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JEDEDIAH CAESAR AND CHRIS LIPOMI
Jedediah Caesar: Rozoj
LA><ART Gallery One
September 7 – October 19, 2013
Opening reception: Saturday, September 7th from 6-8pm
For his exhibition at LA><ART, Jedediah Caesar continues to explore the shifting significations that we apply to organic material and manmade objects. For this, Caesar’s imprinted resin sculptures have been arrayed according to attributes and placed into taxonomic containers as though they were excavated artifacts being readied for preservation. Each combination of multiples references the found and the petrified object. Though distinct, each mirrors the other, like a fossil uncovered in a dried seabed. Individual boxes, too, function as artificial collections while they mimic geological fragments. In this sense, the particles are metaphors for California’s variegated landscape and terrain. The group is an analog or archive of the topography that Caesar occasionally enters for inspiration, and the figments of those places that he creates as installations in galleries. Each box presents an inimitable composition. The painterly quality of each comes from uncommon sources.
These “non-sites” suggesting sorted piles or bundles of cargo, do not construct so much as they accumulate objects. They investigate material qualities and privilege distance through ambiguous forms. In this new work, the artist has been experimenting with materials such as spices. Materiality and process are paramount to Caesar’s practice. He thinks of this as a collapse or entanglement between material and object. The work masquerades as artifact, conflating notions of time and signification. On his investigation into currency around the globe, and how currency marks ideals and identities of nations, the artist remarks: “it is the authority of their form not their sovereignty that I am interested in.”
Part of Caesar’s inspiration is Insulo de la Rozoj, a micronation built in 1967 on a platform in the Adriatic Sea, which introduced the image of its planned currency on stamps without reaching implementation. Using this as a point of departure, Caesar envisions the pelagic currency lost in time and offers prototypes that could be utilized by future micronations.
Los Angeles based artist Jedediah Caesar received an MFA from the University of California Los Angeles in 2001 and a BFA from the School of the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston in 1998. Recent solo exhibitions include out where the stones grow like roses at Susanne Vielmetter Projects, Los Angeles; Platform 9 at the DeCordova Museum and Sculpture Park in Lincoln, MA; Soft Structures at the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston and / ALBATROSS / BADGERS / CHIMPS / DINO / EMPIRE / EXTENSOR / FENCE / GOLDEN / GRANITE HILL / HEAVENS / INSIGNIFICANT / LARK / MR. TUX / ORANGE PEEL /PURPS / RAMPA / SWINGLES / THIN SPOT / UPSHOT / WHITE KNIGHT / YELLOW PAINT / ZIPPER / at D’Amelio Terras, New York. Caesar’s work has been included in the Whitney Biennial, Whitney Museum of American Art, New York, and in exhibitions at the Fundament Foundation, Tilburg, Netherlands; the “California Biennial 2008”, Orange County Museum of Art, Newport Beach, CA, the Saatchi Gallery, London, UK; Dallas Contemporary, Dallas, TX, University of California, Los Angeles’ Armand Hammer Museum, Los Angeles, New Museum of Contemporary Art, New York; and Los Angeles Contemporary Exhibitions, Los Angeles. Among others, Caesar’s work is in the collection of the Saatchi Gallery in London; the Los Angeles County Museum of Art; and the New Museum in New York. Caesar previously produced the Gleaner Stone for LA><ART’s Public Art Initiative in 2008.
About Glow
LA><ART is proud to be a Glow Network Partner and sponsor for Jedediah Caesar's Glow 2013 project. Please join LA><ART at Glow on September 28, 2013 on the Santa Monica beach (glowsantamonica.org). In the context of Glow, Jedediah Caesar will extend his research on the issue of currency and create a site-specific performative and participatory installation on the beach.
Chris Lipomi: Clothed Ascension
LA><ART Gallery Two
September 7 – October 19, 2013
Opening reception: Saturday, September 7th from 6-8pm
Clothed Ascension is focused on a clothing line designed by Roy Halston Frowick (1932–1990).
Known simply as Halston, the fashion icon helped popularize the glitz and glamour behind Studio 54 in midtown Manhattan in the 1970s. In an unexpected midcareer move in the early 1980s, Halston teamed with the department store J.C. Penney to launch a collection. Departing from his designs for some of the world’s leading fashion houses, Halston III was unique for its blend of signature couture in a populist format. The collection was a visionary yet misguided business venture that ultimately flopped. With the reassuring tagline “You’re looking smarter than ever,” Halston III made haute couture available to the masses and promised social mobility. It was a prototype for the merchandising collaborations churned out today between celebrities and designers at the apex of their careers and mega-corporations.
Chris Lipomi’s latest exhibition focuses on the democratic approach to fashion developed by Halston. For LA><ART Lipomi presents an inspired and artistically warped version of what Halston offered to the business-minded woman of the 1980s. This trip back in time recovers the polyester curtains, teardrop perfume bottles, advertisements made in collaboration with Andy Warhol and a facsimile of a Halston III mail catalog. As the star who furnished disco-age styles, the project considers how Halston unwittingly marked the limits of decadence in the mainstream later in his career.
About LA><ART
Founded in 2005, LA><ART is a leading independent nonprofit contemporary art space in Los Angeles, committed to the production of experimental exhibitions and public art initiatives. Responding to Los Angeles’ cultural climate, LA><ART produces and presents new work for all audiences and offers the public access to the next generation of artists and curators. LA><ART supports challenging work, reflecting the diversity of the city and stimulates conversations on contemporary art in Los Angeles, fostering dynamic relationships between art, artists and their audiences. Since 2005, LA><ART has produced and commissioned over 200 exhibitions, public initiatives, and projects.
LA><ART is preparing to launch its Vision Campaign including The Occasional – a city wide exhibition and public art initiative. This platform for LA continues the organization’s ongoing commitment to supporting artistic and curatorial freedom while focusing on commissioning new work in experimental contexts.
LA><ART’s programs are produced with generous support from Larry Mathews and Brian Saliman, Glow and the City of Santa Monica, Christopher Yin and John Yoon. Special thanks to Mark Sandelson and Renegade Flooring.
A special thanks to Marc Pally and Jessica Cusick.
LA><ART is located at 2640 S. La Cienega Blvd. Los Angeles, CA 90034
T.310.559.0166 F.310.559.0167 www.laxart.org
LA><ART is open Tuesday through Saturday 11am – 6pm
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