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7/5/2010

Johannes VanDerBeek

Zach Feuer Gallery, New York

Zach Feuer Gallery is pleased to present Another Time Man, the gallery's second exhibition of work by Johannes VanDerBeek.

This exhibition is vaguely divided into three sections that form a sequence. These sections use light and materials in varying ways to reflect upon larger themes such as transformation, the passage of time, dreams, being broke but resilient, and searching for stories within holey pockets of thought. As viewers move through this body of work, they should consider how an exhibition could be interpreted in a dream and how different elements become stand-ins for a larger meaning in both comical and puzzling ways. They should also set their imagination upon wide expanses of time and the ways in which light, color, and materiality can become increasingly condensed and distorted as they move through the prisms of life, afterlife, and history.

The viewer enters into the living space where there are domestic objects with blank portraits that imply someone was just there. These tiny placeholders also come to represent the open door at the center of everything. The things in this room are made mostly of wood, a material that is still alive. Natural light filters through windows and there are shadows that allude to a fleeting quality of form. Slatted walls diffuse the natural light and hold up memories but also conceal the beaming light from the big can on the other side - before it has been kicked.

As you enter the main space you are in the immediate afterlife. Possibly heading towards the heaven like shine of the big can. Behind this wall of light are ethereal structures made of smaller tin cans, which can either be interpreted as an indication of blunt reality (behind the door is another door) or how supreme geometry can be found in base things. In this section, materials change to transitory or transparent surfaces that are hard to see. There are voluminous metal ghosts that appear as projections or delusions. There is a large stony flat screen television made out of cardboard with a fading signal of decomposing static. There are other sculptures made out of paper towels, wire, and driftwood that are like antennae or signals that depict the impression on the eye after it has stared into a glowing orb. Both the paper towels and the cardboard are further steps in the break down of wood as it is thinned by age or process. In general, all of the objects aim toward an idealized formalism that is grounded by the limits of physicality. The combination hopefully leads to an illusive mental state and the reminder that our mind is the matter we eat towards.

When you head toward the back room the light fades and is solely a representation. Color spectrums are dense and dusty as though the weight of time has pressed them into an atomic powder. In this room there are mostly accounts of dreams that have been scribbled into a mysterious material that looks heavy, like stone or steel, but floats airily on the walls. There are stories to inform the imagery much like a caption in a museum but they do so inconclusively. This is the place of collected histories from the nights before. It is most like our understanding of institutions that preserve the present by constantly shaping the past. This place also references the divergent aspects of our collective imagination. It shows the potential for the burning devil of doubt but also the whimsical wonderings of the subconscious. There are shadow boxes with photographs from decades ago that are treated like ancient relics hovering permanently in trompe l'oeil neon light. There is possibly a weird man that changed himself into an artifact because of something he did to a pig.

All of this is interpreted through the lens of art making. It is not a literal interpretation but rather a layered sequence of allegory that hopefully affects the viewer's perceptions for a brief instance.

Johannes VanDerBeek graduated from Cooper Union in 2004. His work was exhibited in National Projects at PS1/MoMA in Long Island City and Amazement Park: Stan, Sara and Johannes VanDerBeek at the Tang Museum at Skidmore College. His work is currently featured in Trapdoor, an exhibition organized by the Public Art Fund at MetroTech Center in Brooklyn, NY.

Opening Reception Saturday, May 8, 6-8

Zach Feuer Gallery
530 West 24th Street, New York, NY 10011
Gallery Hours: Tuesday-Saturday, 10-6
free admission

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