Stuart Hawkins "Deluxe"
Zach Feuer Gallery
This event has ended.
Zach Feuer Gallery presents new photographs, video and sculpture by Stuart Hawkins. This is her third solo show with the gallery.
In Deluxe, Hawkins collaborates with local artisans in Kolkata, India to build handcrafted props modeled after luxury items found in elite vacation resorts.
Constructed to be oversized, with distorted proportions, and then placed in sparse environs, Hawkins enacts impromptu public performances with her props that reference a global divide of waste and wealth. Upon photographing the live scenarios, the raw materials from the resort sets are then dissembled and recycled back into the host communities as carpets, tables, tents, or insulation. The realm of the elite is re-contextualized, resituated, and re-built with the hands of many and not a few.
In her video piece “The Naturalist”, a resort staff member performs animal sounds and bird calls during ‘Happy Hour’. He entertains a vacation audience that seeks to enjoy the authentic sounds of nature, while distracting them from the reality that many of these sounds can no longer be heard.
Hawkins’ sculpture “Bottled Water” sits in repose drinking water, as the action in Hawkins photographs and video installation unfurl; a vacationer replenishing as the world turns.
Media
Schedule
from May 08, 2008 to June 07, 2008
Opening reception: May 8, 6-8pm
Artist(s)
Reviews
i was quick to dismiss the photographs in the show-- they are intensely saturated and the light flattens everything-- that i thought they were just manipulated in Photoshop. but the surreal quality of the images has stayed with me, days after seeing them. the video piece doesn't need the fake shrubs, or the tent-- its content is strong enough on its own. it is strangely endearing: i watched it 3 times. the sculpture piece is an expensive one-liner, and i really wish it wasn't part of a surprisingly strong exhibition.