by Thomas Frick

"Structure/Nonstructure," shown in LeSaffre Wilstein's basement room, was the most object-oriented work yet from this artiist, whose scrim set pieces and installations have graced a number of dance and multimedia presentations. Galston works with minimal, even liminal, effects, and her previous installations have relied to a greater degree than most on the viewer's subjective apprehension. Not only is one's physical position integral to the experience of her work, but the individuality of perception is also at play. In her "Black on Black," shown at MIT in 1988, Galston used black scrim columns and panels hung in a dimly lit black chamber to demonstrate her great sensitivity to space and light. As one stepped in through the curtained entrance, the space itself seemed to alter remarkably as one's pupils gradually adjusted to the darkness.

"Structure/Nonstructure," too, was presented in dimmed, curtained light, but since the installation was largely fabricated from aluminum framing strips and wire window screening, it had more physical presence than Galston's earlier work. The well-defined boundaries of the polished reflective frames set off the less easily perceptible textures of the screening--an allusion, perhaps, to the elusive nature of art. The transient moire patterns that resulted from viewing screen through screen and the multiple shadows engendered by Galston's lighting helped set in motion the interplay of structure and nonstructure.

Galston had fun with the gallery setting, her frame-and-wire pieces slyly miming the idea of paintings hung in an exhibition. Seen in this context, her materials proved strangely graceful. Yet watching the ever-changing moire patterns, one was inevitably reminded of the way that works of art come to real existence only in the eyes of the beholder. Underscoring this notion was Galston's modification of the gray-carpeted gallery floor: completely covered with two layers of wire screen, it too, produced shifting moire patterns with every step the viewer took. The installation served as a good example of this artist's sense of the possibilities that lie in the simple interaction of light and minimal elements in a human space.