Exhibition “Fictitious Truths”
Arte Institute suggests: Fictitious Truths at Rooster Gallery.
Fictitious Truths: Curated by Kara L. Rooney
Rooster Gallery, 190 ORCHARD STREET, NYC
Exhibition Dates: October 25 – December 2, 2012
Featured artists include: Eric Doeringer, Carol Hepper, Sarah McDougald
Kohn, Liz Nielsen, Ryan Roa, Henry Sanchez and Arlene Shechet.
In 1943, employed as a dive-bomber for the German military, Joseph
Beuys was shot down by Russian flak in a snowstorm over the Crimea
region–and one of the art world’s greatest fictions was born. Indeed,
throughout history, the cloak and dagger of illusion has reigned in the
world of art. In the momentary slippage between image/text, the
slightest shift of a frame, or the interaction of subject with object, a
world of possibilities presents itself.
In probing the limits of visibility we have found that most things are
in fact, unseen. As we feel for it in shadows and hidden corners,
reality tauntingly leers back at us. How we choose to answer that
challenge is both an exercise in personal fortitude and creative
flexibility. Such action’s residual objects, the fleeting anchors of a
distant reality, are those of another world – one where the organic
fuses with the mechanical, nature and technology coalesce and fact
irreparably merges with fiction. The works in _Fictitious Truths_ live
within that intermediary space, in its flexibility, subjectivity and
potential for alternatives. Culling from a variety of mediums–sculpture
and photography, video and installation–the conceptual nature of the
work presented examines such topics as the exploration of personal
identity, the analysis of consumer culture (and by extension the art
market), and the re-creation of political histories. It is not only the
blurring of space and time that interests these artists but also the
notion of shifting focus–from what we perceive to be around us to what
is actually present–for if we are destined to fumble ceaselessly in the
dark, a flashlight is always a good idea.
_-Kara L. Rooney_