Comparative Studies
Comparative Studies was a month long program at Surplus Space where we invited a different academic institution each week for a month to curate the house.
February 28th - Portland State University MFAs, irl///onlineonly, Curated by Katie Holden
March 6th - Lewis & Clark College, Achieving and Undermining Too Many Dinner Parties, Curated/Oganized by Malcolm Hecht
March 14th - Oregon College of Art and Craft, Lasting Impressions, Curated/Organized by Colin Kippen
March 20th - Pacific Northwest College of Art, Cold Read, Linda Kliewer's Off-Site Stategies class
Click on each show title for documentation.
February 28th - Portland State University MFAs, irl///onlineonly, Curated by Katie Holden
March 6th - Lewis & Clark College, Achieving and Undermining Too Many Dinner Parties, Curated/Oganized by Malcolm Hecht
March 14th - Oregon College of Art and Craft, Lasting Impressions, Curated/Organized by Colin Kippen
March 20th - Pacific Northwest College of Art, Cold Read, Linda Kliewer's Off-Site Stategies class
Click on each show title for documentation.
irl///onlineonly
irl///onlineonly is a group show curated by Katie Holden featuring works by Portland State University's current MFA candidates.
In conjunction with showing each artist's work, Holden has approached the artists to be individually interviewed. Through a series of books the cohort voiced their opinions on the effects or non-effects digital life has on their art practices. These interviews act as a preface to a printed archive of their internet postings from the last 3 months.
With a curious and equally playful attitude, Holden asks the artists to consider the question, "What is real life?" as well as how they feel about the now ubiquitous acronym in relation to exhibiting and sharing their work.
Participating MFA candidates: Jea Alford, &&&, Kensey Anderson, Sarah-Jasmine Calvetti, Chris Freeman, Hyunju Kim, Kyle Lee, Emily Lewis, Pam Minty, and Amanda Wilson.
In conjunction with showing each artist's work, Holden has approached the artists to be individually interviewed. Through a series of books the cohort voiced their opinions on the effects or non-effects digital life has on their art practices. These interviews act as a preface to a printed archive of their internet postings from the last 3 months.
With a curious and equally playful attitude, Holden asks the artists to consider the question, "What is real life?" as well as how they feel about the now ubiquitous acronym in relation to exhibiting and sharing their work.
Participating MFA candidates: Jea Alford, &&&, Kensey Anderson, Sarah-Jasmine Calvetti, Chris Freeman, Hyunju Kim, Kyle Lee, Emily Lewis, Pam Minty, and Amanda Wilson.
Achieving and Undermining Too Many Dinner Parties
Lewis & Clark College
Joseph Arzt, Olivia Cater, Liz Finch, Kelsey Gray, Malcolm Hecht, Kristina Nelson, Leah Reusch, Lilly Kiser Taylor, and Clio Wilde
I was beginning to question the way people folded like soft paper shapes, into one another.Insignificant pulpy globes, conglomerated fibers. Like a napkin nervously rubbed between a thumb and index finger, tiny bits of paper rolled into cylinders on perspiring palms––pieces of a discarded whole now slick and somewhat symmetrical. How these shapes became objects that people would eventually pass through: the steam emitting from a boiling kettle, the slight curve in the handle of a toothbrush, the unnoticed differences in patterned bathroom tiles. And about how these objects––though seemingly practical and unromantic––carried all of our weight. The weight of our shoes and of our bare feet, the weight of our thumbs––the way we pressed them into the dipped handle of our coffee mug or the way we prodded softening fruit in the bowl in our kitchen. I was beginning to question the way we molded these shapes into glossed and glazed objects, dull and matte finished surfaces that always seemed to hold our weight. But what if they didn’t?
What if these daily items appeared to us, one day, suddenly changed? What if you ate a bowl of cereal only to see the exact indent of your thumb swirling in the patterns of milk and cinnamon? Would you blink? Would you cash in like the woman who saw Jesus etched in her buttered toast? Would you sell the dust collected from your ceiling fan or the contents of your vacuum bag if you knew it drew you closer to intimacy with god? Or would you savor the contents of this year’s and last year’s collection of lint and pet hair––now compact and unseen, smooshed together then discarded? Would you rub these objects––these soft paper shapes that resemble our weight––into altered forms on your perspiring palms? You can hold these clumps of dust and dander close, for no one will know that you now hold these miniature universes in your clenched fists.
[No one will know that imprinted in breakfast fares and distorted through crystallized fragments of stained glass mirrors and broken windshields we once touched.]
-Emma Joss, 2015
I was beginning to question the way people folded like soft paper shapes, into one another.Insignificant pulpy globes, conglomerated fibers. Like a napkin nervously rubbed between a thumb and index finger, tiny bits of paper rolled into cylinders on perspiring palms––pieces of a discarded whole now slick and somewhat symmetrical. How these shapes became objects that people would eventually pass through: the steam emitting from a boiling kettle, the slight curve in the handle of a toothbrush, the unnoticed differences in patterned bathroom tiles. And about how these objects––though seemingly practical and unromantic––carried all of our weight. The weight of our shoes and of our bare feet, the weight of our thumbs––the way we pressed them into the dipped handle of our coffee mug or the way we prodded softening fruit in the bowl in our kitchen. I was beginning to question the way we molded these shapes into glossed and glazed objects, dull and matte finished surfaces that always seemed to hold our weight. But what if they didn’t?
What if these daily items appeared to us, one day, suddenly changed? What if you ate a bowl of cereal only to see the exact indent of your thumb swirling in the patterns of milk and cinnamon? Would you blink? Would you cash in like the woman who saw Jesus etched in her buttered toast? Would you sell the dust collected from your ceiling fan or the contents of your vacuum bag if you knew it drew you closer to intimacy with god? Or would you savor the contents of this year’s and last year’s collection of lint and pet hair––now compact and unseen, smooshed together then discarded? Would you rub these objects––these soft paper shapes that resemble our weight––into altered forms on your perspiring palms? You can hold these clumps of dust and dander close, for no one will know that you now hold these miniature universes in your clenched fists.
[No one will know that imprinted in breakfast fares and distorted through crystallized fragments of stained glass mirrors and broken windshields we once touched.]
-Emma Joss, 2015
Lasting Impression
Oregon College of Art and Craft
As a group of artists, we each explore the broad ideas of contact and impression. Process and interaction, specifically through material context and use, are important factors in our work. Surplus Space as a home-turned-gallery furthers our exploration of contact and impression by allowing the viewers to experience our work in a different way compared to the typical white-walled, blank slate gallery as our pieces become site-specific installations.
Zenia Diller, Meera Duncan, Jason Horvath, Colin Kippen, Úna Rose, Madeleine Soich, and Karyssa Stearns
Zenia Diller, Meera Duncan, Jason Horvath, Colin Kippen, Úna Rose, Madeleine Soich, and Karyssa Stearns
Cold Read
Pacific Northwest College of Art
The cold reader is a highly skilled and talented individual. And this is true.
A cold read, referring to a set procedure, is not dissimilar to a cold case, which references an investigation, involving a method of supposed unfamiliarity. The notion of a “cold” anything implies an unemotional callus. This idea of a detached perspective is intrical to the show, Cold Read, at Surplus Space, where a group of associated yet disconnected artists from Pacific Northwest College of Art create a collection of work that embodies a whole and yet also features such a variety of work from artists working with many different areas of interest and focuses.
Casey Egner, Trent Gibson, Avery Gilbert II, Joe Greer, Skylar Leaf, Linda Kliewer, Martina Mächler, Carly Mandel, Madé Tavernier, and Ashley Waddell
A cold read, referring to a set procedure, is not dissimilar to a cold case, which references an investigation, involving a method of supposed unfamiliarity. The notion of a “cold” anything implies an unemotional callus. This idea of a detached perspective is intrical to the show, Cold Read, at Surplus Space, where a group of associated yet disconnected artists from Pacific Northwest College of Art create a collection of work that embodies a whole and yet also features such a variety of work from artists working with many different areas of interest and focuses.
Casey Egner, Trent Gibson, Avery Gilbert II, Joe Greer, Skylar Leaf, Linda Kliewer, Martina Mächler, Carly Mandel, Madé Tavernier, and Ashley Waddell
