NYAB Event - John von Bergen "Whip Lash" & Michelle Weinstein "Shine, Perishing Republic"

John von Bergen "Whip Lash" & Michelle Weinstein "Shine, Perishing Republic"

This event has ended.
At Smack Mellon
Media: Drawing, Installation

Smack Mellon presents the ambitious site-specific installation Whip Lash by Berlin-based American artist John von Bergen and Shine, Perishing Republic, two series of meticulous ink and watercolor drawings by LA-based artist Michelle Weinstein. Despite their vast difference in scale, the installation and the works on paper both evoke feelings of uncertainty and foreboding, a collision of past and future, and a clash of the natural and the manmade. Situated within Smack Mellon’s cavernous industrial space, von Bergen’s installation draws attention to the vast white wall by imagining the results of a violent interaction within the gallery. The organic white form paradoxically seems both to grow out of and struggle against the imposing wall, taking on a life of its own as it threatens to consume visitors. In the back gallery, the influence of illustration and native and folk arts are apparent in Weinstein’s drawings. With traditional dipping pen and ink, patterns are built up with repetitive thin lines on several different pieces of paper taped together. Small marks of color punctuate otherwise black and white representations of the stylized forms of spaceships, mountains, boats, and trees. By eluding direct references, Weinstein bestows her drawings with an ambiguous narrative determined by the viewer’s imagination.