NYAB Event - Andy Ness “Nothing Nice and Easy”

Andy Ness “Nothing Nice and Easy”

TSA

This event has ended.

In the summer of 2013 Andy Ness went to Rome and Morocco and recorded what he observed in sketchbooks. The distinct cultures of these two countries presented Ness with a wide range of new visual subjects—a vibrant color palette, Moorish architecture, and the massive ruins of a once grand empire. Upon his return, Ness created a sprawling series of drawings in which his pre-existing lexicon of pictorial forms, such as teeth, leopard pelts, and airplanes, commingled with what he had seen abroad.

These works have a bizarre narrative structure and seem as if they are being formed by memories which are simultaneously surfacing and fading. They do not strive for a superficial resolution but instead are layered with contradiction and dissonance. As an artist rooted in sculpture, it is enthralling to see Ness take full advantage of the medium of drawing and the way it permits a world ungoverned by the rules of gravity. In this series, Ness bends and collapses time and space with a sophisticated and poetic fluidity, conducting a broken parade through a crumbling city under the relentless sun of Northern Africa. forms are as permeable as they are discreet and often end up splayed open with their internal contents seeping out onto the page. Instability and vulnerability are at the forefront, yet Ness insists on presenting an underlying grace and humanity within it all.

Andy Ness lives and works in Minneapolis, Minn. He holds a BFA from the Pratt Institute and an MFA in Sculpture from the Rhode Island School of Design. He has exhibited his work throughout the northeast and has attend numerous residencies including the Fine Arts Work Center, The MacDowell Colony, and the Vermont Studio Center.

Media

• Painting
• Drawing

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