“Wisdom was the feeling for what is high, great, broad, sharp, even, heavy, bright, light, colorful . . . Wisdom was the feeling for an essentially shared reality, for the mystical, for the indeterminate indeterminable, for the greatest determinacy of all . . . but art is reality, and the reality we share must assert itself beyond all particularity.” Hans Arp, Introduction to a Catalogue
Hans Arp discusses particularity as the concept that the reality of art must push past. The work in Able Baker’s Shift does just this. A shared reality becomes skewed, distorted, through each piece. Each work acts as a window into its own reality, yet the combination of the work forms new connections between what is illusion and what is real. Animals with stringy hair covered in a resin-like substance, covered in shiny material that flows down onto the platform they stand on; a Carl D’Alvia sculpture sits in front of a large, rectangular surface, gleaming, showing two nude human-figures-turned-trees dancing to the sides of a tweaking out, concave screen being struck by lighting. An Emilie Stark-Menneg painting stands firm and commands the room by captivating the viewer with color and movement. The linework continues to Elise Ferguson’s shifting colorful works that both echo the Stark-Menneg piece and voice their own action. The work in Able Baker’s Shift, curated by Tracy McKenna, speaks to movement, shape, line and color in ways that captivate and motivate connection between fractured realities. Charged palettes, alluring mark making and content provoke an experience of visual struggle to conform, but also to rebel.
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