Paper: burned, cut, folded, and stitched

Paper: Burned, Cut, Folded, and Stitched Presented By Bryant Street Gallery

“The invention and subsequent use of paper date back to the Han dynasty in China (206 BC). Once a very expensive material, paper is affordable when compared to linen, canvas, panel and many sculptural materials. The artists participating in this show reach beyond the traditional role of paper as a neutral surface considering its potential for expressive, provocative and visually striking work; it’s burned, cut, folded and stitched, expanding the boundaries of paper’s traditional use. “ Excerpt from Curator’s essay (last page) Tracey Adams

Paper: Burned, Cut, Folded, and Stitched Group Show Exhibiting Artists Tracey Adams Michael Bucemi Karen Margolis Jenene Nagy Cecil Touchon

OPENING RECEPTION Friday April 8

2016

6PM-8PM

BRYANT STREET GALLERY 532 Bryant St

Palo Alto, CA

www.bryantstreet.com

Tracey Adams

Tracey Adams has been an exhibiting artist for more than 30 years. She has participated in over 150 solo and group exhibitions in the United States and internationally, including solo museum shows at the Monterey Museum of Art, Fresno Art Museum and the Santa Cruz Museum of Art and History. Her work is included in the collections of the Bakersfield Art Museum, Crocker Museum, Hunterdon Art Museum, Monterey Museum of Art, Fresno Art Museum, Tucson Art Museum and Santa Barbara Museum of Art. Her work was featured in Encaustic Art: the complete guide to creating fine art with wax, Lissa Rankin, Watson-Gupthill, 2010, and Paper + Wax, Techniques in Handmade Paper and Encaustic, Michelle Belto, North Light Books, 2012. She is the recipient of several awards, including a 2015 Pollock-Krasner Grant, an Artist’s Grant from the US Department of State, an Artist’s Grant from the Ministry of Culture, Slovak Republic and an Artist’s Grant from the Community Foundation of the Monterey Peninsula.

FOLDED-January 9, 2015 Pigmented beeswax, silk thread on Kitakata 32x38 (above/right) FOLDED-August 24, 2014 Pigmented beeswax, silk thread on Kitakata 33x35 (left)

Winter Ink and collage on paper 56x48

Michael Buscemi For the past 14 years Michael has been working in the studio environment creating and developing an ever-permutating body of work while still maintaining a distinctive style. Buscemi’s work has become part of collections throughout the Bay Area, New York and Europe, including several monumental size commissioned murals stateside and abroad. His studio process has been chronicled in a documentary by independent filmmaker, Peter Miller. The film followed the creation of “The Sun & The Moon,” a vast and appropriately atmospheric oil on canvas. The ability to alter, mold, and defy mediums is the spark of inspiration that Michael Bucemi finds crucial to his process in these works. He has always found himself drawn to intricate layering in his work as he tried to find new ways to fill the spaces between. Buscemi feels that artist’s strength is in their unity and has actively sought to unite local Bay Area artists through curating group shows.

A detailed shot of Buscemi’s Winter (left)

Mazarine Watercolor, gouache, thread, map fragments on Abaca 14x11

Morass (left), Found (right) Watercolor, gouache, thread, map fragments on Abaca 14x11

Karen Margolis Karen’s work has been exhibited at Zurcher Salon in Paris, France, and in a collaboration with M Missoni in New York City through Garis and Hahn. Selected group exhibitions include the Aldrich Museum of Contemporary Art, the Hunterdon Art Museum, Weatherspoon Art Museum, Garis and Hahn, Schema Projects, McKenzie Fine Art and Josee Bienvenu Gallery. In 2015 she was nominated for an Anonymous was a Woman award. She received a Pollock-Krasner Foundation Grant and a workspace residency at Dieu Donne Papermill. Margolis' work is represented in public and private collections and has been featured in international and domestic press, including articles in Womens Wear Daily, ROOMS 16: Superluminal, Inspirational issue 4 and Interalia Magazine's September 2015 issue. Her work has appeared on the cover of an Italian Fashion Publication, Zoomonfashiontrends. Margolis received a BS in Psychology from Colorado State University and a certificate in Microscopy from the New York Microscopical Society and currently resides in New York City.

Jenene Nagy Jenene Nagy is a visual artist living and working in the Inland Empire. She received her BFA from the University of Arizona n 1998 and her MFA from the University of Oregon in 2004. Nagy’s work has been exhibited nationally and internationally at venues including the Portland Art Museum, Weatherspoon Art Museum, Torrance Art Museum, Takt Kunstprojektraum in Berlin Germany, and Dam Stuhltrager in NY, among others. Her work has been recognized with grants and awards from the Foundation of Contemporary art, the Oregon Arts Commission, Colorado Creative Industries and the Ford Family Foundation.

Along with rigorous studio practice, Nagy is one half of the curatorial team TILT Export, an independent art initiative with no fixed location, working in partnership with a variety of venues to produce exhibitions. Currently Nagy serves on the board of ART PAPERS magazine and is the Visiting Assistant Professor of Painting at the University of California, Riverside.

Older then Host 5 (right) Graphite on folded paper 26x20 Older than Host 2 (left) Graphite on folded paper 20x20 Older than Host 3 (below) Graphite on folded paper 21x21.5

fs3548ct14 (left), fs3553ct14 (right) Mixed media and collage on paper 7.25x5

A detailed shot of Touchon’s fs3553ct14 (Top right)

Cecil Touchon

Cecil Touchon is a multifaceted and prolific artist well known for his collage art but also known as a poet, painter, visual poet, writer, publisher, theorist, curator and museum director.

He approaches his collage art like a visual diary. Touchon’s art employs the use of chance aesthetics and serendipitous discovery. Highly intuitive and improvisational, Touchon masterfully works out his compositions like a jazz musician composing in the moment in response to the materials he works with. His collages have influenced the work of many artists, and have been included in private and public collections around the globe. Touchon’s works are included in the permanent collections of the Museum of Modern Art, New York, NY, the Museum of Contemporary Art, Chicago, IL, the Tate Modern, London, UK, The Getty Research Institute, Los Angeles, CA, the Walker Art Center, Minneapolis, MN, the Fogg Museum of Art Archive, Cambridge, MA, Archivo Francesco Conz, Verona Italy, and the Glasgow School of Art Library, UK.

fs3112ct11-book Collage on paper 9x9

Paper: burned, cut, folded, and stitched Curator’s Essay

Tracey Adams As far back as I can remember, I’ve loved working with paper– from my first folded Origami animals to the work I’m currently doing. The invention and subsequent use of paper date back to the Han dynasty in China (206 BC). Once a very expensive material, paper is affordable when compared to linen, canvas, panel and many sculptural materials. The artists participating in this show reach beyond the traditional role of paper as a neutral surface considering its potential for expressive, provocative and visually striking work; it’s burned, cut, folded and stitched, expanding the boundaries of paper’s traditional use. The artists use mat board, Abaca paper, washi and printed materials as well as their own computer-generated images to achieve and communicate their intention.

Karen Margolis, New York based, finds inspiration in the Enso, Japanese for circle. It’s connection to Zen Buddhism, embodying infinity and perfection is her starting point as she focuses and reinterprets the circle in its positive and negative space, connecting body to mind. Her investigation of the mind’s operations, as it records internal monologues, results in an exploration of the patterns created by various states of feeling. This bringing together of science and art creates “connective tissue between the universe and the microscopic”. Burning paper allows Karen to work through any obsessive thoughts and painful moments as she exposes the layers underneath her fragments of collaged maps, many of which have been lost in the layering process. She paints with gouache, watercolor, often adding map fragments and thread to the surface of her beautifully magical work. Karen shows her work in New York at Garis and Hahn and is the recipient of several grants and awards including a Pollock-Krasner Grant.

Papercutting dates from 6th century Xingjiang China, with the first cut out being a symmetrical form. Many of the early paper cuts were associated with family life, decorative arts, holidays and ceremonies. Michael Buscemi, Bay Area based, creates large paper installations of monochromatic collages in which he cuts and layers thick white paper. “ The white collages came to me in a quest to eliminate all existing media, leaving only light, shape and shadow. I strive to make them undulate and allow the forms to remain organic, yet suggestive. ” While nature is his inspiration, he prefers to leave the interpretation to the viewer. Historically, his work references 18th century marble bas-reliefs. “In order to capture light, as the sun casts on everything that exists in nature, I’m adding back lit reflective hues to create warmth and light”. Michael is represented by K. Imperial Fine Art and Bryant Street Gallery in the Bay Area and Ann Connelly fine Art in Baton Rouge.

Collage is a process that perhaps had its origins in China, but came to full prominence in the 20th century with the work of Picasso, Braque and many of the German Expressionists. Collage, comes from the French word, coller, meaning to glue). Cecil Touchon is an artist living in Santa Fe, New Mexico. He’s best known for his collage work, but is also a poet, writer, painter and curator/director of the International Museum of Collage in Santa Fe. His process involves the use of chance and serendipitous discovery. Many of his pieces use bits of lettering from billboards and street posters to create “non-objective visual poetry” without literary references. Other collage works use brush marking, book and magazine papers – some of this material might be created in a computer program, using a given body of rules that allow random results to occur. In this way, Touchon’s creative process is much like an improvisatory jazz musician. His work can be found in many private, corporate and museum collections. Cecil shows with K. Imperial Fine Art, Nuart Gallery in Santa Fe, Laura Rathe Fine Art in Houston as well as other galleries.

The tradition of folding paper existed in East Asia, then Europe hundreds of years ago. The Japanese word, Origami, comes from the word “ori”, meaning to fold and “kami” meaning paper. Origins of origami began sometime after Buddhist monks carried paper to Japan during the 6th century. At that time, it was primarily used for religious purposes due to its high price. Samurai warriors are known to have exchanged gifts adorned with “noshi”, a good luck token made of folded strips of paper. Josef Albers, father of modern color theory and minimalistic art, taught Origami and paper folding in the 1920’s at the Bauhaus school.

Jenene Nagy, a Visiting Assistant Professor of Painting at UC Riverside with an extensive exhibition history, is also one half of the curatorial team TILT Export, an independent art initiative. A recipient of many awards and grants, she serves on the board of ART PAPERS magazine. Working in graphite on folded paper, she says, “I’m interested in folding because of the (resulting) alchemy”. She explores “the boundary of image and objecthood; folding is an attempt to thoughtfully transform the drawing into an object both through process and material”. Her series, Older Than the Host is a continued investigation into notions of value and perception. The boundaries of image and object are blurred by the variable of light behavior and its relationship to the physical properties of graphite. The diamond or triangular shapes in her drawings create a tension much like a gemstone’s “inclusion”, a solid body that interferes with light as it travels through it. It is this interference, she says, that either diminishes or adds value, depending on the type of stone. Jenene shows with PDX Contemporary Art in Portland, Oregon.

Tracey Adams, curator of this exhibition and an artist, is a 2015 recipient of a Pollock-Krasner Grant as well as other awards. She has exhibited over 30 years, both internationally and in the U.S. with work in many museum, private and corporate collections. The series, FOLDED, is initially created by dipping washi, Japanese paper, into hot pigmented wax. These pieces are then folded into small bands as she works with the waxed paper to create a certain number of folds based on the day in the month. Each piece in the series has a corresponding number of folds relating to the date the work was created. For example, June 10, contains 10 folds. Some of her pieces are folded without stitching and some include hand stitching using silk thread, a process that takes many hours as the stitched lines weave in counterpoint to the wax lines. This body of work represents a meditation, a time at the end of the day when she can sit quietly and fold or stitch, never knowing what the end result will be. Tracey is represented by K. Imperial Fine Art and Bryant Street Gallery in the Bay Area, Patricia Rovzar Gallery in Seattle, Ann Connelly Fine Art in Baton Rouge, and Anne Loucks Gallery in Chicago. This is her first curatorial experience.

OPENING RECEPTION Friday April 8

2016

6PM-8PM

BRYANT STREET GALLERY 532 Bryant St

Palo Alto, CA

www.bryantstreet.com