Artists: Theodore Boyer, Joshua Evan, Martin Lukáč, Corey Mcghee, Miller Robinson , Grant Wells, Heath West
Exhibition title: Decisions, Decisions
Venue: NOMADIC, California Institute of the Arts (CalArts), Los Angeles, US
Date: August 19 – September 17, 2017
Photography: all images copyright and courtesy of the artist and Prairie, Chicago
“This disorientation is partly due to the loss of a stable horizon. And with the loss of horizon also comes the departure of a stable paradigm of orientation, which has situated concepts of subject and object, of time and space, throughout modernity. In falling, the lines of the horizon shatter, twirl around, and superimpose”
-Hito Steyerl
“You need an infinite stretch of time ahead of you to start to think, infinite energy to make the smallest decision. The world is getting denser. The immense number of useless projects is bewildering. Too many things have to be put in to balance up an uncertain scale. You can’t disappear anymore. You die in a state of total indecision”
-Jean Baudrillard
We are pleased to announce “Decisions, Decisions”, the first installment of NOMADIC, a traveling, artist run initiative.
On view from August 4st-11th, located at California Institute of the Arts (CalArts).
Featured Artists:
Theodore Boyer (b. 1983, Seal Beach, California) Theodore Boyer’s works seen at a distance are reminiscent of satellite imagery and foreign landscapes. Up close, however, the tactile quality of the paintings emerges. Recent bodies of work reference the cosmos through hand-dyes, bleach, and acrylic paint on stretched fabrics, blurring the line between the organic and the manufactured. Boyer derives much of his visual inspiration from scientific journals and images generated by NASA. completed his BFA in 2012 at the School of Visual Arts in New York City. Boyer’s work was recently the subject of a two-person show at Shulamit Nazarian, Los Angeles (2016) and group exhibitions at Happy Ending, Dallas (2015); _Gallery, Venice Beach (2014); Eric Firestone Gallery, East Hampton (2012); The Hole Gallery, New York (2012); Fireproof Gallery, New York (2012); and Museo de Cuidad Mexico, Mexico City (2010). Boyer practiced as an exchange resident at the ZhDK in Zurich in 2011 and completed the Carpe Diem residency in Karela, India in May of 2016. His work has been profiled in Modern Painters, Angeleno Mag, and Forbes. Boyer lives and works in Los Angeles.
Joshua Evan
( b. 1991) works in Los Angeles California) His work primarily focuses on painting, specifically that of the relationship between painting and contemporary culture, mass media proliferation, internet culture, and consumerism through the dialogue of abstraction and found material. He earned his BFA at the University of California, Santa Cruz in May 2014 and his MFA from California Institute of the Arts(CalArts). His work has been featured in New American Paintings Magazine, and showcased on blogs such as ContemporaryUntitled, Work2day, ArtLandapp, Sunday-S, and Abstract Mag, and is included in exhibitions at Steve Turner Gallery(LA), Huset for Kunst of Design, (Holstebro, DK), as well as “Clothing Optional” at Night Gallery in August of 2017.
Martin Lukáč
(b. 1989 Slovakia) Lukac’s painting practice revolves largely around the depiction of motifs. Alighting upon a given form, the simpler, the better, he depicts it, sometimes repeatedly within the same canvas, until he has essentially exhausted it. The motifs can range from modified grids, full of expressive higgledly-piggledly interiors; what looks like a shield or a coat of arms; and more recently (at the time of writing this text), the poorly drawn profile of a Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtle. Martin lives and works in the Czech Rebulic and has shown internationally.
Corey Mcghee
Corey creates works around his interest in storytelling. The stories that he creates are often based on his own life experiences as a young black male growing up in Detroit. In his works the artist uses pop cultural references and homages to classical styles of animation. Though not obvious, you may see some of these signifiers in a painting or animated installation. These references are used to talk about issues that children face, particularly black children in urban communities, such as: racism, classism, poverty, domestic abuse, drug abuse, violence, etc., and how these things affect the development from childhood into adulthood. Corey uses mediums such as painting, animation, installation, etc., to open up the discussion of what it means to grow up as a black male in an underprivileged environment. Corey McGhee was born in Detroit, MI, and currently works and lives in Los Angeles, CA.
Miller Robinson
(b. 1992, Lodi, CA) based in Los Angeles, California. Her work, which encompasses actions, writing, garments, sculpture, painting, installation, and video, is in constant dialogue with the state of materials and experiences. Founded in the passage of time, themes of growth and decay are routine to the practice, often melding a dialogue of past, present, and future. At times working nomadically and in response to a given environment, site, context, and nature of being play a central role in her performative work. In 2014, Robinson received her BFA from Otis College of Art and Design. Her work has been exhibited in Los Angeles, New York and Berlin. In 2017 her work has been exhibited in multiple group shows, including California Curse at ArtSea by curator Pejman Shojaei, A New Prescription for Insomnia at HORSEANDPONY Fine Art in Berlin, Germany curated by GeoVanna Gonzalez, and Ours is a City of Writers at the Los Angeles Municipal Art Gallery by curators Suzanne Hudson, Simon Leung, and James Nisbet.
Grant Wells
Living in the age of satellites surveying our planet’s every land contour and Google presenting them on our devices, Grant Wells focuses on how these landscape perspectives affect the understanding of our natural surroundings. Through multiple steps of deteriorated pigment transfers and use of paint, he takes these landscapes and moves them from the computer to canvas. As the image is transferred, rips, tears, and smears melt the image revealing the substrate behind it. Subsequently, paint is applied, images are replicated, areas of pigment are covered and layered materials construct a newly mapped image. Influenced by Richard Diebenkorn’s Ocean Park Series that studied the flattening of space or Michael Heizer’s land works that physically disrupt the earth’s surface, Grant’s work investigates similar perceptive qualities of land and space when put through the lens of virtual maps. Grant is currently based in New York City, pursuing his MFA degree from Hunter College.
Heath West
is a recent recipient of an artist grant in painting for 2017 from the Peter S. Reed Foundation, New York City. He holds a Master of Science in Advanced Architectural Design from Columbia University, a Master of Architecture from the University of Houston, and attended the University of Applied Arts in Vienna, Austria. Heath’s solo show, Neighborhood of Infinity, opened at Galleri Urbane, Dallas, earlier this year, and he has participated in group shows at Harper’s Books in East Hampton, New York, 0-0, Los Angeles, and Castor Gallery, New York City. Heath lives and works in Houston, Texas.
