KATHLEEN WHITE – (A) RAKE’S PROGRESS
2014-08-18The exhibition, (A) Rake’s Progress, is comprised of the complete polymorphichrome drawings produced by Ms. White outdoors in the summer of 2009. The cycle of pastels on paper, a progression numbering 71 works, were created in remembrance of Ms. White’s late brother Chris White.
Chris’s suicide of 2007 was unreconcilable. Gripped by the shadow of loss, I spent a year studying the colors in my Ludlow Street courtyard —the wild garden was transformed from a derelict garbage heap by Rafael and myself. Knowing also that the garden would soon be lost to the high rents plaguing our city -as “the lost decade”, “the fear decade”, “the greed decade” turned 9 -this physical exploration of color through its endless grinding, its proliferating combinations and intense contact onto the page is at once a stance of grace and defiance against the all the world’s insults.
The “glut” of information which prevails over the pursuit of knowledge and feeling in modern times is of particular distress to Ms. White who often utilizes the phrase, “Get out of the way, hobo!” to refer to the state of our present culture’s pervasive, implosive, subtly celebrated, corrosion of empathy. As in the artist’s earlier installations over the past three decades this presentation is in keeping with Ms. White’s practice of creating spaces of reverence, connection and love.
The choice of the pastels was made during a conversation with Mr. Sánchez, “I want this to be an installation of color and sound.” The two artists who have collaborated on numerous acclaimed projects looked to this body of work that has lain dormant for five years. The inclination toward sound comes from a more recent body of work by Ms. White, Sound Texts, which will be represented by the recorded sounds of her instrument of choice during their production: the typewriter.
Exhibition runs through to August 31st, 2014
Momenta Art
56 Bogart Street
Brooklyn
New York
NY
11211
