Artist: Christopher Chiappa
Exhibition title: Pietà Mondrian
Venue: Tops Gallery, Memphis, US
Date: June 25 – August 21, 2021
Photography: all images copyright and courtesy of the artist and Tops Gallery
One hundred years after the schism of Modernism, a new overload of information makes an elemental abstraction imperative once again. This need is not spiritual nor ideological – it is physical.
In his first exhibition at Tops, Christopher Chiappa presents a new series of wall-mounted sculptures whose form and subject are derived by a determinism of gravity. These expertly crafted works made of 2 or 3 elements ground the viewers’ reality in form. Their shapes and colors are real. They are not fantasies of a burned out enlightenment or a stand in for a larger metaphor. Chiappa’s intent is the work itself, bringing content back to the present.
Christopher Chiappa (USA, b.1970 in West Chester, PA) attended the Rhode Island School of Design (Providence, RI) and received his BA from Middlebury College in 1993 (Middlebury, VT). He has held solo exhibitions at Kate Werble Gallery, New York, NY (2018, 2015-2016, 2012, 2010); SCAD Museum of Art, Savannah, GA (2018); the Art-in-Buildings Program, Time Equities, Inc., New York, NY (2017); MASS MoCA, North Adams, MA (2014-2015); Fredericks & Freiser, New York, NY (2000, 2003) and Jessica Fredericks, New York, NY (1998). He lives and works in Long Island City, NY.
