talked he showed me where Sculpture in the Form of a Building and Among the Pin Oaks were installed behind the Mayer Art Building. We talked about the greyed patina the wood of Sculpture had taken on and how some of the boards were warping away from the structure. It’s perhaps even more beautiful now than it was when the wood was golden and new.
I asked Paul about the simple house form that has recurred in his work, because it doesn’t seem that the house form for Paul is expected to say anything about houseness. "Sculpture has to take a form," he said. And where does one go after the minimalist box? Paul said it occurred to him that his work uses found forms, that the saltbox house is just one of these found forms.
So may I urge you, on one of these bright days, to take a field trip down to Marylhurst and make your picnic on the lawn behind the Mayer Art Building. You’ll also see, if you look hard enough under the trees close to the building, his sitework, Among the Pin Oaks, two intersecting concrete block paths laid from trunk base to trunk base of four oak trees. Both worth the trip.