Retrograde Motion & TBA
Benjamin Evans
Peter Drysdale
Dates Showing: November 11th - December 20th, 2001
Benjamin Evans explores issues of nostalgia, high and low art, and the myth of the artist in his new exhibition Retrograde Motion. Using old, abandoned paintings found in The Salvation Army and Value Village, Evans performs a "treatment" of them, either integrating them into a new canvas or painting directly on top of the original. The purchased paintings are often mass-produced or mechanically dictated paint-by-numbers, and by integrating them with an authentic, one-of-a-kind work by a "real" artist, the distinction between high and low art becomes seriously problematic. To highlight this absurd situation, Evans will use a strict formula to put a price tag on the work: purchase price multiplied by one hundred. Thus a paint-by-numbers originally selling for $1.99 is now $199, and a painting received for free is still free. Evans hopes that during his exhibition some of the works will re-appear at The Salvation Army, where the public can make purchases.
Peter Drysdale builds his works entirely out of recyclable materials such as scrap metal, tires, plastics and car parts. Protesting their unnecessary disposal, he reuses "scrap" materials in impressive, amusing, machine-like sculptures. The works are simultaneously seductive and jarring, bringing to light both our fascination with machines and our industrial wastefulness.
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