Museum's Daly show features artifacts from imaginary civilization

Cornell art professor emeritus Norman Daly says he likes to rescue junk and give it a new identity. His exhibition at the Johnson Museum includes artifacts from his invented civilization of Llhuros, as well as work inspired by his longstanding interest in the art of indigenous people. Linda Myers/Cornell News Service

By Linda Myers

When Norman Daly mounted his original "Civilization of Llhuros" at Cornell in 1972, he was praised in Newsweek for creating "an archeological magical mystery tour the like of which has never been seen before," and Art in America noted that the "foibles, follies, superstitions, cruelties, fears and anxieties of this mythical culture [have] disquieting resemblances in our own civilization."

The exhibition traveled to museums around the United States, Germany and the Netherlands, before returning to Ithaca in packing crates and being stored in a barn in nearby Mecklenberg. Now, 32 years later, some of the remnants of Llhuros, which sprung full blown from the imagination of Daly's head, are getting a reprise at Cornell's Herbert F. Johnson Museum of Art through March 7, along with other works by the art professor emeritus and self-described director of Llhuroscian studies.

And Daly, who joined the art faculty at Cornell in 1942, after studies in Paris, New York University's Graduate Institute and the University of Colorado, is now 92, but he is still turning styrofoam and other discarded objects into artifacts from his invented lost civilization.

To accomplish this, he manipulates some of their elements and paints their surfaces with rich patinas intended to resemble rust or corrosion. The charm is in his rediscovery of the objects' uses. A detergent bottle, to which he has added details that make it resemble a woman's torso, becomes an earthenware "trallib, or oil container from the late archaic period." A juice squeezer becomes a "bronze trallib, phallic type, used by priests at the Temple of Phallos at Draikum," from the middle period ("The Llhuroscians were obsessed with sex," said Daly). And a discarded iron, dissembled, becomes a temple votive containing an imprisoned image of a minor deity. "I am challenged, when I see a piece of junk -- detritus -- to give it some distinction, possibly a sense of presence, certainly a new identity," Daly said recently.

Norman Daly's map of Llhuros mimics contemporary re-imaginings of earlier societies.

Daly also invented stories for his civilization. Llhuroscians, he said, sought forgiveness for their sins by walking up a tortuous path to a mountaintop (carefully) on stilts, while balancing large birds on their heads. "The taller the stilts and the unrulier the bird, the greater the penitence," Daly said. The tall tale was intended to playfully make fun of contemporary holier-than-thou religiosity.

Daly, who composed music for his civilization, is described as "a fascinating artist -- highly articulate, literate and imaginative, with an interesting mind," by Frank Robinson, the Richard J. Schwartz Director of the Johnson Museum. "He creates worlds within worlds, with brilliant references to a wide variety of artistic and literary, even anthropological sources," said Robinson. "Visitors will come away thinking about the nature of history and memory, about what is real and what is imagined, and the reality of each. The comedian Woody Allen asked, 'Is a memory something we have or something we don't have?' Here is Norman Daly's answer, enigmatic, mysterious and intriguing."

At the 1972 exhibition, Daly recalled, some viewers came away disturbed to have been taken in (one faculty member famously complained, "It's a fraud!"), but others, among them noted writer and Cornell professor emerita Alison Lurie, have called the work "fun." And writer and critic Albert Goldbarth, in an essay published in 2001 on fabricating the past, called Daly's oeuvre "jubilant."

"I'm delighted," said Daly. "It's satire, but I wanted to make it convincing."

He said he was first inspired to construct his civilization when he saw an ornate 18th century French chair leg and thought it would look interesting turned on its side and partially embedded in sand, as if it had been buried, then rediscovered and assigned a different purpose. Earlier works by Daly at the current museum show reveal his fascination with the art of indigenous people, particularly of the American Southwest, said Andrea Inselmann, who curated the exhibition.

On the challenge of continuing to make art and remain engaged in life while getting older, Daly recommends staying as active as possible physically and mentally. A runner until he was sidelined with painful arthritis a number of years ago, he credits the physical education staff at Cornell with devising effective twice-weekly workouts that helped him overcome the ailment. He also developed an interest in Buddhism that has led to his meditating twice a day.

Daly will lead a tour of his work as part of the museum's Art for Lunch series Thursday, Jan. 29, at noon. The official opening of Daly's show and other new exhibitions at the Johnson Museum is Friday, Jan. 30, from 5 to 7 p.m. Both events are free and open to the public.