Friends of Matthew Demaine '04, who unexpectedly died of cardiac arrest in his sleep last year, say that he was a talented artist who took his work very seriously, as is readily apparent from viewing a sample of his work currently on display at the Hopkins Center.
The Matthew Demaine Memorial Exhibition honors the life and artistic work of Demaine, a lacrosse player from Northfield, Mass.
Featured are pieces from Basic Drawing and Basic Sculpture, two classes that Demaine took with Professor Marilyn Ranker. The exhibit will remain on display until July 21 in the Lower Jewett Exhibition corridor.
The exhibit shows a range of materials used by Demaine, including drawings in charcoal, pencil and pen and ink.
The most well-developed works are those using a technique involving the spreading of charcoal evenly over the page, followed by the erasing of areas to be accentuated. This process produces an effect similar to that of a photographic negative.
"I remember him being very excited about it when he learned how to do it," Max Brooks '04, a friend of Demaine's said while viewing a drawing in this style of a man seated under a full moon. Brooks recalled this self-portrait was the piece about which Demaine was most excited.
It is the most dramatic piece of art on display -- and had also been very eloquently incorporated onto the cover of a book provided for Demaine's memorial service during the winter of 2001.
Another remarkable image is a charcoal drawing of two tree branches in full leaf. What is most striking about this piece is its definition. Instead of highlighting only small areas against a completely black page as he had done in his other negative images, Demaine used only a small amount of charcoal to push the branches from the page against a plain background.
The only piece of sculpture in the exhibition is a section of an old piano, with yellow keys and slightly-warped wooden hammers.
Demaine's former roommate, Adam Goodman '04, and Brooks said that Demaine had found the piano for free in the classified ads. He made several sculptures out of it, including a structure from the wires and other metal components.
"He was very excited about tearing it apart," Brooks said.
Complementing the piano sculpture are two pen and inks of pianists at grand pianos. One is very minimalist, but quite effective in the way in which the musician's hands appear to be moving over the keys. The second depicts a fully-shaded piano and a sparse outline of a man seated at the bench, pulled away from the instrument.
Demaine did not, surprisingly, play the piano, but rather the guitar. Brooks and Goodman smiled as they recalled how much Demaine enjoyed music.
Also on display were several sketches of the human figure, which seemed to have been exercises. Demaine's friends said that those standard subject pieces were his least favorite. Much more remarkable were the ones in which he chose his own topic and was allowed to develop preferred techniques.
"I think they showed what they could," Brooks said of the exhibition of his friend's artwork, "and it's too bad there isn't more."
