The Green Gallery in partnership with the Estate of Truman T. Lowe is honored to announce our final exhibition of 2024: Truman T. Lowe Elements curated by Tonia Lowe opening on December 28th. On view for Lowe’s inaugural exhibition with the gallery will be a range of works spanning over thirty years of the artist’s career. Truman primarily focused his attention on natural materials and forms which are reflected in the soft and delicate nature of Tonia’s selected works. Immediately recognizable, a poetic resonance is posited through his intentional gesture and placement. Truman’s works direct us inward as much as outward. There is an undeniable meditative elegance as the artist connects one with Ho-Chunk thought, while also relaying to the external.
Elements offers two subtle pathways for the viewer. The first of which tells the story of nature. A biography of the woodlands, marshes, lakes and great rivers of Truman’s native Wisconsin. While these terms evoke grandeur, the artist often points to something smaller in scale, maybe even the overlooked. Truman’s works are representative of earth and water. The use of willow branches, feathers and repetitive marks, brings us close but also takes us beyond. These materials and representations are accessible, a matter-of-fact in many environments. These works hold a commanding stillness. On view during the coldest months of winter, Elements reflects the solitary nature of the north woods at this time. Truman’s emblematic works steer us to a place of personal retreat while also helping us to understand a broader sense of space and time.
One finds another route within Elements, toward the cultural. Representations of an arrowhead, canoe, copper, and obsidian, point to things formed or cultivated within indigenous communities in the Americas. Truman’s interest lies in how these materials and forms generated connections and links, the very basis of cultural exchange. An arrowhead is materially from the earth, formed by hand, and used for sustenance hunting as well as currency in trade. Copper and obsidian, were not materials derived from Ho-Chunk land but are objects specifically of trade, opening up pathways to other native communities. Canoes were often the transport vessels allowing for these connections to people and the wild to take place.
Truman’s work solidifies something organic, something that in its very nature is fleeting; here for a moment only to dissolve and reabsorb in the next. These materials, forms and ideas fall into a greater network of the past and present. The works carry connections, history, and place. They present themselves as offerings to understand our environment and the world. But that experience is ephemeral, perceived in the body and gazing outward. The body and nature are always-already in flux, yet these distilled works hold stability for now. Truman quietly suggests that we carry this sensitivity forward.
Please join us for a reception with the Lowe family on Saturday, December 28th from 5-7pm.
Special thanks goes to Nancy Lowe, Tonia Lowe, and Jo Ortel for their support in realizing this exhibition and being exceptional stewards of the legacy of Truman.
We also invite you to experience Truman’s Canoe Man, Plains Image, and Untitled, a trio of sculptures made of pine and peeled willow saplings in 1988, the latest additions to Sculpture Milwaukee, on view now through March 9 in the Ellen & Joe Checota Atrium at the Bradley Symphony Center in downtown Milwaukee only 1.5 Miles from our gallery.
Looking forward, Truman’s work will be shown at the Edith Farnsworth House in Plano, IL in the spring of 2025. The Smithsonian will also be hosting the artist's first major retrospective Water's Edge: The Art of Truman Lowe August 24, 2025 – January 2027 at the National Museum of the American Indian. It’s with great pleasure that we share Elements with you as we welcome a new year and contribute to Truman’s growing national spotlight along with fans and family here in Wisconsin