Bruce Niemi . . .

by Rick McCluskey

Saturday morning the sky was a dull gray and a fine drizzle was falling when I set out to visit Bruce Niemi’s studio. Not ideal conditions for exploring an outdoor art gallery, but it could have been worse. Some weatherman on a Milwaukee station had forecasted thunderstorms.

By the time I exited Highway C and headed west the rain had slackened off to occasional drops that splattered noisily against the windshield. Being the eternal optimist I took the let-up in stride, even though low-slung clouds in the distance threatened to spill rain all over me.

The directions Bruce’s wife, Suzi, had given me were easy to follow and avoided all the traffic snarls from the road construction. A right here and couple lefts there, past ‘Bristol Pottery’ and I quickly spotted their twenty-acre homestead in the distance. “The first driveway on the left is our home, the second is the studio,” Suzi had said when I called earlier.

Bruce Niemi is a second-generation sculptor, though not in the traditional sense. He sculpts with pinch roller, welding, plasma cutter and grinder. Taught by his father to weld metal into art at a young age, Bruce continued his education at Northern Illinois, graduating in 1981 with a BFA in sculpture.

“I‘m sort of contemporary abstract, maybe modern abstract from the fifties.”

Salvadore Dali immediately came to mind. For me he was the epitome of abstract art, the one man who personified the form during that era. Now almost sixty yers later, there is another who has taken the form to new heights and his name is Bruce Niemi. While Dali worked in oils on a canvas, Bruce’s medium is stainless steel and bronze. He turns cold emotionless slabs of metal into breathtaking pieces of art.
Yet what sets him apart from all others is the size of his creations. Some are huge and I was amazed how big they actually were when I pulled to a stop in front of his workshop. One looked to be at least ten feet tall while another further back, ‘Celestial Trio‘, was even taller! “Seventeen feet,” Bruce said as we shook hands.
I gaped in surprise when I learned it was not the largest. That distinction belonged to the ‘Eternal Flame,’ a war memorial for all wars and conflicts. Created in 1993, it’s a healthy twenty-five feet and is on display in Worth, Illinois. I‘ve only viewed pictures from Bruce’s Website, www.bruceniemi.com, but it is something to behold. It’s beautiful and I marvel how he bends the metal to his will.

Unpretentious, to the point being humble, he guided me through his workshop, pointing out sculpts in varying degrees of completion. “I have pieces all over the nation. From here to Palm Springs and Sunnyvale, California to Texas to Colorado. I even have one in Ireland and another on the way to Hawaii.” He smiled sheepishly when he mentioned Ireland. Who wouldn’t? Some of us can only dream of such worldly admiration.

Yet when we entered the indoor gallery I found the true genius of his work. Here I discovered a collection of smaller pieces suitable for wall hanging or displaying on a tabletop. These had the familiar gentle turns and sweeps of the larger pieces, yet there was a delicate elegance that made it hard to believe they were made of metal and not something softer. I wanted to touch them to make sure they were real, but I kept my hands to myself, fearing I might damage them.

“Don’t worry. They’re pretty durable. They may not be eternal, but your descendants will enjoy their beauty long after you’re gone.”
A comforting though, but I still kept my hands to myself. I don’t do well with delicate things. Still, there was something unique about them that started my mind to turn as we headed out into the outdoor gallery. They gave me a curious chill and I wanted to know what caused it.

We talked a lot as we strolled along manicured paths and past a variety of pieces that fitted well into the garden-like setting. Some were rusted, as they should be, but there were others whose surfaces still shined brilliantly. We stopped at one he called the Genesis Series, and as he explained the name it suddenly dawned on me where that curious chill had come from and where Bruce found inspiration.

“Sometimes when I get stuck, when the metal won’t bend or the idea doesn’t blend with what I see in my mind, I stop and pray. I’m not afraid to ask God for help. He gave me this gift and I’m grateful for it. If not for him I wouldn’t be who I am.”

I thought about the sculpts back in the indoor gallery, about the delicate grace that had drawn me towards them and the chill that ran up my arms. There was such a gentle beauty to the subtly twisted metal that I couldn’t help thinking the coldness wrung out had been replaced with something divine. That in the process of his creation Bruce Niemi had captured something wonderful and was passing it on to us.

With the Genesis Series I was feeling that same draw again and there was no need to ask if praying had helped. Even wet, rusted and the smatterings of a small bird nest nestled inside, it was obvious it had. There was something special about his work, about the Genesis Series and I felt humbled in its presence.

We cut the tour short when the skies opened up and started to rain a little harder. Nothing like the promised thunderstorms from earlier, but enough to make it miserable standing in the rain. But that’s okay. I had met the man I had come to visit, discovered his art and come away inspired in ways I cannot clearly express. Perhaps you’ll understand the latter when you’re drawn closer and that curious chill races up and down your arms.

Bruce is having a showing Saturday, July 26th from 2 to 6PM and again Sunday, July 27th from 1 to 5PM. The gallery’s address is 13300 116th Street Kenosha, Wisconsin and the phone number is 1 262-857-3456. Directions are easy to follow. Take Highway C west to Highway U, then south to 116th then east to the second driveway on the left.