Dan Steinhilber: The Art of Injecting Beauty into Consumer Materials

Untitled, 2002
(paper clay with handrails)

Paper clay wih handrails: I saw this weird sculpture at Hirshhorn. Weird while greatly beautiful (or better siad, weird because greatly beautiful).

Dan Steinhilber is using very mundane material for his artworks: peanuts, handrails, plastic bags, soap, and the like. What results is something that gives you the impression of breaking waves.

Says Tyler Green, his work is consistently beautiful, minimal and poetic. His best work, like the coat hanger piece on view at the Hirshhorn, takes one item and repeats it, rhyming it with itself. Who knew coat hangers could hang from each other so precisely? Furthermore, who knew that when hung and rhythmically repeated that they created a beautiful sculpture? Who knew that coat hangers were such fun to look at?... his pieces are the simplest. They are particularly good at bringing out the beauty in the stuff from which they are made. Steinhilber is like a good drummer, holding a composition together while allowing the spotlight to shine on the stars, in his case on materials.

A kinetic sculpture of packing peanuts

Untitled
(tubing bubble-wrap bags soda-pop duck-sauce dish-soap)

Senior Mannequin Still Life

(Hirshhorn Museum)

(Contemporary Art)