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Wall Butterflies
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than art gallery patrons. She often installed her pieces in
public places, including the 62-foot high “Celestial Joy” fea-turing
720 of her signature ‘bouquets’ in a parking garage
in Orlando, Florida. From the Guggenheim to ballet stages, airports
and Disney World’s Epcot Theme Park, Gillespie sought to enliven the
experience of walking through a lobby or parking your car.
Gillespie’s son, Gary Gillespie Israel (president of the Dorothy M.
Gillespie Foundation), wanted to celebrate what would have been
his mother’s 100th year of life by placing her work in various loca-tions
across the U.S. where she had a connection. He reached out to
Wilmington-based Frances Hawk, a longtime friend of Gillespie’s.
Hawk took on the role as organizer and involved like-minded
community members in the process of bringing the celebration to
Wilmington. Launched in June of 2020 and running through March,
pieces from her 2003 Rockefeller Center Exhibit can be seen at the
Cameron Art Museum (CAM), New Hanover County Arboretum,
and the Wilson Center and Wilma W. Daniels Gallery at Cape Fear
Community College. Her comprehensive traveling show is being
installed at the Daniels Gallery in January 2021.
“What Dale Chihuly is to glass in terms of an art form, Dorothy
was to metal,” Hawk says. “I just want people to appreciate what
she wanted. She wanted people to feel happy.”
While predominantly based in New York City and Florida,
Gillespie found ties to Wilmington through Rivenbark, the execu-tive
director of Thalian Hall. He worked at her New York studio in
the 1970s, a time he describes as a transformative era. Then, having
to fill the large student union at New York University on a very tight
budget, she worked with paper.
“Paper takes on a mind of its own, it can cut you,” Rivenbark
recalls Gillespie saying. “She did paintings on these giant rolls of
paper. They’d come off the wall and they’d roll over. That was a
very successful show. Because they were fragile, she began to think
about how she
could do the same
effect. She began
to experiment with
different materials
that led to the met-alwork
she did for
25 years.”
After Rivenbark
relocated to
Wilmington, he’d
often host Gillespie
as she traveled
back and forth
between her New
York and Florida
studios. Although
artists of different
mediums, Gillespie
also formed a
friendship with
Wilmington painter
Claude Howell.
Gary Israel with his mother’s “Beanstalk:
Colorfalls I” at Thalian Hall in Wilmington.
WA L K
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WBM january 2021
PHOTOS COURTESY GARY ISRAEL