“Art History, Interrupted” brings together the work of three very different artists who each have a specific relationship of reinterpretation to the paragons of art history. Landscape, portraiture, and abstraction, expressed in variations of painting, sculpture, and photography -- these are the core genres and mediums that form the tectonic plates of imagic genres and classically-minded scholarly pursuits. In the hands of these three contemporary practitioners, the intentionality, expectations, techniques, and materiality of these genres are inverted and subverted in the most unexpected and captivating manners.
Andy Bauch uses troves of tiny lego bricks to create an absolutely original take on painting and photography, in which everything is pointillist, brushstrokes are conflated with pixels, and the idea of impasto is replaced with the sculptural bas-relief texture of his materials. His series “8-Bit Art History” contextualizes the conceptual and optic foundations of his innovative technique, and includes landscapes and portraits.
Bobbie Moline-Kramer pursues a polymath painting practice, in which she regularly merges portraiture, abstraction, and landscape into a multifaceted vision. In her “Shunga” series, she explores the tradition of abstract process-painting through her layered mixed media approach, as well as including an Eastern tradition of erotic drawing with a minimalist/materialist execution of abstract texture. Her frequent collaborator, the composer Geoff Levin, will create an original soundtrack for the entire exhibition.
Jay Mark Johnson is a landscape photographer. Except that the landscapes of nature, architecture, and industry are not necessarily his subjects -- nor are they recognizable as such in his images. He has developed a highly technical process and incorporated technology from cinema and science to photograph what he calls “timelines” or images of “spacetime” in which what is still appears as linear chromatic striations and objects or figures in motion appear fixed and fully formed.