Barry Hughes

Work from NEOP.

“Taking its title from NASA’s Near Earth Object Program, this is a physical cosmology, investigating particular astronomical phenomena and the science related to the observation and exploration of such.” – Barry Hughes

Mark Dorf

Work from //_PATH

“When examining our daily contemporary lives in western culture, one finds that there is barely a single situation that is not influenced by digital technology and communication through the World Wide Web – the Internet and digital technology has been integrated into nearly every part of our lives and will only continue to become more and more present in our daily routines. I specifically find interest in the ways in which we have become dependent upon this technology to help aid us in our navigation of our every day and how it affects our perception of the world around us all socially, emotionally, and physically – it is no longer about logging on or off, but rather living within and creating harmony with the realms and constructs of the internet for our newest generation of inhabitants.

//_PATH explores these ideas through digital photography, collage, 3D rendering, and primitive 3D scanning technology. Within the images I focus on using strict geometric and synthetic form to contrast against the landscape in which they are manifested; a comparison of language. The natural landscape can be seen as the most ancient of symbolic languages: it is the original set of symbols that birthed all of modern language; it is the original text. Focusing on the landscape and our modern digital language, I seek to understand our aggressive capture and digitization of our surroundings through very basic use of pure color and the native tools of contemporary digital imaging that we use to create meaning and manipulation in mass media.”

Laine Godsey

Work from Pruning Tips.

“The pleasure in Godsey’s work lies in the sensation of losing my sense of the outer boundary of my body in relation to the figures she creates. It is like viewing my pink, internal ductwork in a sun-lit, public space. As I write this, I am embarrassed that I have already subconsciously altered my words to invoke the anthropomorphism of her pieces. It’s a mimetic habit— like smiling along with the actors in a show, although they are not really there, and neither am I. But Godsey does not shy away from this reflexive characterization. She thinks of her sculptures as her children, as mirrored elements of a community. Their relationship to one another, and to the viewer, is foremost based on analogy. She invites the viewer to partake in the hedonistic ritual of ‘looks like’; metaphorizing the objects until they are comfortably tucked away into one’s memory with all other well-known objects, images, and ideas. But I would argue that achieving this level of contentedness is the Lacanian game the sculptures play, and what underlies their ultimate goal of misrecognition.

In the past, Godsey has described her desire to balance the feminine and the masculine, the domestic and the industrial, and the internalization and externalization of identity through the expansive formation of the “dwelling”. She often lets her sculptures extend to match the height of the gallery space, gracefully dominating the viewer. They are made of materials one would find distinctively indoors or outdoors, generating a psychosomatic nostalgia for grandmother’s fabric and the metal machinery that improves the convenience of our everyday lives. If we were Swedish soldiers in the late 1600’s, the cure for this particular strand of nostalgia (believed to be an immobilizing disease back then) would be to return to our homeland, kick back in our favorite upholstered chairs, and smell the sweet smells of coal-fueled oxidizing metals. This unsettling dichotomy poses reasonable questions concerning the definition of the dwelling, but the totemic characters in the room demand more. They demand that I classify them within the art canon, and they demand that I seriously reconsider whether or not the space in which I dwell is where I truly belong.” -Elisa Gabor

Laurie Kang

Work from her oeuvre.

“Laurie Kang works in photography, collage, sculpture and installation. Drawing from her personal female narrative, she uses sensitive materials to mine embedded social hierarchies and structures of power. ” – Laurie Kang

Allora & Calzadilla

Work from Fault Lines @ Fondazione Nicola Trussardi.

“Allora & Calzadilla have developed an experimental and interdisciplinary body of work, linking different elements and languages—such as sculpture, photography, performance, music, sound, and video—which are combined to explore the psychological, political, and social geography of contemporary globalized culture. Their practice investigates pivotal concepts of our time such as nationalism, power, freedom, participation, and social change.

This approach is what inspired the title for their exhibition with the Fondazione Nicola Trussardi: Fault Lines, the rifts in the earth that form between two shifting masses of rock; ragged, unstable fissures that conceal a deep fragility, and could reach the breaking point at any moment. In Allora and Calzadilla’s work, these Fault Lines are taken as points of departure for an exploration of physical and symbolic borders and junctures….”

Justin Morin

Work from Poison at Galerie Jeanroch Dard.

“Justin Morin’s multifaceted work is on view at Galerie Jeanroch Dard in the frame of his solo exhibition, the second at the gallery, titled Poison. The French artist presents his delicate installations seemingly acting at the borders of different worlds. The reference to artistic movements of the past, especially those of the ‘60s, such as New York Minimalism, Californian Light and Space movement and Op art, goes together with the constant dialogue with the world of fashion: its industrial, design and imaginative nature influences and seems to inspire Morin’s production, especially in the silky colored canvases hung to the ceiling or in the “impossible” sculptural pair of shoes lying on the floor of the gallery.

The contexts of art and fashion allow Morin to explore the ideas of beauty and desire and the mechanisms of advertising and seduction. The term poison in the exhibition’s title could be understood as a criticism of the workings of the society of the spectacle, or at least as evoking the artist’s doubts as he observes a system that has become almost toxic as it tries to outdo itself turning images into a poison.” – CURA Magazine

Phillip Maisel

Work from Stack I & Stack II

“Phillip Maisel’s photographs of the materials, walls and floors of his work space muddies the distinction between architectural image and the ways in which out of habit we perceive and label photographic space. In Maisel’s work, the distance drops out between viewer and judge, for he shows us not only tantalizing glimpses of work largely unseen and stacked against the wall, but what we learn is that the glimpse is all you’re ever going to get. The emotional lessons of his photos question both the use value and two-dimensionality of the medium, while confronting us with a physical presence influenced by sculpture.”

Artie Vierkant

Work from Exploits.

“US 6318569 B1, US 8118919 B1; (Exploits) is the first iteration of a new body of work, entitled Exploits, which will continue beyond this exhibition in various forms.

The basis for this project is intellectual property, which I seek to engage with as a material to be used as any other. Existing intellectual properties [hereafter ‘IPs’]—patents, trademarks, copyrights—are located, and a negotiation takes place between myself and the property owner for the purchase or license of said property, toward the fabrication of derivative works. The IP in question is taken as a set of negotiated guidelines within which physical works may be produced, but also as a set of norms to be deviated from. Each negotiation is unique: the property owner may set legal barriers to the contexts in which the IP can be presented, limit the amount of derivative works that may be produced to a set number, or to a period of time. Further a certain IP itself may be valid for use only within certain contexts—a Trademark specifically for apparel, for example. These stipulations are negotiated through legal counsel and manifest in each case in a unique contract between myself and the IP holder.

Intellectual property becomes within this series a symbolic object underscoring the relationship between the social structures that formalize what would otherwise be abstract (the virtual, the ‘immaterial’) and the manifestation of those structures through physical objects and imagery. The model and the depiction. In each case, the IP is one which has already been registered by another entity—Exploits is the process of locating objects which already exist as territories, and transposing said territories into another context through a transaction.

In this exhibition two pieces of intellectual property are utilized, both patents: US 6318569 B1, Detachable Storage Rack for a Metallic Structure and US 8118919 B1, Air Filter and Method of Constructing Same.

Detachable storage rack is currently otherwise sold as a product called MagnaRackTM—a shelving system utilizing rare earth magnets, largely for small refrigerator spice racks. This IP has been licensed to be presented apart from its native territory, and is used here as the formula for a series of structural abstractions: large metal surfaces cut across by magnetized shelves.
Air filter and Method is a patent for the addition of a layer of organza fabric over a window screen, with the lab- tested goal of blocking pollens, allergens, and 95% of UV ray light. Unlike Detachable storage rack, this patent is not currently monetized. Instead its owner is seeking the outright sale of the patent, to be exploited by another entity and brought into the space of retail. Following the stipulations of the patent, the screens include only a few main elements, which have been produced faithfully for this exhibition: a frame, mesh, and fabric, which “may also provide desired shading and or color for windows.”*

A screen and a shelf, respectively, two objects used predominantly as vessels to view or display other content.

These two agreements are the first to be publicly presented for this series. For each, licenses have been agreed on between myself and the property owner which enable the creation of up to 75 works over the course of the series. Rather than locate an object of appropriation—to take a cup from the marketplace to be a readymade, to download and alter an image—what is appropriated here are the structures governing production itself.

*US 8118919 B1, Air Filter and Method of Constructing Same, USPTO” – Artie Vierkant

Peter Puklus

Work from his oeuvre

“Dreamlike symbols, mock-ups, installations, ready-mades – with Handbook to the Stars, Peter Puklus compiles documentation in photographs of a sculpture experiment reminiscent of the form-and-light exercises of the 1920s avant-garde. For Puklus, Handbook to the Stars is an attempt to visualize the infinitely flexible and tricky associative capacity of our brains. He chose not to leave his studio during the making of this series, but to commit himself body and soul to his vision and observations, in the company of trash and bric-a-brac, in complete isolation from the outside world. Following inner voices, he reveals and gives body to deep, unknown, invisible relationships and conspiracies. This project has also been published in book form.”

via Foam

Felix González-Torres

Work from his oeuvre.

“González-Torres was known for his quiet, minimal installations and sculptures. Using materials such as strings of lightbulbs, clocks, stacks of paper, or packaged hard candies, his work is sometimes considered a reflection of his experience with AIDS. In 1987 he joined Group Material, a New York-based group of artists whose intention was to work collaboratively, adhering to principles of cultural activism and community education.^[5] Along with the other members of the group — Doug Ashford, Julie Ault, Karen Ramspacher, and Tim Rollins — González-Torres was invited by the MATRIX Gallery at the Berkeley Art Museum and Pacific Film Archive in 1989 to deal with the subject of AIDS.^[6]

All of González-Torres’ works, with few exceptions, are entitled “Untitled” in quotation marks, sometimes followed by parenthetical title. (This was an intentional titling scheme by the artist).^[7][8] Of González-Torres’s nineteen candy pieces, only six, by their parenthetical titles and ideal weights, can be readily interpreted as portraits. Of these two are double portraits of the artist and his lover, Ross Laycock; two are portraits of Ross alone; one is a portrait of Felix’s deceased father; and “Untitled” (Portrait of Marcel Brient) (1992) is a portrait of the artist’s close friend, French collector Marcel Brient.^[9]

The most pervasive reading of González-Torres’s work takes the processes his works undergo (lightbulbs expiring, piles of candies dispersing, etc.) as metaphor for the process of dying. However, many have seen the works also representing the continuation of life with the possibility of regeneration (replacing bulbs, replenishing stacks or candies).^[10][11] Other readings include the issue of public versus private, identity, and participation in contemporary art.^{[12]” – Wikipedia}