Susan Kaplow & Pam Shields “EmBody”

Ceres Gallery

poster for Susan Kaplow & Pam Shields “EmBody”
[Image: Pam Shields "Sketchbook #04" Pen & Ink]

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Ceres Gallery is pleased to present EmBody, a joint show by artists Susan Kaplow and Pam Shields. Shields’ scrolls and charcoal drawings move through space and time, lightness and dark, rendering the body in charcoal and ink. Kaplow’s fiber sculptures present the body in its power and beauty, its woundedness and healing. Although the artists made their work without consultation or collaboration, they decided to join forces when they realized how their bodily visions dialogued with and complemented one another.

Shields’ scrolls chart her thoughts and emotions day by day. She began work on her now 16 yard long scroll on November 9, 2016, the day after the presidential election. Working on the scroll was a way to deal with her sadness and anger over the election results. She is committed to continuing work on the scroll until there is change in the White House. Shields has rendered the abstracted bodies of her scrolls and drawings in pen and ink. Starting from blind contour drawings, she then used cross hatching to give volume to the contours. Her large charcoal figurative works, were made from stop-motion ‘selfies’, which capture moments in time as well as the artist’s motions through space.

Kaplow’s figures, made from hand-felted fiber and mixed media, investigate how power may grow from woundedness and healing arise from despair. Some of her sculptures bear scars, others are missing breasts. Their fiber base is enhanced with natural materials (bones, branches, shells) and with elements crafted from clay. These figures challenge the notion of ideal bodily beauty and enlarge the definition of beauty itself. Kaplow’s Breast Cancer Odyssey, a five part installation, charts her own experience with this illness, as she moved from sadness and fury toward acceptance and a deeper spirituality. Each part of her journey is written on the body, rendered in fiber and enhanced with beads, metal forms, photographs and clay.

Media

Schedule

from October 01, 2019 to October 26, 2019

Opening Reception on 2019-10-10 from 18:00 to 20:00

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