EXHIBITIONS ARTISTS
Richelle Gribble which a Nova Plex™-doused photograph of the LA skyline seamlessly flows into an acrylic rendering of the same buildings. The half-glaze/photo, halfacrylic result is sensuous and surreal, an apotheosis of textural experimentation; at its best, this practice does not only affect the viewer viscerally, but also offers a peak into an improvisatory, organic artistic process. Nevertheless, Richelle isn’t just a progressive, experimental technician – she also takes pride in her firm conceptual direction. She describes her work as consistently exploring two extremes: intimately personal subjects and macrocosmic perspectives. Taken in whole, Richelle’s oeuvre selflessly invites the viewer into her most private, emotional experiences, while simultaneously forcing the viewer to consider those experiences from an incredibly distant perspective. Often, this is achieved through scale; works like the Tackle Box series (which assembles memories and personal artifacts of Richelle’s late father) and her aforementioned Motion series are executed on almost miniature surfaces (9 x 7 in. wood panels). These presentations seem to beg the viewer to carefully remove the petite panels from the gallery wall, rest each one in her hand and meditatively consume the images. Contrastingly, her more recent exhibitions, Parts per Million and From Neuron to Network Society, have featured predominately large-scale works that deal with expansive ideas. Of her latest series, Richelle shares: I find myself increasingly disinterested with representing the individual molecule, particle, or person; those entities must be defined through collective interactions, however chaotic those interactions may be. Indeed, the individual consistently becomes dwarfed by both the scale and density of these pieces… Ultimately, it is my goal that the viewer becomes lost in these systems, drawn in by the vivid colors and labyrinthine lines, until her own individuality has become a consequence of her surroundings. The imposing and vibrating System V exemplifies this ethos; its overwhelming scale and pulsating rhythms hypnotize the viewer, forcing her to call into question her place within a complex network. A similar phenomenon occurs in A Tribute to Betsy Ross, 1777, wherein the separation provided by an aerial perspective renders each landscape abstract, foreign, and increasingly mammoth in relation to the viewer. All this is to say that Richelle’s work consistently expresses something poignant about the existential loneliness of your average modern human being. It seems that the summation of her technical prowess and conceptual strength is an ability to sincerely confront the plight of the individual within the context of an increasingly fractured and chaotic reality, all without resorting to the sort of irony and irreverence that has become commonplace in today’s art world. Whether it’s through a portal into a private moment or a prodigious rendering of a complex system, Richelle’s work offers each viewer a unique opportunity to confront the most essential questions about what it is that defines the human experience. ACA More about Richelle Gribble can be found online at richelle-gribble.com
Artists
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