Noisy Autumn, 2021
Essays by Lucy R. Lippard, Carlo McCormick, Amy Lipton, Nina Felshin, Bob Holman
excerpt from “nature’s advocate” by lucy lippard
This book displays the extraordinary variety of Rupp’s work over the years and the increasing urgency of her wide-ranging concentration on the cultural framing of nature, from Disney to scientific literature to the Hudson River School to current “cli-fi” (climate fiction). Amid today’s rapid slide into uncaring obsolescence danced to the drumbeats of war and ecological disaster, Rupp’s work becomes prescient. While many “climate artists” focus on our own fears of loss rather than empathy for others, she goes to the heart of the crisis. Caring about wildlife for its own sake, on its own grounds, she is a voice for scientific and aesthetic reason.
Selected Images from Noisy Autumn
Aquatic Larvae, 2020
welded steel and collected single use plastic debris
each approx. 13 x 34 x 8 in.
Reservoir, 2020
cut paper collage, 14 x 20 in.
Boom/ Bust, 2010
cut paper collage, 13 x 16 in.
Your Debt My Asset, 2020
cut paper collage, 13 x 19 in.
Moby Debris, 2019
from the series Plastic Plankton
welded steel and plastic trash, 8 x 17 x 3 in.
Hooray for Westway, 1985
cardboard and paint, 17 x 16 x 3 in.
Copepods, 2015
cut paper collage, 14 x 20 in.
Watershed Glassware, 2000
set of four 10 oz. tumblers for drinking tap water, depicting “harmless” contaminants in New York City water: flouride, chlorine, Cryptosporidia, Giardia, and microbes, 6 x 3 x 3 in.
The Threatened Swan, 2017
(after Jan Asselijn painting, ca. 1650)
welded steel, plastic single-use net bags, 24 x 41 x 15 in.
Birdwall (detail), 2017
welded steel, burned paper, and wax
I Swear I Saw This, 2017
cut paper collage, 14 x 20 in.
Rat Patrol, 1979
poster project around lower Manhattan during garbage strike, Ann Street, New York, NY, approx 70 ft long