Kathryn Hart “SEARCHING”

SVA Gramercy (209 E 23rd St.)

This event has ended.

1st Floor in School of Visual Arts Project Spaces ,

also on view at 380 2nd Ave, 8th floor.

The School of Visual Arts (SVA) presents Searching, a solo show by artist Kathryn Hart. This is Hart’s first solo show at the SVA.

In this solo exhibition, Hart explores the web of emotions confronted in the search to begin anew, and the burden of choice. She continues her dialogue with evolving identity and the hope for new beginnings amidst a maze of emotional conflict, pain, and self-doubt.

Hart offers, “after life leaves us tumbled upside down, completely derailed, we pick ourselves up and begin the search for…personal truth, enlightenment, growth, love, connections, a place to feel comfortable, a place to call home. We even search for the place to start the search. My flightpath was obliterated by an onslaught of happenings – my husband’s cancer, the deaths of both my parents, and my own struggle with an ongoing disease and trauma. How do I move forward?

The search starts with one intent, one thought, one moment, one breath, one catalyst, one cell, one dot. A series of dots, actions, sparks, ideas, or energy becomes a line, a trajectory. Lines reveal potential paths ahead and scars of the ones just followed.”

Kathryn Hart presents this theme across an array of media, which further illustrates the plethora of options for the journey. An on-site installation of hundreds of lines, wires and embedded glass lenses explores the miasma of available routes, some more circuitous and arduous, some involving forced self-reflection. Hart uses these laboriously hand tied knots and line to translate a period of unsettling uncertainty into a path to move forward. Shadowy lines hover behind the actual as beacons or footprints. Ink drawings, reminiscent of ancient cave drawings, indicate the inception of thought and movement. Abstract black and white photographs of found bones allude to structure, life, and an archeological excavation for hidden meanings. There is simplicity and strength in their starkness. The exhibition also includes complex hanging sculptures with line and objects embedded into dense surfaces. In all the presented artworks, Hart examines the dichotomies of movement and stillness, contemplation and decision, and space and line, and the importance of the duality in the search.

“Line represents journey, connections, strength, simplicity, scars, tethers, and choice. Knots can be entanglements, junctures, bindings, obstacles, hurdles, gates and coupling.
I learned suture knots from my plastic surgeon father. His knots would both join and conceal.”

Hart delves into the tension between the search and choice, and ultimately, personal accountability. “We are bound by the choices we make. In the end, my search and its discoveries are all up to me.”

“I am inspired by many artists, particularly the poetry and bravery of Eva Hesse, the bold structures of Lee Bontecou, and the power and personal revelations of Louise Bourgeois.”

Kathryn Hart is a multi-disciplinary artist who exhibits frequently in New York City, throughout Europe, and most recently, Los Angeles. Museum, solo and group shows include Ateneo de Madrid (Madrid, Spain), Howland Cultural Center (Beacon, NY), IDEA Space/Colorado College, Andre Zarre Gallery (NYC), the Chelsea Art Museum (NYC), ArtHaus (Denver), Galerie SD Szucha 8 (Warsaw), Galeria 33 (Poland), Zamek w Goluchowie, (Poland), Myslenice Cultural Center (Poland), the Oceanside Museum of Art (CA), Museo de Castello de Estense (Italy), The Mitchell Museum (MD), Southern Nevada Museum of Fine Arts (Las Vegas), and the Colorado History Museum.

Her artwork is in the public collections of the Ministry of Culture of France, the Ministry of Culture of Poland, the Southern Nevada Museum of Fine Arts, the Myslenice Cultural Center (Poland), and many private collections worldwide.

International awards include scholarships from the Council of Europe (2016), and the Ministries of Art and Culture of France and Poland (2015, 2014), and the United Nations Harmony for Peace Award (2010).

Hart is a member of A.I.R. Gallery in Brooklyn, NY. She holds a B.A. from Boston University, an MBA from the University of Texas at Arlington, and has extended studies in art from the School of Visual Arts in NYC and the City of London Polytechnic. Hart lives in Colorado.