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  A Fresh Meat in the Gallery Exhibition  

 

Opening Reception: Saturday, March 1, 7-10 pm
Gallery Hours: Thursday-Sunday noon-6 pm

 
Postcard for Changing Landscapes

 

About "Changing Landscapes"...

I did not expect to be showing these two bodies of work together outside my own studio.

And so The Plan was born, of paper and ink. On Japanese kozo-shi, the desert began to materialize in 11 schematic “landscapes” featuring a defining horizon in an unbounded space. A calligraphic vocabulary of brushwork recorded claims to territory, forcing together the elements that hover unacknowledged by our ahistorical consciousness and our selective sight, as well as those claims so thoroughly incorporated through overexposure, bland repetition, or institutionalization as to be beneath our normal awareness. Other elements were named but left invisible.

Although for me as an artist the transition between these two bodies of work was a natural evolution, the worlds they represent do not rest in such easy conjunction. As shrinking geography and growing technological access bring universes crashing together there is created both a fertility and a danger.

When I showed love full of life in the desert where I live, a community with little context for the finer points of queer identity, I found myself drawing back, describing the theme rather opaquely as simply “nonheterosexual romantic love.” I was concerned that my gender/orientation would become “the” issue and interfere with my ability to work on common causes. As well, I shrank from having my private life exposed to persons who might not understand. Now, bringing The Plan to San Francisco, I wonder how my rural experience can translate meaningfully to an urban audience.

Tension between these spheres remains uncomfortable, with no easy reconciliation or natural understanding. And yet, all of these worlds live within me, and as an artist I must navigate their differences.

 
 

 

 
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