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Mixed Up: Baltimore Comes to Silvermine

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Regionalism and Artistic Practice by Jill Gordon

Far from post-industrial urban decay and vitality, two distinctive shows explore regionalism and materiality in artistic practice in the exhibition Baltimore Comes to Silvermine. The Silvermine Arts Center and Gallery is located on the site of a picturesque former artist’s colony in New Canaan, Connecticut. Its Gallery Director, Jeffrey Mueller, sought out guest curators Ginevra Shay and Deana Haggag, both from Baltimore’s recently resuscitated The Contemporary, to create an artistic dialogue. Sculptural ceramics, photography, mixed media, video, painting, printmaking, drawing, and encaustic are all well represented.

Deana Haggag curated the Silvermine Guild Group Show, selecting works from an open call to a membership of over 300 artists. In the adjacent gallery, Ginevra Shay independently selected a number of Baltimore based artists for Baltimore, Contemporary Cross Section. Shay said, “A high degree of flexibility coupled with rigorous conceptual discourse are underlying factors that unify the artists in Baltimore, Contemporary Cross Section.” The dialogue resulting from the disparate exhibitions and regions emphasizes common ground, including connections between the subject matter and the materials they use.

silvermine_Shot_Baltimore_Show
Silvermine Guild group show

Baltimore is a tight knit community and Silvermine Arts Center has a history of over ninety years as a premier New England arts anchor and educational resource for all ages, working in all media in Southern Connecticut. The Baltimore artists featured were curious about the guild model at Silvermine, and how it could work in an urban setting. Baltimore has many vacant industrial spaces; they were excited at the possibilities of using such facilities to educate via the guild model. While visiting for the exhibition, some of the Baltimore artists took a side trip to visit Dia Beacon, to experience the minimal art in a large museum setting. “Baltimore artists are inherently interested in other models of experiencing art,” Shay explained.

Shay was pleased to support these artists’ careers by bringing their work to a new region and to witness the excitement that it generated. When the two groups of exhibiting artists met at the opening, Shay said that they were very excited to realize how much they had in common.

Haggag said, “I think there is a larger conversation about everyone’s place in a macro-global contemporary arts community: the trends, materials, and processes that dictate the work that people are making all over the globe.”  These two regional exhibits collectively affirms this idea.

Curator Ginevra Shay with Baltimore artists
Curator Ginevra Shay with Baltimore artists Kyle Tata, Seth Adelsberger, and Ryan Syrell

Shay approached the artists she wanted to participate individually, while Haggag chose from online images. This disconnect with the artist was a different way of working for Haggag, and as such, did not want to insert a heavy handed curatorial statement about the commonalities of the exhibition. According to Haggag, she selected artists on the basis of individual works that could exist in a space together, and those who were taking interesting risks with materials. Overall, the guild show featured hushed milky tones accented with black and quiet pinks in a large white gallery. These individual works were connected aesthetically—not necessarily conceptually, although there were underlying themes of domesticity, fragility, and interior world narratives.

Andrew Laumann "Untitled"
Andrew Laumann “Untitled”

In the Baltimore exhibit, Ginevra Shay wanted to bring progressive, challenging work to Silvermine, choosing artists who were pushing the limits of their chosen media. Work like the satirical political elements in the video of work of Baltimore collaborative artists Daniel Wickerham and Malcolm Lomax presented real world confessionals and layers of  urban landscape imagery, with characters presented in an ironic, humorous manner. This included an accompanying interactive website within the gallery space.

Baltimore artist Andrew Laumann’s large scale collages appear like acrylic paintings from afar, but up close they look similar to telephone poles or bus station bulletin boards posted with layers of flyers, an image common within the NYC commuter culture of Southern Connecticut. The distressed play of ripped white paper with splashes of vivid color celebrate the weathering and passage of time that makes the viewer reconsider their everyday surroundings.

Ryan Syrell "Valley"
Ryan Syrell “Valley”
Deborah Weiss "Inlet Diptych 460"
Deborah Weiss “Inlet Diptych 460”

Some of the Baltimore artists created new work specifically for the exhibition. Ryan Syrell typically paints smaller than twelve inch square abstract landscapes but here he created an epic seventy-seven square inch painting titled Valley. The variation of thick, straight directional applications of oil paint coalesces in a rich palette of whites, yellow-greens, lilac, and mauve. The work creates the feeling of depth and pitch—presenting a breathtaking awe of both land and sky. In a similar, naturalist hand, Guild member Deborah Weiss creates meditative mirror images of still water in her Inlet Diptych 460, a woodcut with cadent overlaps of indigo and blue.

Molly Colleen O'Connell detail "Not Always Paradise"
Molly Colleen O’Connell  detail  “Not Always Paradise”
Margaret Roleke   "Fenced In"
Margaret Roleke “Fenced In”

Sculpture in both Silvermine exhibits created counterpoints to the two dimensional works. Baltimore’s Molly Colleen O’Connell’s amalgamation of a dozen individual ceramic pieces in her installation, Not Always Paradise, veers significantly from past bodies of work –  graphic novels exploring punk, feminist, and trans culture, and often the archetype of the superhero. O’Connell is just beginning to exhibit this playful, new body of sculpture, but its narrative is still murky and evolving. Relationships between feminine imagery like hair, vessels, a spider, and gown gloves upon a pink saw-horse table feels forced in this piece and the childlike craftsmanship of the ceramic objects falls somewhere between deliberate and unintentional.

Guild artist Margaret Roleke’s relief scupture Fenced In is a busy oval conglomeration of white painted toy pieces of vehicles, fancy houses, and fencing.  In her artist statement, Roleke writes, “I am an artist who creates politically aware work. There are problems and chaos in the world around us and I deal with these issues in my art.” The chaos the viewer sees in her crowded micro-world contrasts with the likes of Louise Nevelson’s carefully composed monochromatic sculptures. Conceptually, Roleke’s vision feels clearer to the viewer than O’Connell’s, provoking the viewer to consider suburban excess, stacked fences that instead visually call to mind railroad waste, torqued, twisted steel, and danger in spite of the pristine blanketed white covering.

Lisa Dillon "Window" and "Untitled"
Lisa Dillon “Window” and “Untitled”

Flipping expectations, Baltimore artist Lisa Dillin frames a wall with a mirror, with a mantel placed below that houses a four-foot horizontal neon green light. The viewer’s innate narcissism unconsciously makes them take one step to the side to see their fractal image in the narrow, regally mirrored frame. In Ocelot Tiles (Survivor), Dillin references primitive animal skin rugs with her meticulously inlaid linoleum tiles in the design of an outstretched safari-like leopard. This humble material is camouflaged by impeccable craftsmanship. Contrasting with the idea of comfort and luxury, the flat “rug” is hard and cold.

Baltimore’s Alex Ebstein creates minimalist compositions with large, brightly cut shapes. From afar, they resemble Matisse collages, children’s puzzles, and abstract paintings, however upon closer inspection the viewer is surprised to find that they are constructed from cut and inlaid yoga mats. The scale of two side by side pieces is eye-catching, with bold color situated against large rectilinear black and white fields.  Both Dillin and Ebstein’s work utilize materials commonly used in the public and private sphere to surprising effect.

Alex Ebstein "Untitled"
Alex Ebstein “Untitled”

Guild artist Bob Miranti’s Triad is a vertical grouping of three small square ceramic wall hangings that appear to be soft and supple folded fabric. This piece, located on the entryway of the gallery is visually juxtaposed with the Guild’s Joseph Madrigal’s …At Home…Porcelain, which sits just outside the Guild Group Show gallery. Its wood, construction foam, and hardware form a handmade wooden ironing board with several top layers in soft turquoise and pink tones secured by dozens of silver screws.  Its three-dimensional architectural grid work of delicate porcelain is the resting place for an oval sea sponge-like form evoking a contrast between geometry, construction, and order with what is fluid and organic. Surprisingly, this sculpture speaks directly to Baltimore artist, D’Metrius Rice’s acrylic and graphite on panel, Quantum DD, whose soft layers of coloration provoke a feeling of dreamy memory.  While Madrigal’s sculpture does so in tactile three dimensions, Rice’s piece reels the viewer in closer with subtle mark making that lets us see the hand of the artist in the work.

Curators Haggag and Shay decided that, after their choices were made, their place in the exhibition was to sit back to let the art speak for itself. In both exhibits, the relationship between process and medium was highlighted across a spectrum and each of the artists maintained a high level of skill. There is a dialogue between each show and within each show.

A center for teaching art for all ages, Silvermine Gallery Director Mueller observed students engaging with the work, noticing the vibrancy and variations of boldness, “in conversation about what they know locally, and how this work reflects on that. Everyone can find something they can connect with.” It is certain that the viewer is very affected walking through both shows. The success of Baltimore Comes to Silvermine hopefully marks the beginnings of a continuing exploration, juxtaposing two strong decentralized artists communities in one exhibition space, placing them in dialogue with each other.

Baltimore, Contemporary Cross Section
Curated by Ginevra Shay, Independent Curator and Program Manager, The Contemporary, Baltimore MD
August 3 through September 14, 2014

Exhibiting the work of the following contemporary Baltimore artists: Seth Adelsberger, Daniel Conrad, Molly Colleen O’Connell, Alex Ebstein, Lisa Dillin, Andrew Laumann, D’Metrius Rice, Hermonie Only, Ryan Syrell, Kyle Tata, David Ubias, and Wickerham & Lomax (FKA Duox). See more here

Author Jill Gordon is a writer and artist, teaching in Baltimore.  She can be reached at [email protected].

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