Stuck On You : March/April 2012
Stuck On You
March 17th 6 pm – 12 am, on view March 13 – April 29, 2012
RAC | Recession Art at CULTUREfix
Featuring Recession Art Alumni Artists: Matthew Conradt, Paloma Crousillat, Kate Gavriel, Lawrence Mesich, Ryan Frank, and Johanna Povirk-Znoy
Curated by Melanie Kress and Risa Shoup
Opening March 17th, Stuck on You is an exhibition of six Recession Art alumni artists – Matthew Conradt, Paloma Crousillat, Kate Gavriel, Lawrence Mesich, Ryan Frank, and Johanna Povirk-Znoy – curated by Recession Art staff members Risa Shoup and Melanie Kress. The exhibition is designed as a joyful exaltation of the artists themselves, their work, and the successful first three years of Recession Art. As an encapsulation of Recession Art’s history, the exhibition combines work that runs the gamut of color, dimension, media, and content. And with the varying types of work in this show, from Ryan Frank’s wooden light-box sculptures to Johanna Povirk-Znoy’s disorienting and child-like drawings, the viewer will be invited to linger a little longer, caught in fascination or confusion within each work.
Stuck on You’s opening reception will be held on Saturday March 17th from 6 pm – 12 am and the exhibition will be on view through Sunday April 29th. With Stuck on You as the backdrop, RAC Programming Director Risa Shoup brings to RAC a culturally diverse and eclectic schedule of events.
About the Artists in Stuck on You:
Matthew Conradt received his Masters in Fine Art from Pratt Institute in 2008 and his Bachelors in Fine Art from Iowa State University in 2005. In 2008, Matthew was an Artist-In-Residence at the Cooper Union School of Art, and in 2010, he was a participant in the 30th year of the Artist-in-the-Marketplace program. Matthew currently lives and works in Brooklyn, NY.
Paloma Crousillat was born in Lima, Peru. In 1986 she moved with her family to the Washington D.C. area in response to the heightened threat of the Shinning Path Revolutionary Movement. The exposure she received as a young child to a bilingual, bi-cultural, and politically charged environment continues to inspire the central themes of her work: the systems and frameworks of space, language, and beliefs. Paloma received her BA in Fine Arts at the Slade School of Art in London and moved to New York to complete her MFA at the School of Visual Arts. Her paintings and drawings have been exhibited in New York, Atlanta, Washington D.C., London, and Norwich, England. She has paintings in both private and public collections. She currently lives and works in Brooklyn.
Kate Gavriel’s paintings, sculptures, and installations assert their identity as objects in space to be encountered by the viewer. The pieces are playful, highlighting their own objecthood, thus exploring the different functions and possibilities of art as mimesis, record, tribute, and simple form. By juxtaposing modes of presentation traditionally associated with different types of media, they ask the viewer to reengage with the work and meet each piece with a refreshed gaze. Kate was born in Chicago, lives and works in New York, and studied Studio Arts at Wesleyan University.
Lawrence Mesich’s media work explores the political and social ramifications of intersections between bodies, the built environment, and unconscious human behavior. Most recently, he has created videos and installations that document his often eccentric relationships to institutional interiors. His work has been shown in several US cities including Chicago and New York, and his performances have occurred in public spaces throughout the US, much to the delight, outrage and bewilderment of passers-by. Lawrence was born in Nashville, TN and raised in Chattanooga, TN. His fascination with and exploration of the spaces created by the city’s rapid development and abandoned industrial infrastructure continue to inform his work. Lawrence currently lives and works in Brooklyn, NY.
Ryan Frank has exhibited his artwork and projects in various venues throughout New York City, upstate New York, and Connecticut. He has exhibited twice with Recession Art and has been a resident artist at the Wassaic Project. As a curator, he organized a series of pop-up exhibitions throughout NYC with the curatorial collective Ad Nauseam Lyceum from 2006-2009. Recent curatorial projects include Ode Hotel at the Wassaic Project, Used Books at the Winkleman Gallery Curatorial Research Lab, and Reflective Landscape at the Granary, a private exhibition space in Litchfield County, Connecticut.
Johanna Povirk-Znoy grew up in western Massachusetts and currently lives in Brooklyn where she has been since 2008. She makes sculptures and drawings and has shown with Recession Art in Irrational Exuberance at the Invisible Dog as well as Flux Factory in Queens.
