Pure Paper - Rena Bransten Gallery
Long used as a material to write, paint and print upon, Pure Paper looks at the growing practice of artists using paper as a medium. The participating artists subvert the inherent dimensional qualities of the paper medium to create works that are at once both formidable and fragile. Defining the works is elusive, yet they can be described as combinations of sculpture, installation, photography, collage, drawing and prints. Exploring diverse universal themes, each artist exhibits a unique relationship with paper. For example, artists Peter Callesen and Bovey Lee each create cutouts that incorporate both the paper and the negative space to create ethereal imagery. Kathleen Henderson’s wax and paper pulp sculptures reveal the craft of the “artist’s hand” while also creating a sense of myth and mystery. Works from Julia Goodman’s “Amanuensis Series” play with the notion of printmaking by creating wood casts of enlarged letters found in the library archive of a small coastal town, enlarging the script and the history of one woman’s newfound role as the town scribe. Gregory Euclide’s three-dimensional wall pieces reinterpret two-dimensional landscape paintings, while Paul Hayes and Claire Jackel each use paper to create large scale structural installations with individual pieces of paper. Amparo Sard uses a form of pointillism to create small works of paper consisting of thousands of pinholes resulting in intricate imagery that can only be described as pixilated. Vik Muniz recreates iconic black and white photographs out of strips of paper then re-photographs them to expose our perceptional limitations. All the artists expand our awareness of the possibilities of a piece of paper beyond its prescribed role.