Thank You For Being A Friend

Thank You for Being a Friend
curated by Marisa Marofske
18th Street Arts Center | Atrium Gallery

1629 18th Street, Santa Monica, CA 90404

EXHIBITION: May 16 – June 26, 2015
RECEPTION: Saturday, May 16, 6 – 8pm

The interest of the exhibition is to employ objects as a cast of characters in a setting. Over time, the works perform the scene on a continuous loop. As is the nature of any repetitious performance, the relationship of the object to its role begins effectively and slowly to disintegrate over time. In this progression, the objects themselves are revealed.

Each artwork is distinctly different in material and making and possesses a particular thingness that is evident as such. The moments in which one material takes action on/over another creates a space of tension within and between the works. Light is employed as the protagonist in the space, forcing real-time interaction between the works and suggesting a humming force that heightens the experience of a presently unfolding scene.

The accompanying text serves as a screenplay, crystallizing each player in relation to the others yet perpetuating movement through time. With the video loop serving as a reference point for beginning and end, the group of objects perform their roles continuously for the duration of the exhibition. As time unfolds and the works grow weary (as they are wont to do over the course of a month) the breakdown of narrative gives way and only the material fact of the objects remain. Here we arrive at the dissolving edge between ontological objects and the characters they play.

FADE IN:

Int.

GALLERY SPACE INHABITED BY THREE ARTWORKS

JOSEPHINE DEVANBU (Providence, RI), an 18-minute video loop

KEENAN JAY (Los Angeles, CA), two hanging windchimes

VICTORIA HAYNES (Providence, RI), table with light projection

This exhibition and all related events are generously supported by the Andy Warhol Foundation for the Visual Arts, and the National Endowment for the Arts.