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Aaron Collier
Arcana

2018

About the Item

Octavia Art Gallery is pleased to present Aaron Collier: Of Rocks and Ruins. The “Everything You Need to Know” website that intends to prepare visitors for the breezy summit and scenic overlook of Palatine Hill in Rome offers the following caution: “Without a guide or guidebook, it can be difficult to make sense of the ruins of the Palatine… you don’t want to be one of those tourists who wanders aimlessly around the hill, with no idea of what they’re looking at.” Failing to click on the host of supplied links for guide services made available to me by this website, I became “one of those tourists” in September of 2017. The difficulty of making sense of the excavations and remains drove me up that hill. The promise of innumerable fragments, pieces, and ruins (nothing fully intact or scatheless) was the reward of the climb, not the handicap. A profound inability to explain away or see through every layer was the experience and the seat that I hoped to find, one of bewilderment and mystery. This act of looking is one that prizes possibility and questions, rather than answers and identification. My professional practice as a visual artist is one that implements several modes of image making towards braving the central questions that drive my research: what am I to do with a small and incomplete knowledge of a vast, complex, and multivalent world? What of challenge or gain accompanies an incomplete knowledge of the world? How are images, which are inherently shards or snippets of information, able to picture this inability to know in full? Abstraction, marked as it is by the ability to be both suggestive and silent, proves to be a fitting vehicle for exploring the possibility of paint to simultaneously reveal and conceal. This dichotomy parallels a shifting, evolving world where what we know consistently shares an edge with what we do not. Paintings in Of Rocks and Ruins layer observed positive shapes and negative spaces from historical works such as Leonardo’s Virgin of the Rocks and Hendrick Goltzius’ Pieta to the degree that the individual and original referent becomes difficult to delineate. Piecing together a knowledge or experience of something through remaining or available fragments mimics our daily interactions with the world. Rather than suggest that these interactions foreground a certain lack or shortcoming, I wonder if incomprehensibility can ever be a source of joy? – Aaron Collier Aaron Collier is a visual artist living in New Orleans. He teaches drawing and painting at Tulane University as an Assistant Professor. This is Aaron’s first solo exhibition at Octavia Art Gallery. Previous solo exhibitions of his work have occurred at Cole Pratt Gallery and Staple Goods, an artist-run gallery in the St. Claude Avenue Arts District of New Orleans. He has participated in recent group exhibitions at The Clemente in New York and the Ogden Museum of Southern Art in New Orleans. Additionally, his work has been featured in New American Paintings and is represented in such collections as the New Orleans Museum of Art, Iberia Bank, and the Boston Medical Center. Collier has been awarded artist residencies by the Ragdale Foundation, the Virginia Center for the Creative Arts, the Joan Mitchell Center (New Orleans), ISCP (Brooklyn), and Open Ateliers Zuidoost (Amsterdam).
  • Creator:
    Aaron Collier (American)
  • Creation Year:
    2018
  • Dimensions:
    Height: 18.25 in (46.36 cm)Width: 15 in (38.1 cm)
  • Medium:
  • Movement & Style:
  • Period:
  • Condition:
  • Gallery Location:
    New Orleans, LA
  • Reference Number:
    1stDibs: LU11023448081
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She has been living in Woodstock, New York for nearly two decades, including a Residency at the Byrdcliffe Art Colony from November 2004-08. Jenny has been exhibiting for many years nationally and regionally including, Tria Gallery, Manhattan, NY; Hidell Brooks Gallery in Charlotte, North Carolina; Carrie Haddad, Hudson, NY. SELECTED EXHIBITIONS: Solo Shows: 2019 Carrie Haddad Gallery, Hudson, NY 2019 Hidell Brooks Gallery, Charlotte NC 2018 Light Waves, Hidell Brooks Gallery, Charlotte NC 2017 New Works, Carrie Haddad Gallery, Hudson NY 2016 Sailing in Place, Hidell Brooks Gallery, Charlotte NC 2013 Traveling Light, Tria Gallery, Manhattan NY 2012 New Work, Smink Modern, Dallas TX 2012 New Work, Carrie Haddad Gallery, Hudson NY 2011 Awakenings (Duo with Keun Young Park) Tria Gallery, Manhattan NY 2010 New Paintings, Chace-Randall Gallery, Andes NY 2008 Autumn Elegance, Asher Neiman Gallery, Red Bank NJ 2008 The Light Between, Chace-Randall Gallery, Andes NY 2007 New Work, Carrie Haddad Gallery, Hudson NY 2006 Of Line and Light, Chace-Randall Gallery, Andes NY 2006 Abstractions, Gallery 100, Saratoga NY 2005 Spring Collection, Coffey Gallery, Kingston NY 2005 New Work, Carrie Haddad Gallery, Hudson NY 2004 Summer, Omega Institute, Rhinebeck NY 2004 New Work, Carrie Haddad Gallery, Hudson NY 2003 Paintings from Shady, Coffey Gallery, Kingston NY 2001 Fisher Studio Art Gallery, Annandale-on-Hudson Group Exhibitions: 2018 20th Anniversary Show, Hidell Brooks Gallery, Charlotte, NC 2017 Due East: Woodstock Artists in Nantucket, Nantucket Arts Center, Nantucket, MA 2017 Composition: The Abstract Landscape, Kleinert/James Gallery, Woodstock NY 2014 Women in Abstract, Hidell Brooks Gallery, Charlotte NC 2013 Hidell Brooks Anniversary Show, Hidell Brooks Gallery, Charlotte, NC 2013 AD Boston Art Fair, Gold Gallery, Boston 2012 Contemporary Painters, Carrie Haddad Gallery Hudson, NY 2012 Featured Artist, Dragonfly Gallery, Martha's Vineyard, MA 2012 Tria Gallery Summer Exhibition, Manhattan, NY 2012 AAF NYC, Tria Gallery, Manhattan, NY 2011 Featured Artist, Dragonfly Gallery, Martha's Vineyard, MA 2011 AAF NYC, Tria Gallery, Manhattan, NY 2011 Figures and Abstractions, Carrie Haddad Gallery, Hudson NY 2010 Art Hamptons, Tria Gallery, Manhattan NY 2010 Featured Artist, Dragonfly Gallery, Martha's Vineyard MA 2009 LA Art Fair, Bryant Street Gallery, Palo Alto CA 2009 Curators Choice, Chace-Randall Gallery, Andes NY 2009 Instructors Exhibition, Woodstock School of Art, Woodstock NY 2009 Group Exhibition, Bryant Street Gallery, Palo Alto CA 2009 Small Works, Anne Irwin Fine Art, Atlanta GA 2009 Winter White, Tria Gallery, Manhattan NY 2009 Contrasts, Anne Irwin Fine Art, Atlanta GA 2009 AAF NYC Tria Gallery, Manhattan NY 2008 Summer Cocktail, Tria Gallery, Manhattan NY 2008 5"x7" Show, Kleinart-James Gallery, Woodstock NY 2007 Faculty Plus One, Columbia Greene Community College, Hudson NY 2007 Art Basel Miami, Carrie Haddad Gallery, Hudson NY 2007 One New Work, Chace-Randall Gallery, Andes NY 2007 5"x7" Show, Kleinart-James Gallery, Woodstock, NY 2006 Beach, Gallery Yellow, Cross River NY 2006 Flow, Kleinart/James Gallery, Woodstock, NY 2006 Group Exhibition, James Cox Gallery, Woodstock NY 2006 Collectors Choice, Kleinert/James Gallery, Woodstock NY 2005 Group Exhibition, Chace Randall Gallery, Andes NY 2005 Passionate About Art, Kleinert/James Gallery, Woodstock NY 2005 New Talent, Alpha Gallery, Boston MA 2004 Six Women Painters, Albert Shahinian Fine Art, Poughkeepsie NY 2004 New York Underground Art Fair, Pool Art Addict, Four Points Hotel NY 2003 Senate House Show, Kingston NY 2002 Group Exhibition, Carrie Haddad Gallery, Hudson NY Juried Exhibitions: 2004 Woodstock Artists Association, Woodstock NY 2002 Hudson Valley Artists 2002, Samuel Dorsky Museum, New Paltz NY Selected Collections: Warren Bierwirth, Paris, France Cecilia Greene, New York NY Helen Chapman, New York NY Michael & Sheila Faharty, New York NY Christopher Dlutowski, New York NY Jim & Dianne Footlicke, New York NY Laurent Gaudry, New York NY Nancy Seigal, Boca Raton FL Holli Gersh, Boca Raton FL Kenneth & Margaret Uhle, Ridgefield CT Dr. Lee Sider, Mt. Tremper NY Friedrike Merck, Woodstock NY Weston & Julia Blelock, Woodstock NY Miller Howard Investments, Woodstock NY Kingston Hospital, Kingston NY Media: Jenny Nelson, Accidental Storyteller, Carrie Haddad Gallery, 2017 Jenny Nelson's chaos, Hudson Valley One, 2017 A Conversation with Artist Jenny Nelson,, Blog Talk Radio...
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