Teresita Fernández
Stacked Landscape, 2011

LOCATION:
University of South Florida, Tampa
College of Nursing entrance rotunda

PROJECT DESCRIPTION:
Teresita Fernández is internationally known for her immersive installations and evocative large-scale sculptures that address space, light, and perception and explore the cultural fabrication of nature. These referential constructions are characterized by Fernández’ deft transformation of common materials into dazzling cinematic illusions. Through minimal means, she blends abstraction, reflection, and transparency into potent mixtures of projection and play. “I am interested in the projection of the body, in an imaginary, kinesthetic way, penetrating history and distance cinematically, almost like a daydream,” she explains. “It’s as if, through visual pleasure, your gaze positions you in a place without actually being there.”

Through Stacked Landscape, Fernández transformed the entrance rotunda of the Universty of South Florida College of Nursing into an immersive environment that surrounds visitors with saturated color and reflected light. Using custom tiles made of pearlized cast acrylic mounted on basswood, she created an immersive site-specific installation of art that evokes nature.

Stacked Landscape, 2011 is comprised of 2,100 square feet of custom-cast acrylic that covers the wall in a staggered pattern. Like its precursor, Stacked Waters, 2009 in the Blanton Museum of Art at the University of Texas at Austin, the work’s title also alludes to Donald Judd’s “stack” sculptures.

Vertical bands subtly shift from olive green to white as they descend the wall. Standing in the middle of the rotunda creates an effect akin to being under the cascading branches of a willow tree. The pearlized material that covers the wall mirrors light from the rotunda’s many large windows, causing the space to shift with the weather. Complementing Stacked Landscape is a shallow rectangular reflecting pool visible from inside the rotunda, and a field of white Crepe myrtles and jasmine ground cover is visible through windows on the opposite side.

ABOUT THE ARTIST:
Teresita Fernández (b. 1968, Miami, Florida) is internationally known for her immersive installations and evocative large-scale sculptures that address space, light, and perception and explore the cultural fabrication of nature. These referential constructions are characterized by Fernández’ deft transformation of common materials into dazzling cinematic illusions. Through minimal means, she blends abstraction, reflection, and transparency into potent mixtures of projection and play. “I am interested in the projection of the body, in an imaginary, kinesthetic way, penetrating history and distance cinematically, almost like a daydream,” she explains. “It’s as if, through visual pleasure, your gaze positions you in a place without actually being there.”

Fernández is a 2005 MacArthur Foundation Fellow and the recipient of numerous awards including a Guggenheim Fellowship, and NEA Artist’s Grant, and a Louis Comfort Tiffany Biennial Award. Appointed by President Obama, Fernández is the first latina to serve on the U.S. Commission of Fine Arts, a 100 year-old federal panel that advises the President and Congress on national matters of design and aesthetics. Fernández’s works are included in prominent collections and have been exhibited extensively nationally and internationally. Fernández received her MFA from Virginia Commonwealth University and her BFA from Florida International University. The artist lives and works in Brooklyn, New York.