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DEEP IN THE HEART OF SOUTHIE
In LaMontagne Gallery's first year there has been a lot of thought
and discussion about the collaborative elements of maintaining the
beginning and growth in relationships. LaMontagne Gallery is pleased
to present our summer exhibition, DEEP IN THE HEART OF SOUTHIE,
an observation on interpersonal relationships through different
media and narratives. RONNIE BASS, NINA BEIER and MARIE
LUND, ALEJANDRO CESARCO, SAMUEL EKWURTZEL + TIFFANY SUM, LAURA HARRISON,
KIKI SEROR, JESSICA WILLIAMS and ANDREW WITKIN approach
this topic; through painfully close inspections and take pause to
reflect on why people relate to one another and how these profound
connections can effect all aspects of living.
Ronnie Bass (b. 1976, Hurst, TX) is a New York
based visual artist and musician. He received an MFA from Columbia
University and a BFA from the University of North Texas.
In this particular video piece, Our Land, is a hope that
people may escape, or find contentment within, oppressive social
and economic situations. Our Land explores social utopias, fringe
religions, new inventions, black box technologies, tactics of late
capitalism, and friendship.
Nina Beier and Marie Lund (London, UK) in their
ongoing video project ‘the Play me series’ Nina and
Marie set up abstract games for different groups of people to play
out. Each task focuses on the space between the individual and the
group. Based on references to social games and customs, rules, traditions
and mannerisms, most of the projects impose certain limitations
onto the individuals by challenging their sense of personal space
and free will. In doing so they provoke the sense of self in the
participants and their reactions to being part of a group.
Alejandro Cesarco (b. 1975 in Montevideo, Uruguay)
is a Brooklyn based artist who's main interest is to explore language
and how meaning is re- contexualized through memory.
The emphasis in producing the work is not placed primarily on the
transmission of information, but rather on how meaning is felt.
Cesarco's work is constructed by cataloging, classifying, appropriating,
reading, misreading and retelling other people's stories.
Since 1998 he has exhibited at, among other places, Leslie Tonkonow
Artworks+Projects, New York; El Museo del Barrio, New York; Socrates
Sculpture Park, Long Island City, NY; and The Bronx Museum of the
Arts, Bronx, NY.
Samuel Ekwurtzel (CT) + Tiffany Sum (CA) met during
the summer of 2007 at Skowhegan School of Painting and Sculpture
in Skowhegan, Maine. Together they worked together to build submersible
speakers and installed them in a popular swimming area. The installation
was carried out discreetly and anonymously so that swimmers would
encounter the piece unknowingly. Music by deaf artists/ composers/
singers was broadcast underwater for the duration of the installation,
two hot weeks in August. Through bone conductivity, swimmers were
given the sensation of thinking music, rather than conventionally
hearing music. Thus, Lake Intervention truly challenged the legitimacy
of our physical sensations by making the act of hearing involuntary
(plugging ones ears does not block out the sound). Photographs show
participants synchronized in the act of listening. Apparent in the
images is the intimacy of this particular group of swimmers and
their awareness of a shared sense of hearing.
Laura Harrison's (Boston, MA) work examines different
approaches to surface. Harrison plays with patterning of Architectural
facades, decor and stage sets to develop multi layered paintings
that camouflage text, distort figures and twist meanings. Harrison
has exhibited recently at Mario Diacono Gallery (Boston, MA), Paul
Sharpe Contemporary Art (NY).
Kiki Seror’s graphic texts (NY, LA), transcribed
from actual web chat rooms and backlit by a light box, lure the
viewer into participation. Juxtaposing art and technology, gender
and identity, fantasy and desire, Kiki Seror’s work transforms
the explicit language of cybersex into dazzling and disturbing digital
images and animated projections.Seror has been shown internationally
and most recently exhibited at I-20 (NY), White Box (NY).
Jessica Williams, recently completed her BFA at
Cooper Union (NY) and completed "I'm Too Sad To Tell You (after
Bas Jan Ader)" was originally conceived as a project to create
an archive of self-portraits taken while crying. The images were
to be displayed online on a website and then later made into a book.
An open call was posted on the photo sharing community Flickr.com
asking people to submit their crying self-portraits over the period
of one month.
Andrew Witkin (Boston, MA) contributes a piece
that has been in development since last spring when a bird made
a nest on his porch. This object represents a simple and complex
nurturing relationship. Witkin's practice consists of textual and
theoretical research, geographic exploration, an intense commitment
to conversation, along with more traditional modes of art-making
such as video, audio, photo, drawing, sculpture and design-based
works.
Andrew Witkin was named one of the four finalists for the 2008 James
and Audrey Foster prize at ICA Boston and has an upcoming exhibition
at LaMontagne Gallery in early 2009.
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ALYSE EMDUR
SHOW AND TELL
Show and Tell is an ongoing project that involves filming children
reenacting the time-honored American educational exercise in first
grade classrooms across the nation. The direct intimacy children express
in Show and Tell, is humorously entertaining and endearing. An early
public speaking experience, "Show and Tell" invites us into
children's inner worlds at a moment of self-conscious performance.
Their reflections on attachments to objects - often gifts - reveal
how children grapple with life's complexities- events such as divorce
and death, senses of accomplishment, sharing, and gratitude. Their
innocent and imaginative natures invite viewers to reminisce on American
childhood. At its core, Show and Tell, invites an examination of the
subject-object relationship. The objects presented are inscribed with
civilization. Their toys represent cultural icons and, by extension,
social conditioning. Children's show and tell mirrors what many of
us do as artists. We present objects that are special to us.
Alyse Emdur Alyse Emdur seeks out subjects in the
midst of social activities that, at first glance, may appear trivial–
classes in Portland, O.R. where new age believers learn to telepathically
communicate with animals and competitions where pet enthusiasts race
through agility courses with talented dogs in Washington. She asks
viewers to find appreciation in such seemingly ridiculous or simplistic
activities.
Her videos are an agreement made possible through generosity and trust.
The heart of this agreement is the mutual recognition and insistence
that the participants' lives are important and worthy of being viewed
as art. This acknowledgement encourages them to think differently
about their activities.
Emdur will be working towards her MFA at USC in Los Angeles next fall.
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