“Space Between” Exhibition

The FLAG Art Foundation

poster for “Space Between” Exhibition
[Image: Ellsworth Kelly "Blue Relief over Green" (2004) Oil on canvas, two joined panels, 80 x 74 x 2 3/4 inches, © Ellsworth Kelly Photo courtesy the artist]

This event has ended.

SPACE BETWEEN features cross-generational artists whose works in contemporary abstraction investigate the seams, tears, and edges between two and three dimensions.

Sadie Benning, Douglas Coupland, Sarah Crowner, Svenja Deininger, Tony DeLap, Thomas Demand, Olafur Eliasson, Liam Gillick, Andreas Gursky, Mark Grotjahn, Jim Hodges, Roni Horn, Wyatt Kahn, Ellsworth Kelly, Agnes Martin, Kaz Oshiro, R. H. Quaytman, Julia Rommel, Sérgio Sister, Blair Thurman, Rebecca Ward

Inspired by Ellsworth Kelly’s superimposed canvases Blue Relief over Green, 2004, and Dark Red Relief with White, 2005, Space Between investigates the legacy and influence of abstraction on Western art, presenting a selection of artists that enter into a conversation on history, process, and form. Many of the works included within the exhibition deny simple classification, asserting the richness of the physical territory between painting and sculpture, as well as the emotive and evocative possibilities of gesture, color, and line.

Kelly’s layered canvases depart from the artist’s iconic flat-colored geometric compositions, combining color, shadow, and shape to create new dimension. Sadie Benning and Julia Rommel connect with the hard-edge color-field abstraction of the 1960’s, pushing outward against the edges of the canvas through their innovative use of materials. Kaz Oshiro’s sculptural paintings contort the physical plane of the canvas, playfully breaking the traditional hard edges in a brilliant shade of hot pink. Rebecca Ward and Wyatt Kahn further deconstruct the canvas and frame (at times thread by thread) to build new compositions. Jim Hodges, Roni Horn, and Rachel Whiteread explore implied space and transitional edges through their translucent and sublime works in glass. Agnes Martin’s hand-drawn grids, both delicate and austere, are ‘all-over’ compositions that impart order and dimension to canvas. R. H. Quaytman infuses abstraction with the architecture, history, and poetics of the specific space, themes that appear in the monumental photographic works of Thomas Demand and Andreas Gursky.

“Through a focused selection of work, Space Between contemplates the poetic and creative potential for abstraction to flirt and dance with the edges of opticality and experience, synthesizing a new space for the viewer,” states curator Louis Grachos.

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