Mann Art Gallery exhibit ending year on a high note

“Both exhibitions have to do with interiors and issues of private versus public space, and how people project themselves in their homes and how they showcase their homes to others,” said Campbell.

The largest exhibit in terms of pieces will be by Arnold, and Campbell said it has a strong focus on women and gender roles.

“We have over 60 works by her in our project space, and what she has done, she’s taken advertisements from the Victorian Era and she’s basically taken the female figures and placed them in different contexts..So it really challenges our perception of what we expect females to do and how people occupy gender roles in society.”

“These are great because they’re in part humorous but they also have some dark undertones as well.”

Campbell said this is a little different as they usually feature just two.

The artists will be in attendance Friday night for a reception to open the show at 7 p.m. at the gallery.

These exhibits will be on display until Jan 19.

The Exhibits:

Campbell gives a detailed description of the exhibits by Murray and Arnold:

The Space Between – M. Eileen Murray

“The Space Between consists of ten large-scale paintings of elaborately colourful and slightly odd domestic spaces. The paintings act as a threshold between public and private domains; the home is a familiar place yet it is frequently made into a visual spectacle.

Considered to be a private realm, one typically retreats to the home for comfort, solace, and rejuvenation. But when entering the personal spaces that belong to others, we are voyeurs gazing in. As outsiders, we are enticed by flash chandeliers, bright colours, and depth of space that seduces us to look further. Yet while others’ homes are compelling to take in, they also force us to consider how we inhabit our own domestic spheres. Is the house a self-portrait and if so, how is this portrait constructed? How authentic a representation of its inhabitant can the house be in this consumer culture, in an age filled with “stuff”?

The theatricality and bold colours of Murray’s works are drawn from the Baroque tradition of immersive, overwhelming environments. Applied to the domestic sphere, these are sites of both decorative seduction and personal memory. Murray invites us to consider how we respond to the home, portrayed by both inhabitants and within a consumer culture.”

Rooted: The Daphne Dilemma – Lindsay Arnold

“This is a series of artist books, drawings and collages created by Arnold between 2009 and 2014. Female figures taken from Victorian-age advertisements are placed in strange, dreamlike, settings to challenge our ideas of identity and social expectations.

Arnold utilizes a variety of media in her works such as China plates, wallpaper, sewing patterns, embroidery thread, and velvet photo albums. Appropriately, these types of objects grew popular during and after the Victorian era, when excess was deemed normal; sought-after, even. With more than 40 pieces in Rooted, we recall a time when visual and material culture began to flourish. As a result, social ideals about gender and class were disseminated throughout the western world.

The small size of Arnold’s delicate works force viewers to look closer – we are brought to an intimate level of understand. A dark, twisted world appears underneath the pleasant appearance of the media and illustrated Victorian women. The deeper we look, the further we are challenged to re-evaluate our perceptions about identity and image.”

Woman in-Between – Wade Kotelo

Former curator Griffith Aaron Baker details the exhibit by Kotelo:

“Inviting a surprising and somewhat disturbing revelation of our societies’ neglected spaces, Wade Kotelo’s Woman in-Between series features orange-hued oil paintings that show a night in the life of a woman who is removed from her normal dwelling. His works capture her struggle to define herself in a succession of unfamiliar situations. The persistence of solitude looms in every corner, where she is pushed out of normal circumstances and faced with unavoidable introspection.

Influenced by the ‘hotel’ paintings of American artist Edward Hopper, Kotelo’s loose style and technique, supplemented by the interior design of the Uptown Motel, impart a feeling closer to a 1950’s domestic space rather than a present-day location. Immediately, we are reminded of the principles and impetus of modernism, where society dictated that personal struggle should be hidden under a shroud of perfection and progress.

As the series unfolds, the passage of time, her emotional state, and the circumstances that put her where she is, are investigated and revealed. Changes in posture and clothing, concealed symbology, and references to expressionism narrate the woman in-between’s adversity through the emotions of disbelief and confusion to the revelation of clarity of mind and eventual salvation of spirit.”

jbowler@panow.com

On Twitter: @journalistjim

by James Bowler

Mann Art Gallery exhibit ending year on a high note

What's Trending