Kim Beck
Martyn Blundell
Zlatko Cosic
Sarah McKenzie
Michael A. Salter
Gregory Thielker
February 5 – March 5, 2011
Opening Reception: Saturday, February 5, 2011 – 6:30pm – 9:30pm
The show Drive By at Project 4 Gallery features six artists whose drawings, paintings, collages, and video art offer unexpected insight into the common scenes we observe while moving through the structures of an urban and suburban landscape. People play a periphery role in the artwork and are frequently absent altogether. The material objects that encapsulate our urban lifestyle take on subtle psychological, emotional, and spiritual characteristics. Mundane landscapes and ordinary object are transformed by the artist into quiet reflections of the intangible structures that form the individual experience in a Western culture. The featured artists Kim Beck, Martyn Blundell, Zlatko Cosic, Sarah McKenzie, Michael A. Salter, and Gregory Thielker take different approaches to explore what we miss when driving by seemly unimportant landscapes, too trivial for our conscious recognition or attention. Kim Beck creates cut paper collages from silhouette drawings of ubiquitous tree island found in suburban parking lots, transforming islands into forests. Martyn Blundell weaves video of highways in Europe and the U.S. into stunning visual abstraction challenging the viewer’s sense of perspective, speed, and time. Zlatko Cosic touches on themes of freedom and privacy in a surveillance style video that using the politically charged Berlin Wall as the portal. Sarah McKenzie uses geometric abstraction in oil and acrylic paintings of suburban sprawl construction sites. Distinct moments of visual rupture reveal cracks in the suburban American dream. Michael A. Salter‘s digital drawings and animations use subtle humor to explore themes of isolation in suburbia by observing the daily activities of urban wildlife amongst seemingly unoccupied homes. Gregory Thielker‘s oil paintings distort the world observed through a car window. Water running down the windshield abstracts the viewpoint and creates a sense of tension between fixed orientation and implied mobility.
For additional information please contact: Brittany Lawrence Yam
DIRECTIONS AND INFORMATION :
Project 4
| Contact: | 1353 U Street NW, 3rd floor, Washington, DC 20009 tel: 202 232 4340 info@project4gallery.com |
| Website: | http://www.project4gallery.com/ |
| Hours: | Wednesday – Saturday 12:00 – 6:00 pm, and by appointment. |
| Map: | See our location on Google Map (We are located at the intersection of 14th Street and U street NW). |
| Metro Access: | Project 4 is easily accessible by metro. We are located one block west of the green line U St/African-American Civil War Memorial/Cardozo metro station, 13th Street exit. |