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Creative Venues: Projection Show The show features: Carla Aurich • Stephen Beveridge • Erik T. Burke • Dawn K. Chase • Papo Colo • Jose Luis Decena • Felix Diclo • Peter Ferko • Pamela Flynn • Paul Gabel • Steve Giovinco • follow izzi • Kerry Law • Kate MacDonnell • Sky Pape • Amir Parsa • Anna Pinkas • Maritza Rivera • Rough Acres/RL McKee • Bob Sabiston • Phil Sanders • Harold Wallin • Bryan Zimmerman. The projection is featured at right (see thumbnails below for individual artists work). Click to see the invitation and location |
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| Artist Statements Carla Aurich Color is always the starting point in my painting process. The idea of one color and it's offspring or the dance between two colors in relationship. My process is intuitive and analytical as I build and scrap and alter hue, value and intensity to arrive at the desired combination. Composition is informed by structures which are built within the picture plane containing and obscuring light and color. This weaving together of interior and exterior space references architecture, building blocks and quilt patterns. The use of the diagonal in these compositions creates a spacial movement upward and inward. My work is rooted in the language of abstraction and pays homage to the early modernist and color field painters. It is the duality of nature and structure, separation and connectedness that I choose to explore in these paintings. >>More about this artist Stephen Beveridge I love to surprise the viewer take them someplace unexpected. This piece grew out of the collection of my friends faces I have reduced to their sparest elements. Reduced in such a way they are still recognizable to me as the people who posed for them. Reduced to black and white shapes the face still cries out to be seen and we indulge it by filling in the missing information. The puzzle solved we find our neighbors face in the collection of abstract shapes. All faces become one. My interests in equality drive a lot of my work. Seen in this manner, reduced to sparsest elements each face constructing the next feels like I am lowering my guards of judgment and separation. The software used was a simple screensaver that choses images from the photo library to form each image in succession. I created a new photo library consisting of only these black and white reduced images of faces of people I know. I have used these images in a number of other works because they fascinate me. I used a video camera to capture the screensaver and the movement of my hand for me lends a little of the artists touch, a bit of the humanity the computer removes. >>More about this artist Erik T. Burke >>More about this artist Dawn K Chase A Different View Seeking the hidden image is what makes photography challenging. A Different View often entails being nose to the ground, upside down, or in various other contortions. However, while discovering what is hidden, I'm constantly amazed by the intricate beauty of ordinary things. >>More about this artist Papa Colo >>More about this artist BACK TO TOP Jose Luis Decena I have always thought that art was something that was very educational and is a way of uniting the Latino community with the American community. Sharing art and culture and teaching the young people and adults about art is a positive step to take. I have always wanted to continue taking art classes to be able to contribute to the unity among people. I would like to be a professional artist, and in order for me to do so, I would like to be exposed to different art techniques from the masters at the Art Students League of New York. My reason for taking the classes at the Art Students League is simply to further my development as an artist. My motivation in art is to continue to learn new things. Art is the area that has most drawn me to learn about new things. It makes me think deeply about the message carried through the different artwork. There is a lot left for me to learn in the arts. To be a good artist takes a lot of work, but art is also a way for me to reflect and relax. My goal is to become a good artist, but to do that I would need to take part in many more classes. I also would like to learn more about art because I would also like to teach those who have not been exposed to the arts. This way, people would have the opportunity to be exposed to art, and they can understand art better. My goal after taking the classes with the Art Students League is to meet people in the art world. I want to expand my network, gain exposure, and to have my art known nationally and internationally. >>More about this artist Felix Diclo In my painting, I am able to reflect the anxiety of my spirit through the varying use of shape, color, and space. For example, I can isolate as well as liberate myself from the outside world while premeditating the use of various colors in each of my artistic compositions. In essence, my imagination inspires the creativity necessary to achieve ultimate originality. En mi pintura, reflejo la ansiedad de mi esp’ritu a travˇs de la forma, el color, y el espacio. Por ejemplo, me puedo aislar o liberarme del entorno y premeditar el uso del color en mis composiciones art’sticas. Es en esencia, mi imaginaci—n, lo que me inspira la creatividad necesaria para lograr la originalidad. >>More about this artist Peter Ferko I work in the medium of photography, and also run collaborative projects, which can be found at www.artistsunite-ny.org. Taking the lead from painters (Mark Rothko, Gerhard Richter), sculptors (Anish Kapoor) and film makers (Andrei Tarkovsky, Ridley Scott) whose work exposes transcendent moments through the use of fields of color, voids, textures and blurred visions, I explore, and de- and reconstruct unique formal qualities in everyday scenes. I look for the moments in which the artist's perspective on something ordinary opens a connection to what is extraordinary, revealing the "magical" or "true" that separates art from ordinary perception or commercial posing. These moments have required inquiry into questions of time and perception: What is the unity between images grasped sequentially? What is the meaning of still image in a world constantly in motion? Can the artist alter viewers' perception through reinterpretation of the found environment? Can the joint experience of fleeting or shared moments bring formal issues into the realm of social interchange? >>More about this artist Pamela Flynn Walls protect. Walls are barriers. The viewer empowers the image. >>More about this artist BACK TO TOP Paul Gabel This video surveillance of a cast shadow, seen advancing along the face of a window, is directed toward the ocular phenomena clarified in Merleau-Ponty's work. As the centered window frame marks the video screen into sections, they are also perceived by us as "anchored" objects. Part of a larger unfolding, these anchors and points of reference are amongst a series of other elements that comprise this perspective. Some, although out of sight (such as the shadow-producing sun) are nevertheless present before the viewer's eye (i.e. the specter of the tree). >>More about this artist Steve Giovinco >>More about this artist follow izzi My largest body of work (artwork) is people, for whom I design time and sculpt reality. To do so I utilize sound, the English language, symbolism, and logic. My art requires the willing participation of the audience whot themselves, are instrumental in its experience. Each design has a unique function, yet shares a single purpose3 - to guide our species toward enlightenment. This is achieved through exercises that expand consciousness, empower the self, and demonstrate how we (humans) are more similar than different. >>More about this artist Kerry Law Nature creates many barriers. The projection of these natural "walls" in an urban environment creates the potential for many interesting juxtapositions. This may be a barrier we must cross over and go through. It may be an invitation or something to avoid entirely. Does it yield freedom and beauty or danger and hard ship? A wall of trees can be a barrier of sorts. This could be literal or it could be entirely in the mind. A wall of trees could be where civilization ends and untamed nature begins. A means of escape or wall that prevents further progress. If there is a barrier in a person's mind one might say they can't see the forest for the trees. A wave can be a wall of water. A force beyond our control. It can be harnessed for its energy. A thing of its own and a part of a greater whole. Waves can cleanse and sooth or drown and destroy. They are never ending, affected by the heavens, eternal. Weather can take the form of a wall. A front can move in or out. It affects our mood and our lives daily, profoundly. It affects the quality of light. It can create and take life. >>More about this artist Kate MacDonnell "One can travel the world and see nothing...to achieve understanding it is necessary not to see many things, but to look hard at what you do see." - Giorgio Morandi Michel de Montaigne's defined his new form of writing, the Essay, as an attempt at figuring out what you know about a topic by writing about it. Aldous Huxley talked about the essay in terms of three approaches from which an essayist can go at a topic: personal/autobiographical, objective/concrete-particular, and universal/abstract. He extolled using all approaches simultaneously. Unlike a photographic essay in which several images are made of a specific topic, I think of each of my images as an attempt to see what the world looks like. Looking at the totality of my images as the broader essay showing what I know (personally, objectively, and universally). While editing, for each image I ask: what can I learn about myself from this image? What can I learn about the world from this image? And does this image speak to anyone else? I am interested in the camera as a tool that very questionably documents the moment, just as our minds very questionably create memories. For example, intermittently and over the course of years, I have been re-photographing the interior of the house in which I grew up. I am creating and collecting images of the familiar landscape of my youth as it ages, changes, and stays the same. I am sincerely interested in recognizing beauty as part of my daily experience of life. More than wanting my images to make viewers think something or feel a certain way, I want my images to remind viewers to be more engaged with their own visual landscapes as Morandi suggests. I was born into the structures and culture that the photographers of the New Topographic School were questioning. In fact, I was born into this altered, cookie-cutter American suburban landscape the year the New Topographic show was mounted. Growing up, I had David-Lynch-like moments in other children's houses because one house would have the exact same structure as another house. Only the stuff inside the house, or the color, or the orientation to the street was different. Looking out from one of those houses through the mind of a child was otherworldly - the same but different, familiar and unrecognizable. I am interested in this quality as something to strive for in images. I work intuitively like a street photographer. Meaning I always carry a camera with me. If I see something that resonates with me, I photograph it. In 2008, my daily practice also included a diaristic and proletariat approach to image making by taking a photograph every day of 2008 at 7:15pm. These images are posted online as a collaboration with five other artists at www.sametime715.com. In a way, we were each clocking in with the shot that we took. The challenge was to really look when the alarm went off each evening, and find something to photograph within that minute Šon demand not because there was inspiration to do so. My attempt to see the sometimes dull through effervescent glasses was challenged by this project. In a good way. To put it in terms of the Morandi quote above: in order to gain some understanding, "to look hard at what you do see" means whenever you are looking out of your eyes, not just when it looks good. >>More about this artist Sky Pape Our sense of vision, like our sense of smell has the power to connect to things deep in our minds in a way that has nothing to do with spoken language. I would like people to see something in the images that they realize they somehow recognize, without necessarily having the need or ability to name what, exactly, it is. >>More about this artist BACK TO TOP Amir Parsa Amir Parsa's photographic works use the registers and the parameters unique to the medium to allow for new fashionings of the world and of reality. From the single image to multi-image narratives and bookstills, from the tools and materials used to the modes of production, dissemination and exhibition, his engagements with the formal, structural and stylistic underpinnings of photographic practice dismantle categories and overcome conventional genres and projects. The overall oeuvre constitutes a theory in motion, a discourse in constant search of the possibilities of photography in relation to its own history and those of image-making and writing in general. Photography becomes a unique language, a system of scriptural intervention, a critique of and meditation on ways of seeing, ways of knowing, and the very poetics of leaving traces - of graphism - itself. >>More about this artist Anna Pinkas "For as long as I can remember, I have always..." We all like stories. Narratives pervade not only childhood but also our relationship to others, to our career, our past and our beliefs. My work inhabits this narrative space and, in disentangling and building from personal and historical fiction, conjures up our constant search for linear, comprehensive and resolved stories. The notion of identity is crucial in my apprehension of subject matter. What does one do when faced with manifold cultural, geographical and religious heritage? How does one shape a clear and comprehensive autobiography from a convoluted and fragmented reality? My work does not offer a satisfying compromise but rather, dwells within the limitations of our narrative endeavors. Found objects, films or photographs that appeal to me in that they recall my family history or cultural heritage often trigger my work. A 16mm film shot by my grandfather in Venezuela, a movie depicting 1930's Yiddishkeit, a bundle of pictures bearing the traces of unidentified relativesÉ these artifacts are all witnesses to the diasporic elements that compose my past. It is their enigmatic connection to my present that I aim to uncover. My media of choice - animation, artist's books and drawingŠevoke classical modes of storytelling. My treatment of the media emphasizes the presence or absence of formal parameters such as characterization, introduction, development and conclusion; reflecting on them, rather than using them as recognizable and comforting aids. My drawings and animations do not only give a visual identity to an existing story, but are the retelling and making of the story itself. The technique and illusion at work in film and animation is an intricate part of this process. The repetitive, almost obsesionnal practice of hand - drawn animation allows me to focus on the imagery I have chosen, to inspect every frame in its entirety, and to withhold the 24 images-per-second mechanism. But this painstaking endeavor to break down the filmic sequence and to free the subject matter from its narrative framing often results in an even more subjective and elusive interpretation. While I was raised in a family with a long migration history, it is my own departure from Europe to the United States that triggered the set of inquiries that form the core of my art practice today. My focus has shifted from wanting to invent and share stories to embracing the very fables that govern my perception of history and identity. Just as the single frame and the animated sequence cannot be reconciled, my idea of self cannot wholly embrace at once all of the elements that compose it. >>More about this artist Maritza Rivera These pictures were taken in Assisi, Italy a few weeks ago. On a hot sun-drenched evening, I decided to walk the entire road up hill and into town. During my walk, I encountered incredible views of nature like I'd never seen before including golden wheat fields and large intensely colored flowers. The sunset happened just as I reached the top of the hill. It was the most peaceful and spiritual moment in my life standing at the top of a hill in Assisi, observing the incredible colors and action of the sunset while hearing the birds sing in the backround. I wanted to capture Assisi's magic in some photographs. >>More about this artist RoughAcres/RL McKee My work is very "in the moment" -- people and things that claim attention out of the corner of our eye, whether it's a person (a working mother reading to her daughters on the "A" train), a place (a tranquil corner of a larger garden), or a thing (a window stuffed to the gills with 'stuff'). I shoot candids only; with people, I try to capture that moment of vulnerability when one is unselfconscious, and open to what's happening to them right now. I believe in experiencing the essence of a moment: the way sunlight dances on a wood fence; the expression of defiance on a young man's face; the quietness of a cat surrounded by chaos. In distilling the moment into a photograph, I interpret my experience of wonder at the world, and hope to convey it to others. >>More about this artist Bob Sabiston The Line Research work is mostly flat and created to no particular scale In addition, it's highly dynamic, very fluid. With projection, the formally flat and solid surface of the wall becomes permeable. The very abstractness and simplicity of the shapes at play have the effect, I think, of making one forget about the ordinary purpose for the wall, whether that be barrier, support, or containment. The compositional elements in these scenes are not static, they collapse and slide around and really exist more for their part in the overall pattern. What sometimes appears structural is not at all -- a few seconds later the same elements have reorganized, changed color, become something else. The constant tearing-down and building-up of these images reinforce the notion that a wall need not be a barrier. >>More about this artist Phil Sanders Cage on Duchamp - He requires that we know that being an artist isn't child's play: equivalent in difficulty - surely - to playing chess. Furthermore a work of our art is not ours alone but belongs also to the opponent who's there to the end. Artists need to engage with an opponent focused on achieving the same goal, a completed game. I see Duchamp's opponent as a collaborator and often serve as the opponent for other artists. My artistic interests lay in points of transition, from one state to another, one time to another, one conversation to the next. Transitional manifestations, both conversational and physical, exist as much in the mind as the hands, rooted in experimentation and built upon a platform of history. I am not attracted to a single medium for accomplishing my artistic goals. Rather, I am compelled by the genesis of ideas in such a way that the technical and aesthetic outcome is dictated by the conceptual pursuit. I believe the physical art object serves as the link between players and must function without the shroud of the artistÕs intentions. It must invite the audience to make a move, to collaborate. >>More about this artist Harold Wallin Filmmaking is completely about the narrative; it exists for the viewer, and at its most fundamental is concerned with the illusion of continuity. This is the exact opposite of my usual painterly interests. A painting exists for its own reasons, the viewer is unnecessary, and the message it might carry is at best secondary. Painting is essentially a conversation with myself. Filmmaking is collaborative. The footage I've chosen is from a documentary I am working on of British sculptor Alan Turner creating an installation entitled "Making Connections" in Anchorage, Alaska. Over the period of a week, I filmed Alan creating and testing this piece in the studio, and then installing it in the university gallery. All this has been very exciting for me on many levels. Thank you, Artists Unite and the project curators, Peter Ferko and Anthony Archibald J. I appreciate this opportunity. >>More about this artist Bryan Zimmerman Manhattan is so dense with human commotion that the city walls would seem to be physically affected—like weather—by so many human vibrations. I imagine that urban decay is so beautiful because it looks like layers of human history, warm and corrosive, brimming with stories that only the buildings and sidewalks know. The monumental north wall of the Carl Fischer building in the East Village seems like a wall that has seen a mythic, almost unbearable amount of human activity—facing the nonstop bustle of Astor Place as it does. I wonder, “How can this wall even be called a wall? Wouldn’t it age the way a human face ages? How does it absorb its surroundings?” And even though the towering music-note clock on the wall is an advertisement for sheet music, I admire how naturally this music note seems to belong here. A music note only entertains the possibility that this wall is some kind of living organism—kinetic and vibrant like a symphony or a jazz quartet and temporal like a human. I had to get out my large-format camera when I looked up on a blustery day and saw masons hanging from ropes, repairing the face of the wall. For this public art projection show, I thought it would be fun and interesting to see how this particular wall—a wall that’s too seasoned and too musical to be a barrier—would activate another wall and another space in a completely different Manhattan neighborhood. >>More about this artist BACK TO TOP |
