“Realism, Reality and Surreality” Exhibition

Bronx Art Space

poster for “Realism, Reality and Surreality” Exhibition
[Image: John Ahearn "Devon w/ His Father's Last Tattoo" (2019) Courtesy of Alexander and Bonin, NY]

This event has ended.

curated by Sabine Schumacher M.A.

“There is never a question of what to paint, but only how to paint. The how of painting has always been the image-the end of the product” Robert Ryman

From metaphoric trompel’oeill to sardonic commentary and surreality five artists on view at BronxArtSpace grapple with differing dimensions of reality, transformed and altered reality. John Ahearn and Devon Rodriguez exhibit their artistic dialogue with images of each other. Carla Rae Johnson’s Séance Series pairs remarkably different individuals converging across time, space, and culture. Jun-Cheng Liu ‘lifts some of the ancient Chinese characters off their dusty pages into the 3rd Dimension”. Sarah Sagarin follows the path of the Surrealists by starting every new painting with no road map, no source material, and steers clear of any conscious intent or preliminary subject.

John Ahearn best known for his outdoor installations in the Bronx in the 1980 and 1990s, presents two new castings of “Devon w/ His Father’s Last Tattoo” 2019 and “Rose Holding Her Second Version of “POPEYE” 2019. John met Rose on the streets near his studio in the SouthBronx and was fascinated by her handmade Popeye that she carried with her. Roses’ cartoon like face expression mirrors the little hero she is holding in her hand.

Jun-Cheng Liu, shows metaphoric trompe-l’oeil works such as Fractured Memory; then transforms expected reality with his sculpture ‘Moonlit Monologue into the 3rd Dimension. Liu says “the use of line in traditional Chinese art always fascinated me. “In my senior year research trip to the west along the Yellow river historic sites, I traversed the Chinese line of ages. In fine motions of brushwork, the Chinese line dances between gravity and fluidity, delineates shapes of thoughts, resonates mother nature’s heartbeat.”

Carla Rae Johnson’s large charcoal drawings from “Portrait of the Artist as an Arrogant American Series,” evoke individual habits of mind and behaviors to reflect the disconnect between our espoused values and our collective actions. The Séance Series proposes hypothetical meetings between creative and historic figures who never met during their life-times.’ My delight is in pairing those whose lives, work, gender identities, cultures, personalities, or reputations are extremely different .’

Devon Rodriguez makes hyper-realist portraits of New Yorker’s for which he is becoming recognized. Among his 5 paintings we see Jonathan (2018), which depicts his cousin seated in a chair, his Keith Haring T-shirt in full view. ” Mr. Rodriguez, a 23-year-old graduate of the High School of Art and Design in Manhattan, has yet to come up with a catchy way to describe his works, many of them influenced by traditional 19th-century European portraiture, but with an edge. ”

Through her process of automatic mark making, drawing, and painting, Sarah Sagarin’s imagery emerges and is developed or edited. She leave traces of her dialogue with the canvas, while ultimately investigating issues of creation and challenging the presumption of free will. Working this way each painting takes on a life and a struggle of its own, becoming a conceptual puzzle to be solved both formally and psychologically for herself and the viewer.

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Schedule

from January 24, 2020 to February 22, 2020
Artist Talk: Saturday, February 29th, 4pm.

Opening Reception on 2020-01-24 from 17:30 to 20:30

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