ART-PRESENTATION: Teresita Fernández Autumn(…Nothing Personal)

Teresita Fernández is a contemporary American artist best known for her prominent public installations and experiential large-scale sculptures that evoke striking landscapes. Often inspired by natural wonders, Fernández frequently places importance in her choice of medium, employing gold, graphite, and other minerals that have complicated histories often tied to colonialism.

By Efi Michalarou
Photo: Harvard University Committee on the Arts Archive

“Autumn (…Nothing Personal)” is a public sculpture by the artist Teresita Fernández, commissioned by the Harvard University Committee on the Arts, the installation is both a physical site and a space for public dialogue and performance. The project transforms an area on Harvard’s campus that is normally a place of transit into a space for public dialogue and discussion, gatherings, and performance. Teresita Fernández set out to “Make a work that was almost camouflaged by the changing colors of autumn in the Yard. While the piece does not change or move, everything around it is in constant flux–leaves turning colors and falling, passers-by animating the scene, activating the work and site with performances and simple gestures of being in the space”. The project is in part inspired by American novelist and social critic James Baldwin’s text “Nothing Personal” (1964), at the height of the civil rights movement. Baldwin’s essay, originally produced alongside images by Richard Avedon, explores the complexities and contradictions at the center of the American experience and offers a critique of a society that is disconnected, unjust, divisive, and violent through his personal reflections and perspectives. Yet Baldwin ends his work speaking of love, light, and trust. “It is this conjunction that inspired my use of the vulnerable light of autumn as a metaphor for a nation still struggling so desperately with the same issues Baldwin so eloquently exposes” explains Fernández. “Autumn (…Nothing Personal)” will feature dozens of collaborations, including public events led by organizations on campus such as Harvard’s Committee on Ethnicity, Migration, Rights, Harvard University Native American Program, Harvard Art Museums, American Repertory Theater (A.R.T.), and experimental performances by artists such as Josefina Báez, Jill Johnson, and Claire Chase. Volunteers are encouraged to read the Baldwin essay, lead a group discussion, or propose their own public performance as part of the installation throughout the month of September. Sign up online to join a group reading.

Info: Commissioner: Harvard University Committee on the Arts, Harvard University, Tercentenary Theatre Harvard Yard, 2 Kirkland St, Cambridge, Duration: 27/8-1/10/18, http://autumnnothingpersonal.arts.harvard.edu