NOV. 19, 2022 - MAR. 11, 2023 - RESTING PLACES
OPENING
November 19, 2022, 6-9pm
DURATION
November 19, 2022 - March 11, 2023
birds + Richard proudly presents a group exhibition titled Resting Places featuring the work of Kierian Cunningham, Bill Meuser and Bailey Romaine.
“All foxes dig back doors.” says Margaret Atwood through her archetypal evil woman, Zenia Arden, in The Robber Bride.
If it is possible for art to stand outside of dominant cultural systems, then rest is resistant. Matisse compared art to a good armchair – one of serenity and rest from physical fatigue. This statement has gone on to controversy, however, I believe there is still a place for it in art – especially for the working class. If our main way of participating in dominant cultural systems is to sell labor, then rest is an act of abstaining from this transaction. To prioritize rest is to be stigmatized in our ambitious culture. To represent our value as labor merchants, and thus our indispensable status, we decry our busy schedule, inability to say “no,” and sleepless nights. If the only power the working class has is over their own labor – whether to sell it or not – an interesting third way is to look for the foxholes through which to sustain their own autonomy of creation.
Bill Meuser allows us to get lost in the shimmering space between branches and sky. We find a cool bit of shade in the heat. We find a living thing that extends beyond our own lifespan. It stands tall above to cover for us. Holding space. Obscuring the heat and creating symbiosis with the living and the nonhuman. Transcending the anthropocene. Allowing us to lose ourselves in soft focus. Meuser’s work appears naturalistic but leans toward the abstract landscape visions of Forrest Bess – based on his dreams.
A chair can be a metaphor for power – the throne, the seat. So, while – if we think of Matisse – it can draw associations of comfort, it is also the power to rest. Kierian Cunningham’s work provides the strength and elegance for the task of rest. To take a seat is an act of agency in his functional sculptures. They embody a zen quest for perfection as interconnected with accepting the imperfect.
Bailey Romaine’s sculptures continue in paradox. Wood itself is a paradoxical material. Its warm color belies its dead organic material. Of all the substances in Bailey Romaine’s sculptures, this seems to encapsulate the nature of passing – all things passing – in her work. Like an arc shot, we circumnavigate sculpture in a gallery, giving a point of focus to a meditative consideration of passing. Like the work of Al Taylor, the subject of liminal structures harmonizes with material here. Romaine’s work appears more carefully considered, leaning toward Donald Judd’s concrete structures, rather than the tumble-down structures we see with Taylor. Hardness passes to soft, asymmetry to balance, natural colors to approximations and coatings; the work holds room for peace in the unresolved.
Holding a place for bodily and mental rest, each of these artists allow for paradox and soft focus. These works allow one to disappear into the space of daydreams – or actual dreams. Whether immersed in the shimmering space between branches and sky in Meuser’s work, lost in a peaceful cinematic arc shot circumnavigating Romaine’s contemplative sculptures or drifting into imagination in Kierian’s functional sculptures, this show invites the resistant act of rest.
PRESS CONTACT
For more information and for high resolution images, please contact the gallery at abq@birds-richard.xyz.