Dirty work
The gallery says:
“Rangel responds to dirt as a material that can present vulnerability, failure, strength, and potential to promote growth and change. The structures she creates are composed of dirt and found materials from places that hold significance. For her, the intersecting and overlapping of lines in this work acts as a metaphor for navigating complex emotions and the potential and opportunity for growth.
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“‘Through Line’ celebrates basic mark-making as a foundation for the remarkable. Each of the six artists on view explores line through the lens of their distinct practices and mediums, ranging from marker to string, chalk, and even dirt! Together, they apply their shared interest in using lines as the basis for their work to boldly illustrate how understated, rudimentary marks can be explored more deeply. Collectively, the artworks on view act as tributes to the mark, celebrating the multitude of ways lines can be made, manipulated, and made monumental.’’
Art inflation
The gallery explains:
‘Claire Ashley’s large-scale inflatables explode the possibilities of painting. Her practice devours the traditional mediums of sculpture, installation, painting, and costume, spitting back hybrid ‘bodies’ that are moveable, wearable, and deliciously preposterous. Made from PVC-coated canvas tarps, spray paint, and small blower fans, Ashley’s work is a complex, humorous mash-up of fine art meets bouncy house.
“The artist resists and pushes against the traditional norms of painting, disrupting the straight edges and flat, fixed nature of the discipline by creating bulbous, malleable inflatables that alter themselves to fit new environments. Displayed as site-conscious interventions that shape shift as they playfully wedge into and squish between architectural spaces, this exhibition expands beyond the walls of Lamont Gallery. Ashley’s monumentally scaled works emerge inside academic buildings and spill out onto campus, surprising the viewer and prompting questions such as, what the object is, how it appeared, and where it came from.’’
Art, not anguish
The gallery says that each artist in this exhibition was tasked to "weave contemporary ideas with traditional art and craft," with the aim of bringing experiences of their cultures and marrying them to different mediums that complement each other.
An ‘eerily prescient’ show
Lamont Gallery Director and Curator Lauren O'Neal said: "It was impossible to know that when this exhibition was finally realized, that it would become eerily prescient, that it would forecast a felt and lived experience, rather than merely a curatorial one."
The artwork on view encompasses a wide variety of media, including painting, sculpture, photography, visual and audio performances.
The gallery says: “While we all hope to soon be physically together with others without fear, ‘Being & Feeling (Alone, Together)’ provides us with cathartic emotional release, instilling hope and appreciation for our humanity even at the worst of times. To check out “Being & Feeling (Alone, Together),’’ visit exeter.edu/lamont-gallery/being-feeling-alone-together.
Investigating American identity
The gallery, part of the famous prep school in Exeter, N.H., says the show “features provocative works by Becky Alley and Melissa Vandenberg, who use common domestic items to explore themes of patriotism, war, and commemoration in our current cultural environment. Whether tongue-in-cheek, or an outright adverse critique, the artists focus on American identity, and our relationship to what we believe and why.’’
Man and mutations
"Mutation: Specimen'' (textiles) by LAURA MORRISON, in the "Lush Life'' show at the Lamont Gallery, in Exeter, N.H.
The gallery notes say: "The artwork in this exhibition explores the natural world and the effect that humans have on it, encouraging us to cultivate our imagination and consider our own ecological footprint by expressing the beauty and fragility of our world.''
Face mirrors the soul?
"Ang San Suu Kyi,'' by MARIANA COOK, in the show "Justice: Faces of the Human Rights Revolution,'' at the Lamont Gallery, at Phillips Exeter Academy, in Exeter, N.H., through July 31.
The Burmese human-rights advocate has a kindly face but then so have many murderous dictators, such as Stalin and Mao. Others, such as Syrian dictator/mass murderer Bashar Assad, simply look bland.