Soloway is pleased to present:It's Not You It's Me,
Caitlin Keogh, Boru O’Brien O’Connelll and Graham Collins
organized by Paul BrancaJuly 30- August 7, 2011
Opening Reception: Saturday, July 30, 6-8 pm
Gallery hours: Saturday and Sunday 12-5 pmWhen a subject presents itself as inspiration, the artist often asks: is this for me? Can this become mine? This exhibition considers the declaration of the individual through working with or for others, i.e. artists, employers, or more abstract experiences: those of style or memory. Each artist here presents us with their own transference of personal experience into authored object.
Caitlin Keogh creates delicate and detailed paintings that meander between Bargello needle point patterns and early Modernist paintings, in conjunction with skills she picked up working as an artist’s assistant Keogh states, “the paintings combine techniques I learned from artist's I've worked for; Cameron Martin, Lucy McKenzie, Cheyney Thompson, Wayne Gonzales, with the addition of every drawing-job skill, making technical drawings of handbags, shoes, buildings, embroidery for throw-pillows, and jewelry. I think about time when I make them, and I think about lettering (repetition, steadiness) and information.”
Boru O’Brien O’Connell creates an abstract dialogue with his past reading of Malcom Lowry’s semi-autobiographical novel Under the Volcano, and questions just why is it that these specific objects are pointed out by the protagonist, a certain Geoffrey Firmin. The images Firmin notices are then reified as black and white photographic prints and are displayed alongside a blurry video of a page from the novel’s text. Why memories of these images? These photographs function as concrete facts present for close observation. His re-working of Lowry’s text is a way to over-focus on somewhat blurry memories, first read by O’Brien O’Connell 5 years ago.
Graham Collins recycles materials from past exhibitions at his job at Lower East Side’s Untitled gallery. The detritus of left behind stones and boxes, display units and ephemera, base materials once authored by exhibiting gallery artists, reappear as elements in dialogue with his own pieces. Collins re-claims these constituent parts as his own materials that are simultaneously ‘found’ and worked for. Their past value is now re-assigned and in merging with his own specific materials he creates his own visual language.+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
Caitlin Keogh was born in Spenard, Alaska in 1982, and is currently living and working in Brussels, Belgium. In 2010 Keogh made a work in collaboration with Graham Anderson at 179 Canal, NY, which was later included in the group exhibition 179 Canal/Anyways, at White Columns, NY. Recent shows include Town Gown Conflict, 2011, organized by Lucy McKenzie at the Kunsthalle Zurich, in Zurich, Switzerland, and Wallpaperism, 2011, at the Motel Campo, in Geneva, Switzerland.
Boru O'Brien O'Connell was born in Geneva, Ohio, in 1979, and is currently living in Brooklyn, New York. He works independently and collaboratively with photography, writing, film, video, and sound. Recent and upcoming projects include 'State Changes' with Justin Lieberman, for the online magazine Triple Canopy, 'And Lose the Name of Action', a work-in-progress residency at The Walker Center for the Arts in collaboration with dance company Miguel Gutierrez and the Powerful People, (currently unnamed) at Night Gallery in Los Angeles, and More Information Has been Transmitted via the Telegraph, at LaMontagne Gallery, Boston.
Graham Collins was born in 1980 in Washington DC and lives and works in Brooklyn, New York. His sculptural works are often made from a wide range of materials. He is currently participating in two group shows: [back room], at Untitled, NY, and Perfectly Damaged, organized by Isaac Lyles, at Derek Eller Gallery, also in NY.
