Poupee Boccaccio Enterprises

Altarpieces to venerate love, vulnerability

In reaction to the streak of cynicism running through the art of the '80s, many young artists have moved in more romantic and/or spiritually oriented directions.  Poupee Boccaccio and Betty Rodger might agree on the importance of vision and transcendence in art, yet their work could not be more different.
Boccaccio's is the more intriguing by far.  Her mixed media assemblage objects spring from legacy of Joseph Cornell's boxes as well as the jewel like richness and poignancy of Luca Samaras' sculpture.  Each glittering, glass encrusted wall sculpture and framed box is a small altarpiece to the tensions between vulnerability and strength, love and death.
Hearts are repeated symbols in Boccaccio's assemblages, as are broken glass, bejeweled snakes, tiny skulls and the duplicated image of a forelorn female cupid with bow and arrow in hand.
Several of Boccaccio's pieces conform to the same shape: and elongated peak roofed house that serves as a body with angel wings and straight ballerina legs.  In the center of each house is a chamber, lined in a brilliant shade of fuchsia, containing a beetle - or scarab - for a heart.  Each of these sculptural figures is covered from roof to toe with mosaic of broken glass.
The power of this work lies in its careful organization of elements and the visceral response they elicit.  One may be drawn toward the center, but not without the peril of sharp and jagged edges.  The artist creates hearts of glass that flame, but are also broken.

After being mezmerized by the intimacy and magic of Boccaccio's work, it is difficult to read Rodger's large geometric paintings, sculptures and installations as anything but exercises in shape, color and volume.  Rodger's use of pure color - deep blue, red, black and gold - is reminiscent of some installation and site works by Lita Albuquerque, yet without Albuquerque's consistent homage to the earth.
Rodger comes closest to the organic  in "Seed," a large bifurcated pod like floor sculpture edged in gold and lined in electric blue that is wide enough to accommodate a fairly large child.  This idea is enough to spark the imagination.  However, her largest work - a tomato red, tornado shaped funnel that hangs from the ceiling and moves in small circles over a flat blue disc - is neither sufficiently graceful nor orginal enough in concept to invite contemplation.
The gem of the show is Boccaccio's poetic assemblage titled "Scarab Reliquary II."  Two scarabs - beetles that were regarded as sacred by the ancient Egyptians - are pierced by hatpins in the top corners of the box.  In the center is an open shell containing the image of a kneeling girl.  At her feet is a small pile of shattered glass that presses up against the window through which we view the piece.
The shell and the angelic girl are reminiscent of Renaissance romanticism, a theme that is repeated in details on the ornate frame.  Yet a  sense of disillusionment persists - arrow of love that cause things to break, sacred hearts that become specimens of sorrow.
Abstraction may have a long history of aspiring to the universal, but in this instance, it is th personal and the specific that strikes the most profound cord.

Friday, February 23, 1990                                  The San Diego Union  E-13

Boccaccio's 'Reliquaries' a persuasive exhibition

There is an intensely haunting photograph in Poupee Boccaccio's art.  It pictures a young girl, with beautiful and delicate features, costumed as an angel.  Her expression is sweet and her eyes meet ours - in several of the artist's works in a solo exhibition at the David Zapf Gallery on Kettner Boulevard.
Photography is not her medium.  This repeated image, borrowed from a snapshot, is sealed behind glass in small boxes and cabinets she terms reliquaries. It is surrounded by all sorts of symbolically resonant objects: brightly hued hearts that are split in half, serpents, tiny skull charms, baby shoes and rows of upturned nails.  The cases, too, are adorned with things metaphoric: crosses, angels and so forth.
The photograph, we learn from Boccaccio's accompanying statement, is a childhood portrait of her sister.  But she also informs  us her sister is a clinical schizophrenic.
The photograph reveals much about the artist's view of life and art.  For lurking behind the idealized image of a girl is tragedy.  At  the same time, the picture is symbolic; it suggests that tragedy can be transcended and art can show us how, by evoking a spiritual realm.
This theme binds all of Boccaccio's art.  And of course, even her use of the term reliquary has religious resonance.
But these are not devotional  shrines; they are autobiographical ones.  They are compact sculptural allegories that ruminate on primal concerns: death, nature and love as well as personal tragedy and the soul.

"Reliquario del Fuego (fire)," true to its name, contains a flaming heart heart of myriad glass fragments, set against a backdrop of darkly colored glass.  Inside the heart is the shell of a scarab, neatly preserved and painted gold.  Below it are still more flames in glass.  Encasing this three-dimensional image is a black cabinet, narrowing to a point at the top and decorated with trumpeting angels.
The image of the flaming heart has a long history in religious art, and it is particularly reminiscent  of the scores of similar pictures contained in emblem books of the 17th century and later.  Boccaccio uses symbols in the same  tidy way as these books for spiritual mediation.
Indeed, her use of symbols is too tidily structured.  Symbols become props, skillfully manipulated but too predictable by virtue of their familiarity from older art and their repetition in her own work.
The saving grace of Boccaccio's reliquaries, though,   is an obsessive commitment to materials.  The sheer number of miniature skulls that surround the picture un "All Souls Reliquary," the graceful look of its case, make this construction more than a self-conscious rumination of death and the death of innocence.
What is more, she has a good eye for color, and it is not surprising to learn that she is also a painter.
"Art for me" Boccaccio writes, "is proof that the metaphysical does exist."  I would add that her art is an  ongoing argument for its existence.  That argument becomes redundant at times.  But at other moments, it soars and becomes persuasive art.

Mystery, Magic from Simple Elements
Poupee Boccaccio at David Zaph
BY JUDITH CHRISTENSEN

Artweek

When I lived in downtown Los Angeles, I frequently passed piles of "downtown diamonds" and wondered why I  had not seen any artwork which utilized them.  These glass pebbles in gutters or glass shards on the sidewalks elicited a complex response.  On the one hand, these were negative associations: damage to a car or store window, anger and the inevitable frustration over the subsequent hassle with repairs and dealings with insurance agents.  Yet, these piles of glass also displayed an uncanny beauty.
Poupee Boccaccio, in her Reliquaries - Assemblages, captures the dual nature of this material,  Broken glass as well as other visual metaphors are dominant motifs in the two series of wall-mounted works at the David Zapf Gallery.
Each of the half-dozen angel reliquaries have the same basic shape: a stylized, winged angel with straight legs, like a ballerina on her toes.  The top of the rectangular torso is capped with a peaked roof and in the middle of the torso is a recess in which a relic, most often a beetle, is housed.  Like the glass, the beetle projects a complex nature.  The small, oval, green beetle in some  of Boccaccio's pieces are Southern California pests that eat soft skinned fruit.  Yet the iridescent green of their bodies gives them an exquisite appearance.  Placed, as they are, in a sanctimonious cavity lined with deep red, heart shaped sequins, they become precious, revered symbols, invoking the mystery of the Egyptian scarab.
In a nearly obsessively detailed manner, Boccaccio  has covered the surface of these monochromatic angel-figures with a mosaic of small glass shards.  Although each of the glass shards has hard, jagged corners, the appearance of the whole has quite a different effect.  The angel-figures look soft, almost pliable.  Some of the shards that hang over edges, though thick, solid and dangerously sharp, take on the appearance of fragile icicles, ready to break at the slightest touch.
In the other series, assemblages contained in wooden boxes with glass fronts, a wider range of symbolic imagery is arranged to suggest altar pieces.  In these, Boccaccio succeeds in harmoniously blending iconography from a diversity of cultures.  The black, lacquered surface of Fan Reliquary's box has an oriental look which the contents, in particular the fan, enhance.  In All Souls Reliquary multitudinous miniature skulls on toothpicks are reminiscent of little paper umbrellas that come with exotic drinks.  They also suggest Mexican Calaveras.  Likewise, the metal that caps the box looks like Southwestern or Mexican tinwork.  Butterfly Reliquary combines oriental masks with imagery that intimates a Latin American origin.

All Souls Reliquary contains two images that recur in many of the pieces: an animal-like head and a winged, female figure.  The large, gaping mouth of the canine type animal is ominous.  But Boccaccio has painted it gold an d red and given it a bright red jewel for an eye, sot that it resembles a mask worn at festival or carnival time.  The winged figure  is a central image  in many of these pieces. She appears young in her frilly dress, suggesting the innocence and vulnerability of youth.  But her central placement and the fact that she holds either a bow and arrow or magic wand like rod invests her with a mystical power.
Although all of the altar-box reliquaries posses a considerable amount of detail, Fuego Reliquary is unique in its layering.  The decorated box (which winged trumpeters) and the foreground images (flame-like glass shards against a red and orange background and a red heart with a beetle in the center) read as a unit.  Behind these images is the background, painted paper with glass pebbles pasted to it.  In a few places, the background layer is torn open to reveal a third layer, glass shards painted green and long, re jewel-like pieces of cut glass.  This layering, used in conjunction with an image of fire and with symbols capable of evoking a multi-level interpretation, summons to mind Plato's image of the cave  in The Republic.
The strength in Boccaccio's pieces derives from her choice of materials (lace, sequins, red velvet and jewel-like objects), colors (rich blues and reds), and readily readable but complex imagery.  Her solid visual vocabulary, which she uses in a consistent manner throughout the work, draws on symbolism with a strong religious, historical or cultural grounding.

A sister boxes up her nightmares

Indirectly, we have Peter Falk to thank for Poupee Boccaccio's entrancing exhibition.  "The Art of Obsession," at the David Zapf Gallery.
Twenty years ago, Boccaccio, amid an acting career, had garnered a small role on "Columbo" episode that required a couple of months on a cruise ship.  During time away from the set, she and Falk spent time drawing together.  Sensing her love for art, he told her to forget about acting and pursue that passion.
Boccaccio took his advice.  In 1980, she was accepted to Otis/Parsons Institute in Los Angeles and feels blessed to have spent time there.  She encountered inspiring teachers, painter Emerson Woelffer  and assemblagist Betye Saar prime among them.
No air of regret hovers about the slender and intense Boccaccio.  To her, small parts in movies and television didn't compare.  Nor did singing  in nightclubs or show dancing.
Still, she fondly recalls being a leading performer years ago in the "Follies Bergere" at the Tropicana in Vegas.  And she finds a link between that world of glitz and the poetic universe of her art.
"It's the idea of excess, though the intent is different.  I still think about audience when I'm making art, and always think of this work as a form of theater.
But Boccaccio also draws distinctions between he former life as a performer and her current one as an artist: "In show business, you're the product.  With art, you don't have be there for someone to be moved in some way.  Movies, television, it's all collaborative, but with art it's all you.  That's what's so wonderful and terrifying."
Boccaccio's art is deeply personal. The beautiful, young girl who appears in many photographs is the artist's older sister as a child.  She  is almost always in costume: an angel readying a bow and arrow, a gypsy, or a ballerina.  These images aren't new to Poupee Boccaccio's art, but they are more prominent than they were  in her exhibitions of 1990 and 1995.
That girl is Catherine Boccaccio, who is a clinical schizophrenic.  She is 15 years older than Poupee, but we only see her as a child in the wall-mounted assemblages (housed within suitcases), photographic collages and bedroom like installation.
"I never knew her in a normal way," says the artist, who grew up on Orange Avenue  in Coronado.  "She was having psychotic  experiences.  We shared a room, so I went through them with her.

Of several photographs of Catherine in the current exhibition, Boccaccio says: "I'm not trying to be self-indulgent, but these are terribly powerful images  in my life."
She isn't content to let these pictures speak for themselves.  Boccaccio often encloses the family photographs  in small suitcases, lined with color photocopies of numerical patterns, as well as fragments of correspondence her father would send to friends and family in Italy.
He emigrated first to Ecuador, where he worked as a journalist and silent film director. There, he met Boccaccio's mother. Commercial pursuits took him to Tijuana and, ultimately Coronado.
But while the presence of other family members is in her work, only Catherine  is pictured in this show.  As angel or dancer, her image multiplies to fill one side of a case.  On the other side are butterflies, also in rows.  The results are sharply poignant odes to the fragility of life.  The butterflies are dead, of course, yet Boccaccio implies that the Catherine in those pictures exists only in memory.
The mesmerizing magnum opus of the exhibition - which continues through June 26 - is an installation that takes the form of a child's room, it's walls, floor and furniture lined with numbers that hint at pattern, but defy decoding.  Above the bed is a framed arrangement of encased butterflies - brilliantly colored ones - flanked by photographs of Catherine.
This "room" is called "La Jaula (The Cage)," a title that functions eloquently.  The stream of numbers that line the room is a transcription of her sister's obsessive lists.  By employing them so prominently, Boccaccio creates both a homage to Catherine and a three dimensional version of a mental cage she continuously creates for herself.  For the artist, this installation is also a constructive cage: It allows her to wall off the relationship with Catherine, which she characterizes as nightmarish.
Still the artist acknowledges that "The Cage" is open to interpretation, "Some viewers have told me it is beautiful, even tranquil," Boccaccio says.
The title of Boccaccio's exhibition is also telling.  It's been four-plus years since her last solo show at the Zaph Gallery - or anywhere else - and she's needed that much time to fulfill her vision for these works.
She recalls the moment when that vision began to take shape.  Her sister wasn't able to care for herself any longer, and Boccaccio had sound a nursing care facility in El Cajon.
"When Catherine moved out of her apartment," she recalls, "I found some steno pads covered in numbers she had left behind.  They were delicious things, so surreal.  I thought: 'My God, this is it, this is my next show.'"
The smaller, wall mounted works are altar and album like: memorials to her childhood and remembrances of their relationship.
"My desire is to put her in these boxes," Boccaccio confides, "to put the nightmare to rest, to pin it down.  I want to contain all these emotions, to put them in a box."
The David Zapf Gallery is at 2400 Kettner Blvd., in Middletown.  For more information, call (619) 232-5004.

Game of life seen darkly
'Art of Luck' visually seductive

Angels, of human proportions, stand at the far end of the David Zapf Gallery in Middletown.  There are nine of them and they have skin of cracked glass, just like the checkerboard below them.
Along the border of the board are a few choice lines from Dante's "The Divine Comedy."  However, the outcome of this "game" looks anything but divine - or sublimely comic - and that's surely an irony that Poupee Boccaccio has embedded in this installation, titled "Dante's Global Game," and her entire exhibition.
Called "El Arte de la Suerte/The Art of Luck," the show is a second solo effort for the San Diego artist at this gallery.  In it, Boccaccio employs a host of familiar games: Chinese checkers, roulette, tic-tac-toe and different versions of the lottery.  Yet in each case, the games have a dark tone. 
With the exception of the large installation, the works are wall constructions and table-top pieces.  Some resemble compact reliquaries; others, three dimensional paintings.  All are painstakingly crafted and intricately detailed.
Boccaccio lines the backdrops of several compositions with grids that become extended tic-tac-toe boards, X's and O's incised un their painted surfaces.  Symbolically, the motif is corny, a kind of doomsday commentary that declares the game - our game - is a drawing to a close.  And several other symbolic conceits, like the hangman and the roulette wheel, are equally cliché-burdened.
So this cluster of works shouldn't work - and yet it does.  The reason: the pieces are so obsessively well-made and visually seductive.
Carved figures of gallows-style figures, hung and hooded, are beautifully formed.  Backgrounds don't resemble rudimentary tic-tac-toe boards; they're richly worked painted surfaces.