LA><ART IS PLEASED TO PRESENT A NEW PROJECT BY LOS ANGELES-BASED ARTIST KELLY BARRIE, A NEWLY COMMISSIONED FILM BY TERRY CHATKUPT, AND A NEW BILLBOARD PROJECT BY KATE COSTELLO.

KELLY BARRIE: NEGATIVE CAPABILITY

LA><ART GALLERY ONE

LA><ART is pleased to present a new project by Los Angeles-based artist Kelly Barrie. Inspired by the junkyard playground in London where the artist played as a child, Negative Capability is inspired by the 1959 Declaration of the Rights of the Child (which was amended to the Universal Human Civil Rights Declaration of 1948) that states: 

“The child shall have full opportunity for play and recreation, which should be directed to the same purposes as education; society and the public authorities shall endeavour to promote the enjoyment of this right.”

Despite its passage in 1959, this Declaration did not become legally binding until 1989.  As a result, this particular right that guarantees free self-directed open space play would ultimately find concrete expression between the 1960's-1980’s with the emergence of junkyard playgrounds and other non-authoritarian play spaces such as adventure playgrounds. Today, due to real estate demands and increasing gentrification, the adventure playground has all but vanished in the US, though they remain popular in Europe. 

Barrie’s series of leaning photos/drawings recreate the archetypal components of the historic junkyard playgrounds, such as a reclaimed sewer pipe and rope ladder. The framed photographs are installed in such a way that they convey a sense of idle transition--as if they could be picked up and moved to a different corner of the room. The exhibition title, Negative Capability, refers to a literary concept introduced by poet John Keats that is rooted in the idea that a state of idle receptivity is a means for observing the truth. The manner in which Barrie’s photographs and drawings are installed in the gallery reflect the impermanence of the playground’s components, further evoking a sense of idle transition. For the artist, the gestures conveyed in his photographs address the tension of free versus fixed play.  In this case, Barrie’s reconstituted adventure playground will allow for the viewer to abandon the constraints of an existing social order; generating a platform to explore and “actively do nothing,” much like a child at play.

Kelly Barrie was born in 1973 in London, England and currently lives and works in Los Angeles, CA. Kelly Barrie received his BFA in 1996 from Hobart College, Geneva, NY, and his MFA in 1997 from the California Institute of the Arts in Valencia, CA. He is a 1998 graduate of the Whitney Independent Study Program. Barrie’s photography has been exhibited at the 2008 Biennale of Sydney, Australia and the 2008 California Biennial. He’s had solo shows at Miller Durazo Fine Arts and Angstrom Gallery, Los Angeles, CA. His work has also been presented in numerous group exhibitions in various venues including Sikkema Jenkins & Co., New York, NY; Queen’s Nails Projects, San Francisco, CA; Artists Space, New York, NY; and the Museo Alejandro Otero, Caracas, Venezuela. He is a recipient of the Durfee Artist Completion Grant.

TERRY CHATKUPT: TRANSFERASE

LA><ART Gallery Two

LA><ART is pleased to present a newly commissioned short film by Los Angeles-based artist Terry Chatkupt. Stemming from the artist’s interest in physical landscapes and the materialization of history and memory in the built environment, Chatkupt’s new film, Transferase, marks a distinctive shift in the artist’s interrogations of the experiential dimensions of space and place. Inspired by the 1989 apocalyptic cult thriller, Miracle Mile (written and directed by Steve De Jarnatt), Transferase is the artist’s first film to engage the specificities of Los Angeles as both a city-space and an urban imaginary. Echoing the significant theoretical contributions of urban scholars and theorists like Kevin Lynch, Mary Jane Jacobs, Norman Klein, and Mike Davis amongst others, Chatkupt provides a cinematic reconfiguration of Los Angeles’ cartography as a situational, corporeal, and phenomenological account. The film portrays a protagonist overwhelmed with anxiety after receiving a disturbing phone call. What proceeds is a sequence of small events that operate as a psychological excavation, unveiling the rapidly changing and unstable characteristics of both the protagonist and the LA landscape. Although seen as a narrative film, Transferase is experimental in structure, juxtaposing a dynamic mix of cinematic techniques often mobilized in the thriller and dark comedy genres. This process allows Chatkupt’s film to adhere to the story’s surreal nature while simultaneously provoking a destabilizing the viewer, speaking to the anxiety and ecology of fear that have positioned Los Angeles historically and theoretically.

Terry Chatkupt’s work focuses on myriad subjects including nostalgia, self-reflection, and cultural disparity.  Using video and installation, the artist creates scenarios in which processes of memory are investigated through repetition of saturated images.  Chatkupt received his MFA from CalArts in 2004.  In 2003 he attended the Skowhegan School of Painting and Sculpture artist residency program.  His videos, installations, and photography have been exhibited at The Museum of Modern Art (MoMA), Seattle Art Museum, PDX Film Fest 2008, Art Basel Miami Beach Video Lounge 2007, Harris Lieberman (NYC), and Los Angeles Contemporary Exhibitions.  Recent exhibitions include Video Review at Jerome Zodo Contemporary (Milan, Italy) and Never Very Far Apart at the Gallery at REDCAT (LA).   Terry Chatkupt lives and works in Los Angeles, CA.

KATE COSTELLO: THE LONER  2006/2010

LA><ART Billboard

LA><ART is pleased to present a new billboard project by Los Angeles-based artist Kate Costello. Costello's billboard features a still from The Loner, 2006/2010, a video set in the Okeefenokee swamp that follows the form of an archetypal story of a drifter as he comes into a small town. The drifter character is featured on this month's LA><ART public billboard on La Cienega Blvd. facing north between Washington Blvd. and Venice. LA><ART's Public Art Initiatives expand our mission of bringing new art to new audiences by interrogating models of public art exhibition in Los Angeles. 

Kate Costello was born in Newfane, Vermont, 1974. She received her MFA from the University of Southern California in 2003. Costello is known for artwork that explores the subject-object relationship of sculpture and background flatwork, recently expanding from the figurative into abstraction. Selected exhibitions include: THING: New Sculpture from Los Angeles, Hammer Museum, Los Angeles, CA; Kadist Foundation in Paris, France and Making Do, curated by Robert Storr and Sam Messer at Green Gallery, Yale University School of Art, New Haven, CT. Solo exhibitions include Cockaigne, Redling Fine Art, Los Angeles, CA; and Tattood Ladies, Wallspace, New York, NY.

ABOUT LA><ART

Celebrating its 5th Anniversary in 2010, LAXART is the 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, LAXART produces and presents new work for all audiences and offers the public access to the next generation of artists and curators. LAXART 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. LAXART has produced and commissioned over 100 projects in five years.

LA><ART’s programs are made possible with the generous support of the Andy Warhol Foundation for the Visual Arts, Danielson Foundation, the G.L. Waldorf Family Fund, City of Los Angeles Department of Cultural Affairs, Eve Steele and Peter Gelles.

Terry Chatkupt: Transferase is made possible with generous support from the James Irvine Foundation.

The exhibition is made possible with additional support from Curators Council Linda Maggard and Margaret Morgan, and the Pasadena Art Alliance.