By Ed Goldman
A SCULPTURAL ALPHABET—FEATURING SOME REAL CHARACTERS
It would be misguided to call the work of Fletcher Benton as simple as ABC.
What Benton did was consider whether the letters of the English alphabet had personalities, postures and maybe even secret lives by creating steel sculptures of everything from A to Z. And, in the beautifully mounted show of his sculptural alphabet at the Crocker Art Museum through March 24, even interpretations of the numbers one through nine get some serious playtime.
Not surprisingly, the Ohio-born Benton (1931-2019) started out as a sign painter, something the justly revered and very-much-missed Wayne Thiebaud also did in his youth.
In those days, painters didn’t always use stencils or drawn-on guiding lines to create wayfinding, advertising or office signage. They would simply grab a brush and—as Wayne himself told me in an interview 20+ years ago—sometimes use a stick in one hand to steady their other hand, painting the letters directly onto the appropriate surface.
It’s hard to explain the sweetness of this show except to say that each character hascharacter. According to the excellent write-up of the exhibit, “Benton started his alphabet sculptures by making a sketch on an index card that he folded and cut until a letter or number emerged. With a spirit of whimsy, he used combinations of shapes and voids to realize the essence of the familiar, flat characters.” Once he cast the pieces in steel, he painted them.
The colors of the letters offer still another artistic choice. While varied (red, blue, gold), the colors are neither ultra- shades nor neon. This is not to suggest they’re flat or matte—just subtle, I’m guessing so that the objects won’t be upstaged.
Benton earned a BFA from Miami University, which alert readers will know is located in Ohio, not Florida. He taught at the legendary California College of Arts and Crafts and then began his life as a nomad-cum-beatnik, traveling through Europe on his motorcycle. He eventually found himself in the Allen Ginsberg/Jack Kerouac/Gary Snyder Era of San Francisco (the 1950s and ’60s), where he painted signs by day and expressionist works by night.
It should be noted that the array of sculptures and miniature maquettes (from which Benton produced his final pieces) were gifted by James J. Curtis III.
In short, this is a splendid show that makes you wonder why the venue doesn’t call itself the Crocker Museum of Modern Art. After all, as CEO Lial Jones has told me in interviews for other stories, even at its 19th century beginnings, the Crocker was showing, along with older classics, contemporary pieces—of that era.
For this show, the gallery certainly deserves a degree in Art and Letters.
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