NYAB Event - “The Hunt of the Unicorn” Exhibition

“The Hunt of the Unicorn” Exhibition

Gitler &

[Image: Tom Sanford "The Unicorn is Found" [detail] (2015) oil on canvas, 62 x 48 in.]

This event has ended.

Gitler &_____ presents the group exhibition The Hunt of the Unicorn, comprising seven new works by seven artists, each a reimagining of one of the famed Medieval-era Unicorn Tapestries that adorn the walls of The Cloisters in Upper Manhattan. Exhibiting artists include Jason Covert, Peter Daverington, Gabriel Giucci, Boy Kong, Liz Adams-Jones, Graham Preston, and Tom Sanford. A printed catalogue will accompany the show and include an essay by Jennifer Ball, Associate Professor of Art History, Brooklyn College and The Graduate Center, CUNY, and Guest Lecturer at The Metropolitan Museum of Art.

The Hunt of the Unicorn will join singular, mixed and multi-media works by artists who know Gitler’s space well. Conceived by Daverington and Sanford, along with gallerist Avi Gitler, this exhibition presents seven distinct interpretations of the myriad themes—both religious and secular—contained within the vivid works, from the unicorn-as-Christ symbolism to the social hierarchy of the huntsmen. Ineffable in their beauty and chaos, each fantastical arrangement contains elements that are pastoral, mystical and brutal, all assembled in an opaque chronology. And yet, the building blocks of the tapestries’ long-form narrative defy interpretation by contemporary standards.

The tapestries’ oft-debated provenance has only enriched their legend. The prevailing theory that they were not originally hung as a group only further lends each artist the creative license to riff on his or her respective tapestry, and either adhere to or manipulate the canon.