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Email PageNecrophilia
December 16, 2006- January 20, 2007
Reception: December 16, 6:00 pm - 8:00 pm
Seth Johnson, Tim Maxwell
Rare
521 W 26th StRARE is pleased to announce Necrophiliac, an exhibition of drawings by Seth Johnson and Tim Maxwell.
Seth Johnson’s tightly rendered pencil drawings conflate symbols into prejudice, and prejudice into conspiracy. Even though Johnson is never so obvious as to refer to this propulsive and manipulative force by name, he certainly offers enough evidence to bring its analogue or alter ego – widespread cultural complicity – to trial and ensure conviction. The way in which these marvelous drawings are gathered and arranged formally questions how sequence affects significance. Have our ideas of randomness or chance been manipulated into an excuse for reality to discriminate? Do cultural institutions (of which we are all a part) regulate both cause and effect? If so, then are we not living in a paranoiac’s worst nightmare?
Tim Maxwell’s monumental pen drawings take art history for their starting point. From a distance of several feet, each looms imposingly as a studied reproduction in a way that demands reverence. On closer inspection, Maxwell’s line, which at first appears serious and obedient, now carouses across the paper as absentmindedly as doodles in the margins of a phone book. Instead of an act of betrayal or a sign of defacement, Maxwell’s line rejuvenates the worship and hushed awe of art history with the beautifully bad temper of tattoo art. Furthermore, Maxwell suggests a rather erotic relationship that the body has to the paper, so that distortions become flourishes, and escape hatches become environments of eternal sustenance.
Books and DVDs related to artists in this show
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