revisiting some of last year's peripheral gallery programs

 Image courtesy of Primary.

Resource | Miami, Florida
January 5, 2018

About Primary.
Primary. Founded in 2007, Miami, FL by Cristina Gonzalez, Books Bischof, & Typoe Gran is a multifaceted organization that explores and promotes various forms of aesthetic expression from both established and emerging contemporary artists, within the gallery context and beyond. PRIMARY works to continually expand the expectations of the contemporary art world, and to foster new, unexpected conversations between artists and the public.

Balancing Infinity, While Hanging Upside Down. Watching Lovers Fall from Grace, Underneath the Ground
By Autumn Casey

Images courtesy of Primary.

November 25th, 2016 - January 21st, 2017 

Primary Projects (PRIMARY) is pleased to announce Autumn Casey's "Balancing Infinity, While Hanging Upside Down. Watching Lovers Fall from Grace, Underneath the Ground," premiering during Miami's leading international art week.

The occasion marks Casey's second solo exhibition with PRIMARY, and showcases sculptural, installation works, and seventy-eight (78) 2-D collage inspired by A.E. Waite and Pamela Coleman Smith's 1910 tarot deck, famously known as the Rider-Waite-Smith Tarot Deck.

You don't buy Tarot cards, they come to you. Not to say that you can't buy them, but it's unadvised. Autumn Casey received hers when she was 18, at a Christmas party, and was thus initiated.

This deck is the product of three year's work. Or, put another way, three year's life. Its creation ran alongside Casey's other work-her art, her music. It was the downbeat, the noise between the notes.

Collaged out of art history textbooks, pages of illustrated Shakespeare, books on astronomy and biology, home décor. Not to mention hand drawings and scraps found elsewhere. The entire world pared down and combined, two unlike things that become one composition: this is what collage is. The world folding back on itself, resting on a jagged edge.

Each simple composition tendrils out into her life and the lives of the viewers, either suggesting meaning or remaining mute.

It's difficult to assign a lineage when dealing with a secret history. These began at that Christmas party, shot forward through years of turbulence, dipped back through punk, to Hannah Höch, and then to Pamela Colman Smith, who designed the go-to Tarot deck along with A.E. Waite in 1910.

It has been said that the 78 cards of the Tarot can be viewed as a massive calendar, accurate for 2,200 years.

The Rider-Waite-Smith deck is famous for its symbolist vibe, its subconscious heft, and yet it's also famous for being famous. Created during the infancy of popular culture, when printing and distribution networks were being perfected, it became disseminated, but standardized. That is collage. That is DIY. Taking what exists and making it your own.

Finding origin in Modernism's cataclysm, the cards also summon Madame Sosostris,

T.S. Eliot's "wisest woman in Europe/ with a wicked pack of cards." Unfortunately, this Wasteland clairvoyant is beset with a bad cold, suggesting that even if you can see into the future, certain maladies are unavoidable.

She pulls the Phoenician Sailor, Belladonna, the Man with Three Staves, the Wheel, The One-Eyed Merchant, and one obscured card. But this is not about her hand. When Casey finished this deck she pulled three cards: Two of Pentacles, the Hanged Man, Lovers Reversed.

A coincidence: Madame Sosostris mentions the Hanged Man as the card she does not find, which at first seems fortunate-hanged men being what they are. However, the card's meaning is much more tangled. It suggests inversion, overturning the old, seeing things anew. It represents contemplation, reflection.

Tarot cards are images, and function as such. They all have positive and negative attributes; they shift depending on their relationship to other images, and to the viewer herself.

Reflecting upon these three, Casey wrote a few lines:

Balancing Infinity
While Hanging Upside Down
Watching Lovers Fall from Grace
Underneath the Ground.

But to stay in the Wasteland a little while longer-the fractured narrative, the myriad points of view, the blend of slang and arcana: all of this finds echo in collage, and in Casey's Tarot deck.

That the same symbology can have infinite outcomes, that the world, in all its variety, can be covered by 78 archetypes, this is what Tarot teaches you.

That a rectangle contains a game of chance, a guide of fate, and a map of days. The tarot teaches you that also. It is also what you learn from art.

Fuck It Will Set You Free
By Kelly Breez

All images courtesy of Primary.

March 4th - April 8th, 2017

“Life should not be a journey to the grave with the intention of arriving safely in a pretty and well-preserved body, but rather to skid in broadside in a cloud of smoke, thoroughly used up, totally worn out, and loudly proclaiming “Wow! What a Ride!” – Hunter S. Thompson

Opening March 4, 2017 at 7:00 PM, PRIMARY is pleased to present Kelly Breez – “Fuck It Will Set You Free”. This occasion marks the artist’s first solo exhibition with Primary and will feature selections from her latest body of work 2016 – 2017.

“Fuck It Will Set You Free” began as a mantra, adopted by a core group of friends who collectively relocated to San Francisco, California. In early 2008, the group acquired a new (old) van and began the journey to the west coast. Over time, the mantra stuck, it became the motto for Breez’s California years, in turn, becoming her way of life.

Through a collection of resin covered illustrations on wood, with a visual aesthetic loosely compared to the likes of Raymond Pettibon or Margaret Kilgallen, Breez combines a California state of mind with her South Florida tropical upbringing.

Breez explains, “Fuck It Will Set You Free is a collection of works that represent my belief in artistic / personal liberation in the face of convention. The future is unknown, which leaves room for adventure and mystery. Calculated moves shut out possibilities, Fuck It is about affirming your power to do stuff people might not understand. It’s playful, it’s stubborn.”

Her devotion to hefty materials like wood & epoxy is in part influenced by her participation in the restoration of her father’s sailboat as well as “a nod to all the previously lived, long Florida nights. A celebration of the hazy memories found in the pennies, shells, and beer caps preserved inside the resin of the many bar-tops you discover throughout the tropics.”

Included in the exhibit, Breez develops an ongoing painting series of “How-to” books. Titles such as “How to Spot a Cop Car from Two Miles Away Even in the Dark” & “How to Vandalize that Booty” give a glimpse into the calculated wit that is Kelly Breez. She describes her approach to these works as “highlighting informalities” and “about the inner voice that everyone has, but more often than not, won’t talk about openly in public.” By depicting these thoughts on something formal like a book cover and rendering the type in a loose, cartoon-like aesthetic, Breez seizes the opportunity to present her unique inner voice to the viewer on a personal & informal level.

The Motion of Movements
Carlos Betancourt, Ronald Moran, Deon Rubi, Ben Pederson, Wade Schaming, Gavin Perry, Manny Prieres, & Keenen/Riley

All images courtesy of Primary.

April 22nd - June 24th, 2017

Opening April 22, 2017 at 7:00 PM PRIMARY is pleased to present “The Motion of Movements”, a group exhibition showcasing new works from Carlos Betancourt, Ronald Moran, Deon Rubi, Ben Pederson, Wade Schaming, Gavin Perry, Manny Prieres, & Keenen/Riley.

“Extraordinary” might be an understatement in describing the times we are living in. Through an ongoing series of internal conversations here at Primary, we have continued to inform each other about the nature of movement(s). There is no question that momentum is building worldwide, we remain curious about the constant bending of the checks and balances that govern our lives.`

English documentarian Adam Curtis arguably describes this day and age as:

“An entire generation retreating from an active engagement with power and still wanting to change the world. You can feel it, there’s a great restlessness. There is a great deal of dissatisfaction among white working class people, there’s a great deal of fear and dissatisfaction amongst all sorts of ethnic groups for different reasons.There is a great feeling of restlessness and hunger for change amongst white middle class and black middle class, it’s all over the place but no-one has any vision of what to do. I think it is because people have retreated – possibly into culture – but also into a never-never land where everything has been emotionalized, rather than confronting issues of power.”

With an ongoing fascination for various forms of balance and movement(s): creatively, socially, and politically, we find ourselves with a revived invigoration for work that considers the tipping point and challenges the idea of movement(s) or the lack there of.

In Keenen / Riley’s “The Sirens”, the collective work addresses our topic through a site specific installation that is both aesthetically attractive and potentially dangerous to the viewer, in equal measures. Through inverted catenary arches, forms are balanced, mathematical and elegant, connected to create an ephemeral space. Small explosives are contained within the arches like a malevolent constellation of stars. They are placed without order, adding to unpredictability, creating clear tension between beauty and danger.

In “Times of Illuminations”, a new work by Carlos Betancourt, the artist utilizes his vast collection of Christmas tree toppers to explore issues of memory and personal experience. In contrast to the Dadaist movement that rejected aestheticism of modern capitalism, this artwork not only embraces the personal and collective memories that these objects incite, it also praises the sometimes dismissed beauty of mass-produced and disposable objects.

Using light and motion as vehicles for harmony and balance, “Times of Illuminations” reflects on how ones’ own experiences and memories can actually transcend the personal and become universal. Specifically to Betancourt, this work is a celebration of our perpetual condition of being in motion as a society and finding an equilibrium in the syncretism of our times.

In contrast to Adam Curtis, Haile Selassie delivered these timeless words to the United Nations in 1963:

“We must become something we have never been and for which our education and experience and environment have ill-prepared us. We must become bigger than we have been: more courageous, greater in spirit, larger in outlook. We must become members of a new race, overcoming petty prejudice, owing our ultimate allegiance not to nations but to our fellow men within the human community.”

True to form, movement(s) will continue to fluctuate, through the rejection of logic and reason, in the name of artistic expression, responding to inequality, in an effort to advance a power struggle, regardless of its nobility.

Impressions of our Landscape
By Magnus Sodamin

All images courtesy of Primary.

September 27th - October 28th, 2017

Primary is pleased to present “Impressions of our Landscape”, an exhibition of new paintings by Magnus Sodamin, the artist’s third solo show with the gallery.

Influenced by a lifetime of open-air exploration, this new body of work focuses on the diverse 83 acres of the Fairchild Tropical Botanic Garden, the artist’s year long residency at the Deering Estate and a period of research at the Artist in Residency in Everglades (AIRIE) program.

Reminiscent of impressionist methods, the paintings act as windows into the quiet solitude of nature. In recognition of time and beauty, Sodamin depicts a world overflowing with lavish flora, where light acts as an element of change, encouraging the viewer to honor our natural surroundings now before the moment is lost into an unfamiliar future

With this series, the artist has narrowed his subject matter to the commanding foliage of the Tropical monsoon climate. Captured on panel, these works highlight the various subtleties of nature before and after humankind and consider the many who dedicate their practices to the distribution, propagation, and curatorial of thousands of plants species into a single region or specific location. While elements of previous bodies of work remain integral, Sodamin pushes these paintings beyond his standard field of vision. Responding to the density of the surrounding vegetation, Sodamin interprets the intimate life of the lush greenery with a loosened brush stroke and a heavier texture.

Although the paintings directly acknowledge a history associated with the Tropical landscape of southern Florida, Sodamin’s work transcends locality. These works reach out to a broader scope, from the inquisitive explorer to the novice urban botanist. Bursts of radiant color flanked by ominous tones of green draw the viewer into Sodamin’s microcosm. In celebration of tribal mark making and naturally occurring patterns, the observable layerings are tactile, impasto applications of acrylic that elegantly trail across the work like hallucinations from “behind the looking glass”. As the colors and textures combine into one unified vision, Sodamin affirms his dedication to the heritage of painting and reminds the viewer of the simple beauties that dominate the most complex realities our delicate world has to offer.

Black White and Brown
By Derrick Adams

All images courtesy of Primary.

December 4th, 2017 - January 27th, 2018

“Imagination can be radical.” – Derrick Adams

Primary is pleased to present Black White and Brown, a fully immersive installation by multidisciplinary artist Derrick Adams, his first solo exhibition with the gallery.

This uniquely equanimous exhibition unveils all-new works and reconvenes previously-unavailable segments from performances and presentations at MoMA/Ps1, The Metropolitan Museum of Art, Studio Museum in Harlem and Performa, among others. Presented together as a collection for the first time, Black White and Brown highlights an important part of Adams’ conceptual framework: the semiotic consideration of the institutional presentation of artworks.

Black White and Brown incorporates bold geometric black and white patterns, some with various shades of brown, in reference to the black body as a conduit or apparatus for performative mechanisms in the work. Living within Adams’ lexicon of intentionality, these works (dis)assemble emblems of cultural identity, social-political commentary, and formalized structures. Demonstrating power and reverence, familiar and unfamiliar imagery is presented against the hard-edged grid of the gallery’s black and white interior wall patterns.

Set in a virtually unrecognizable Primary Projects space, mixed media objects stand in direct conversation with Adams’ bold Op-Art application as a backdrop. While the artist’s installation represents an element of engagement with formalism, his work is, at the same time, thrust into the contemporary art space, destabilizing an excessive focus on representation in lieu of provenance and cultural context. Following the genesis of Adams’ artistic practice,

Black White and Brown adapts his signature collage to the built-environment, at once offering viewers access to works past while journeying into a vision for the future.

Primary.
15 NE 39th St.
Miami, Florida
33137

Contact
(954) 296-1675
info@thisisprimary.com
@primaryprojects on Instagram

RESOURCE
A posting of any length based primarily on submissions but also compiled through research by The Rib. Resource shares press releases, exhibition details, photo essays, interviews, podcasts, and other original content generated by galleries or alternative sources. Resource establishes a critical dialogue or discourse for artists and institutions by simply sharing information in a network connecting networks.