Ryan Foerster, Sam Moyer, Charles Ross, Hugh Scott-Douglas
19/10/2013 > 25/01/2014
Opening on 19/10/2013, from 7 pm to 9 pm
A phantom sun, or sundog, is an atmospheric phenomenon that creates bright spots of light on either side of the sun, often on a luminous ring in the sky. The sun light, passing through diamond dust drifting in the air, creates a powerful image of two 'mock suns' appearing in the sky.
This exhibition intends to bring together the works of artists integrating the sun and natural elements into their work. Working across various mediums with raw materials and exposure to nature, each artist engages an experimental process of creation finding a balance of control and release. The resulting compositions are dual manifestations of the artists' will and nature's whim. In their own practice, each artist allows natural elements to dictate tone. Time and climate become their tools and geography a platform. The works exhibited here are presented as "objects-images" - a combination of painting, sculpture, photography and scientific method that captures the trace of a past time. To understand these works, the viewer has to look beyond the object to its creation process through space and time. It's is their manifestation that makes the work, in the way an image appears on the photographic paper.
It is with a collection of works by CHARLES ROSS (born in 1937, lives and works in New Mexico), that the sun becomes the central element of the exhibition. The Serial Cube Set from 1968 is a sculpture of four modules designed from the cube, a symbolic form of minimalism. The four modules in a transparent Plexiglas cube develop show a cube that grows truncated until it is a triangle. Within each element, the optical liquid, developed by the artist, diffracts the light and reveals a series of iridescent fringes amplified by the complex interplay of transparency and diagonals derived from these volumes. It was after a long time working on the diffraction of the light that CHARLES ROSS has decided to focus on its concentration: showing the raw power of the sun, The Solar Burns are the result of exposure of a wooden panel to sunlight concentrated by an optical lens. At the surface of the wood emerges a pattern left by the combustion phenomenon on a simple white painting. From panel to panel appears an eerie constellation of black stars. For years, CHARLES ROSS has also been working on the construction of a monumental site in New Mexico, Star Axis, an architectural work of art that the artist understands to be a link between the earth and the stars. Within this majestic site, the Hour Chamber allows for example to observe one hour of the rotation of the earth. In the center of this site, the Star Tunnel, located exactly in the Earth's rotation axis, is an ideal place to observe the curve of the stars. Three large photographs shot by the artist on this site reflect its majesty.
It is from photosensitive papers that RYAN FOERSTER (born in 1983, lives and works in New York) imagines a series of abstract images in bright colors made outside. The photographic papers are buried under all sorts of debris, soil, plant fragments, organic elements. Paradoxically, this treatment of the photographic image reveals a surprising palette of vibrant colors. The result is both dirty and degraded, yet has something extra that magnifies the image. The artist says that it was during Hurricane Sandy that the most beautiful images were created: capturing something of a natural violence, RYAN FOERSTER produces a series that renders the force of nature sensitive through a fully abstract composition.
HUGH SCOTT-DOUGLAS (born in 1983, lives and works in New York) uses for his part a traditional method, the albumin printing, which combines egg white and silver to reveal an image from a negative. Invented in 1855, this method is famous for revolutionizing the nineteenth century society's relation to the photographic image, making possible multiple print from a negative. Albumin prints were dedicated in large part to sending postcards, which developed the popular practice consisting of giving evidence of one's presence somewhere. The impressions of SCOTT-DOUGLAS are made from scans of old silver coins that stopped circulating the same year the technique of albumin was invented. On the surface of these coins, slight traces of hallmarks reflect the many tests made to verify their authenticity.
SAM MOYER's large formats (born 1983, lives and works in New York) are designed from simple elements, black ink, canvas and bleach, using the folds and cracks in the fabric. Left outdoors while drying, the resulting canvases show a set of alternatively rigid or organic patterns. The quality of black and white that follows, strongly evokes the photographic process, reinvests traditional notions of horizon, shadow and light, volume and hollows in a non-figurative context.