Doyle’s small-scale sculpture of a house in "If the Creek Don’t Rise" tells the story that takes place in a gray zone between everyday events and calamities that can, at any time, strike a home.
Doyle’s “people,” an assortment of miniature figures, carry on, oblivious to encroaching danger.
Viewers, though, see it and are visually plunged into a world where an unsettlingly familiar thread of anxiety runs.
The artist creates a swollen riverbed that crosses the museum’s gallery. A river is flooding, it must be dammed, and the piled-up paraphernalia from Doyle’s suburban house becomes the force that holds it back.
The debris actually forms two dams, and in between sits a single house and a yard. “The dams,” Doyle said, “have a purpose while nodding to the absurdity of changing the natural world.”
Then, inspired by Hudson River School artist Thomas Cole’s "The Course of Empire" paintings. which show the growth and fall of a city in five parts, Doyle, in his sculpture "Culminating Point," shows the life cycle of a suburban home from “Empty Lot” to “Under Construction” to “Perfect House” to “House Flooded” and finally, “Empty Lot for Sale.” Doyle brings to Cole’s cycle of history the personal element of an individual home.
Doyle, who lives and works in Katonah has shown his sculptures at galleries and museums across the United States and in London, Florence, Seoul, and Beijing, among other locations.
The museum is at 511 Warburton Ave., Yonkers.
For times and information, call 914-963-4550 or click here.
Click here to follow Daily Voice Yonkers and receive free news updates.