Ryan Brown “Lots On View”

Ryan Brown “Lots On View”

Bryce Wolkowitz Gallery

This event has ended.

Bryce Wolkowitz Gallery presents Lots on View, an exhibition of new work by Ryan Brown.

The cycle of drawings in this exhibition contends that the meaning of a work of art is bound to the context by which it is presented. The implied neutrality of the gallery, its latent societal and economic functions are interrogated, exposed and absorbed into the drawings themselves. The form of pages from an enlarged art catalogue offer an analogy to support the overarching theme of hyper-reflection, where all points of reference loop, feedback and spiral inwards towards an indefinite center.

Images of anonymous abstract paintings contribute to the loop by matter-of-factly describing themselves. The effect blurs the distinction between opposites: copy to original, source to residual, end to beginning. There’s a strong element of self-parody, satirizing the inscrutable figure of the artist. A meta-narrative builds up through the margins: notes become clues, captions become riddles and titles are an open act of deception. The subsequent equalization of the aesthetics of auction catalogues to the art they purport to describe, classify and sell, questions the purpose of meaning, the meaning of purpose and the very meaning of meaning in art.

Ryan Brown lives and works in New York and Lima, Peru. Recent solo exhibitions include Variations on a Theme, Max Estrella, Madrid; Stare at the Wall, OMR, Mexico City and To Hell With It All, Let’s Pray That It Lasts, Y Gallery, New York. His work is in the collection of CIFO Cisneros Fontanals Foundation, Miami; Fundacion JUMEX, Mexico City and the Zabludowicz Collection, London among others.

Media

• Drawing

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