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Louise Despont: Energy Scaffolds and Information Architecture
Main Gallery
 
Jennifer Bartlett: Hospital
Drawing Room
 
Opening Reception:
Thursday, January 22, 6–8pm

New York, November 18, 2015 – Energy Scaffolds and Information Architecture will be the first solo museum exhibition for Louise Despont, an artist best known for using compasses, stencils, and rulers to create intricate and deeply meditative drawings on antique Indian ledger paper. For Energy Scaffolds and Information Architecture, The Drawing Center has commissioned a new site-specific architectural installation and several series of large-scale drawings that have been influenced by Despont’s recent relocation to Bali. The first architectural enclosure on view, entitled Pure Potential, will consist of a wooden façade covered by wooden dowels that create a textured and protected surface. For Despont, the series of Pure Potential drawings represent the transition of form into formlessness and the continuous passage of energy through life to death. The second architectural space, which is oval in shape, will hold a monumental frieze drawing that is sixty feet in length, six feet in height, and composed of seven panels. The drawing depicts the relationship between a material form and a subtle body, the entity that is manifested in but not dependent on the physical self. Curated by Brett Littman, Executive Director.

Concurrently in the Drawing Room gallery, Jennifer Bartlett: Hospital is the first museum exhibition of this new series of ten pastels made in 2012. The works are based on a series of photographs that Bartlett took during an extended stay at Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center in New York, and which she later cropped and edited in her studio. Bartlett has included pastels in other large-scale serial works like In The Garden (1980) and Air: 24 Hours (1991–92). As well, pastels have acted as a sort of travelogue for Bartlett, with various series referencing places she has lived in or traveled to, including: Cape Cod, Bermuda, Aspen, Iceland, Mayeaux, Sun Valley, Amagansett, Brooklyn, and Manhattan. With Hospital, Bartlett continues her long-established practice of close observation and responsiveness to her environment, but this time turns her attention to interior spaces and window views rather than landscapes, gardens, and atmospheric conditions. The drawings mine the liminal experience of "hospital time," long periods of waiting interspersed with highly organized routines of treatment, medication, and physical therapy. Curated by Brett Littman, Executive Director.

Credits

Louise Despont: Energy Scaffolds and Information is made possible by the support of Anna Getty, Jerry Bruckheimer, Fred and Nancy Poses, Eric and Fiona Rudin, John Sughrue, Steven Roth, Barry Siadat, Morris Orden, and David and Susan Marco. Additional support is provided by members of The Drawing Center's Exhibition Fund.
 
Special thanks to Nicelle Beauchene Gallery.

Jennifer Bartlett: Hospital is made possible by the support of Jerry Speyer, Michael Forman, and the Schiff Foundation. Additional support is provided by members of The Drawing Center's Exhibition Fund.

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For further information and images, please contact
Molly Gross, Communications Director
The Drawing Center 212 219 2166 x119 | [email protected]