TEXT F That Louise Nevelson is
believed by many critics to be the greatest twentieth-century sculptor is all
the more remarkable because the greatest resistance to women artists has been,
until recently, in the field of sculpture. Since Neolithic times, sculpture has
been considered the prerogative of men, partly, perhaps, for purely physical
reasons: it was erroneously assumed that women were not suited for the
hard manual labor required in sculpting stone, carving wood, or working in
metal. It has been only during the twentieth century that women sculptors have
been recognized as major artists, and it has been in the United States,
especially since the decades of the fifties and sixties, that women sculptors
have shown the greatest originality and creative power. Their rise to
prominence parallels the development of sculpture itself in the United States;
while there had been a few talented sculptors in the United States before 1940s,
it was only after 1945 when New York was rapidly becoming the art capital of the
world that major sculpture was produced in the United States.’ Some of the best
was the work of women. By far the most outstanding of these
women is Louise Nevelson, who in the eyes of many critics is the most original
female artist alive today. One famous and influential critic, Hilton Kramer,
said of her work, "For myself, I think Ms. Nevelson succeeds where the painters
often fail." Her works have been compared to the Cubist
constructions of Picasso, the Surrealistic objects of Miro, and the Merzbau of
Schwitters. Nevelson would be the first to admit that she has been influenced by
all of these, as well as by African sculpture, and by Native American and
pre-Columbian art, but she has absorbed all these influences and still created a
distinctive art that expressed the urban landscape and the aesthetic sensibility
of the twentieth century. Nevelson says, "I have always wanted to show the world
that art is everywhere, except that it has to pass through a creative
mind." Using mostly discarded wooden objects like packing
crates, broken pieces of furniture, and abandoned architectural ornaments, all
of which she has hoarded for years, she assembles architectural constructions of
great beauty and power. Creating very freely with no sketches, she glues and
nails objects together, paints them black, or more rarely white or gold, and
places them in boxes. These assemblages, walls, even entire environments create
a mysterious, almost awe-inspiring atmosphere. Although she has denied any
symbolic or religious in- tent in her works, their three-dimensional grandeur
and even their titles, such as Sky Cathedral and Night Cathedral, suggest such
connotations. In some ways, her most ambitious works are closer to architecture
than to traditional sculpture, but then neither Louise Nevelson nor her art fits
into any neat category. Which of the following about Nevelson’s sculptures that the author believes can be inferred from the passage
A.They suggest religious and symbolic meanings. B.They do not have qualities characteristic of sculpture. C.They are mysterious and awe-inspiring, but not beautiful. D.They are uniquely American in style and sensibility.