On view October 19, 2008 - January 26, 2009
P.S.1 Contemporary Art
Center presents the work
of three artists and a collective as part of the Fall 2008 cycle of the International and National Projects program. Featuring new and recent works by a diverse group of artists, these
solo exhibitions showcase a range of media including film, photography, sculpture, paintings and installation. The International and National Projects will
be on view from October 19, 2008 through January 26, 2009.
P.S.1 has invited Minus Space, a collective based in Brooklyn, New
York, to present an exhibition of Reductive art:
art characterized by minimalism and abstraction in its use of monochromatic
color, geometry, and pattern. As a movement concentrating on abstraction, Minus
Space bucks the trend toward figuration that took hold in the 1990s. For P.S.1,
Minus Space has brought together 54 artists working internationally, ranging
from Australia to Brazil to New
York City, for a dense and playful show in the Café
and Basement Boiler Room, two of the museum's most unique and intriguing
exhibition spaces.
Artists include Soledad Arias, Shinsuke Aso, Marcus Bering, Hartmut Böhm, Richard
Bottwin, Sharon Brant, Michael Brennan, Henry Brown, Vicente Butron, Bibi
Calderaro, Melanie Crader, Mark Dagley, Julian Dashper, Christopher Dean,
Matthew Deleget, Lynne Eastaway, Gabriele Evertz, Daniel Feingold, Kevin
Finklea, Linda Francis, Zipora Fried, Daniel Göttin, Julio Grinblatt, Billy
Gruner, Terry Haggerty, Lynne Harlow, Gilbert Hsiao, Andrew Huston, Simon
Ingram, Inverted Topology, Kyle Jenkins, Mick Johnson, Steve Karlik, Sarah
Keighery, Andrew Leslie, Daniel Levine, Sylvan Lionni, Lotte Lyon, Gerhard
Mantz, Rossana Martinez, Juan Matos Capote, Douglas Melini, Manfred Mohr,
Salvatore Panatteri, Dirk Rathke, Karen Schifano, Analia Segal, Edward Shalala,
Tilman, Li-Trincere, Jan van der Ploeg, Don Voisine, Douglas Witmer, and
Michael Zahn.
Organized by P.S.1 Curatorial
Advisor Phong Bui
Robert Boyd presents Conspiracy Theory, the first
part of his forthcoming project TOMORROW
PEOPLE. A synchronized two-channel video installation, Conspiracy Theory addresses
issues of social paranoia and civil distrust in an era of questionable politics.
The video covers topics from government involvement in the September 11 attacks
to government cover-up of aliens at Area 5l, world domination by the "high
priests of globalization" known as the Bilderberg, human invention of the
HIV/AIDS virus, and the bizarre "reptilian agenda" that reveals
reptilians as rulers of humanity. Incorporating audio and video excerpts from syndicated
radio talk show hosts, international conspiracists, amateur documentary
filmmakers, and the mysterious Commander X, Conspiracy
Theory addresses some of today's leading conspiracies relayed by their most
evocative proponents. Set to a fast-paced dance track, the work functions as
both a critique and parody while raising the question-what if all is not as it
seems?
Robert Boyd (b. 1969) is an
interdisciplinary artist working in the areas of video, installation,
photography and sculpture. His work has been widely exhibited at venues such as
the Sundance Film Festival, Park City, Utah; The Indianapolis Museum of
Contemporary Art, Indianapolis; 303 Gallery, New York; Wesleyan University,
Middletown, Connecticut; Artsonje Center, Seoul; Context Galleries, Derry; The
Hospital, London; PKM Gallery, Beijing; Kunst-Werke, Berlin; Palacio de Bellas
Artes, Mexico City; Participant Inc, New York; Centre de Cultura Contemporània,
Barcelona; White Box, New York; Galerie Chez Valentin, Paris; Smart Project
Space, Amsterdam; The Islip Art Museum, Islip, New York; and Momenta Art,
Brooklyn, New York. His work is included in numerous private and public
collections including the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, New York.
Organized by P.S.1 Curatorial
Advisor Lia Gangitano
New York based photographer Patrick O'Hare presents thirty intimate color prints in the third floor
hallway. Working within the medium of photography, O'Hare documents the
contrast between man-made environment and nature through landscape shots in
which people have largely vanished. He searches in overlooked places like
highway overpasses, construction sites, parking lots and trailer parks with the
intent of creating order out of chaos and upheaval without losing subtlety and
mystery. Influenced by the New Topographic photographers of the 1970s who cast
a critical eye on suburban sprawl, landscape painting, and the novels of Don DeLillo,
O'Hare finds the modern landscape as it is: shards of architecture in a state
of entropic transition and decay.
Patrick O'Hare (b. 1958)
has been exhibiting his photographs since 1987, when he was featured in the
P.S.1 group show Portrait of Long Island
City. O'Hare has participated in exhibitions in such galleries and
institutions as Kirkland Art Center,
Ronald Feldman Gallery, Parsons School of Design, Rotunda Gallery, Sideshow Gallery,
and Black and White Gallery, all in New
York. He has had solo exhibitions at The Camera Club
of New York and O.K. Harris Works of Art,
New York. His photographs are in
the collections of the New York Public Library and the Samuel Dorsky Museum of
Art, New Paltz, New York.
O'Hare is based in New York.
Organized by
P.S.1 Curatorial Advisor Phong Bui
Croatian artist Ana Horvat makes her U.S. debut in the 3rd floor Corner gallery with a 3-channel video installation entitled Before and after. In these video works
the artist performs three different plastic surgery procedures -
a nose correction, liposuction and breast enlargement - on rag
dolls. Using these dolls instead of actual human
bodies, Horvat compares aesthetic interventions with an
innocent childhood game taken too far: adults unhappy with their appearance, a
society obsessed with the ideal of beauty, and patients undergoing physical
aggression and pain to achieve acceptance not only from others,
but from themselves. Also presented in the gallery are jars with
tissue samples and patient statements, all of which add to the subtle and
ironic questioning of the modern phenomenon of plastic surgery.
Ana Horvat (b.
1977, Zagreb, Croatia) has
had solo exhibitions in Karas Gallery, Zagreb (2005
and 2008); Vladimir Nazor Gallery, Zagreb (2004)
and Studentski Centar Gallery, Zagreb
(1999, 2004 and 2008). She has been included in group
exhibitions including Youth Salon, Zagreb
(1996, 2001, 2004 and 2006); the Zagreb Salon (1998) and the Croatian Sculpture
Triennial, Zagreb
(1997 and 2000). Horvat is a member of the Croatian Association of
Visual Artists.
Organized by
P.S.1 Director Alanna Heiss
P.S.1 Newspaper articles referring to this exhibition
Robert Boyd: Conspiracy Countdown