GROUP EXHIBITION Dexterity: Works On Paper Chris Biddy, Jocelyne Gilead, Jason Maas, Andy Mister, Melodie Provenzano, Aristides Ruiz, Jason Bard Yarmosky
July 11 - August 11, 2012 Artists' Reception Wed, July 11th, 2012, 6-8pm
Lyons Wier Gallery 542 West 24th Street New York, NY 10011
Lyons Wier Gallery is pleased to announce Dexterity: Works On Paper, co-curated by Michael Lyons Wier and Lyons Wier Shashoua Residency Artist Jason Maas. Dexterity features seven highly skilled artists who demonstrate their draftsmanship on paper through various media such as pencil, charcoal, ballpoint pen, acrylic, watercolor, and gouache.
Chris Biddy turns to Facebook and other social networks for inspiration for his watercolor paintings. His subjects are self-represented, captured via their smart phones or digital cameras, observed within the context of their respective lives. Biddy uses these vernacular images to transport the subject from its original common state of snapshot to a parred down representation of our current social media zeitgeist.
Jocelyne Gilead explores the different aspects of self-identity, such as the "authentic" self, the way we view ourselves, and society's perception of us. The artist delves into the emotional and psychological experiences of conditioning by society, politics, history, culture and human interaction, using her own body as the final representation of self.
Jason Maas creates drawings that find the core expression in human body language by carefully removing contextual information and leaving a structure that both illuminates and challenges the content of an image. Negative spaces provide focus, silence, and an openness to allow the viewer to 'finish' the composition and confront their understanding of how they read journalistic images of social unrest.
Andy Mister creates large-scale, hyper-realistic drawings of found and appropriated images sourced from photo-sharing sites like Flickr. Inspired by Dan Graham's video, "Rock My Religion" which draws parallels between rock music and the American Shaker religious practice, Mister's series of 'crowd' images poses the question; "Can a mass-produced cultural experience adequately address that culture's spiritual needs, and if so, how?"
Melodie Provenzano sets up still lives of figurines and various objects and renders them meticulously, creating mock dramas that build narrative momentum as the viewer assigns iconographic meaning to the different objects represented within the compositions. Aristides Ruiz' photorealist watercolor and ballpoint portraits convey the extraordinary resonance of "being" hidden behind the veil of the ordinary, revealing the subject's essence through his adroit rendering and interpretation.
Jason Bard Yarmosky's graphite drawings of his grandparents explore the physical process of aging while reflecting on the youthfulness of spirit. Dressed in costumes, his subjects engage in playful, tender moments, leaving subjective room for interpretation.
