May 09 2007
exhibition nonsense
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Disappearance — A Mixed-Media Gallery Show Curated By Students Of The Art Institute of Philadelphia
Disappearance
Opening Reception:
Thursday, May 24, 2007 from 5pm-7pm
Show runs from May 22 through June 5, 2007
Gallery hours : Monday – Thursday: 8:30 AM – 7:00 PM
Friday: 8:30 AM – 5:00 PM
Saturday: 9:00 AM – 4:00 PM
Sunday: CLOSED
1622 Chestnut Street, Philadelphia, PA 19103-5198
Students in Patrick Coué’s Spring 2007 History of 20th Century Art class have collaborated to present Disappearance, a mixed-media gallery show which explores various approaches to creating a rapport with the human figure.
The 1622 Chestnut gallery space will host drawings by Michael McJilton, paintings by Max Maddox and Brian Boutwell, installation art from Nadia Hironaka and Janelle Olah, and ceramic works from Brooke Hine.
For most of the last hundred years the body has been the bête noir of the visual arts. It has been in turn distorted, deconstructed, and eliminated altogether by the avant garde movements of the last century. It has been an uneasy and divisive relationship – the adherents of figuration were criticized as passé and academically retarded while non-representational artists have been described as out of touch with the essence of their crafts, elitist, and unsubstantial.
Disappearance aims to demystify the alienation of the artist from the figure and showcases some original solutions by local artists.
Some common threads emerge from these disparate visions. In the works of Michael McJilton, Max Maddox and Nadia Hironaka, the body is eviscerated of its three-dimensional solidity and acquires a haunting quality. McJilton’s drawings update the Social Realism of the 19th century and evoke the imagery of today’s troubled world.
In contrast, Maddox’s paintings explore the interior world of the psyche as a solitary figure melts into the whiteness of the canvas. Hironaka’s video installation completes the sequence as solid figures undergo a phase transition and become ethereal.
A different type of evisceration is explored by the ceramicist Brooke Hine. The body sheds its exterior envelope and is abstracted to its skeletal essence.
In the works of Brian Boutwell and Janell Olah, the body is not on view but nevertheless plays a central role. The gashes of color on Boutwell’s large canvases are vivid portrait of the artist in the act of creating art. In Olah’s installation the roles are reversed – the cool distance between the art and the viewer is erased and the observer becomes the observed.
This is the second History of 20th Century Art class taught by Patrick Coué to curate a group show at The Art Institute of Philadelphia. This curatorial exercise gives the students enrolled in the class a unique opportunity to interact with established artists and apply the concepts they have learned in class to the Philadelphia art scene.
Mike;
I wanted to push A&C; I’ll bump you back after the show!
Nick