New Work by Lucy Fradkin, Alleghany Meadows, and Trey Hill
August 15 – September 15, 2019
About The Exhibition
LUCY FRADKIN
With sources ranging from the ancient frescoes and mosaics of Etruria, Rome and Byzantium to Indian and Persian miniatures, from vernacular, hand-painted signage to folk art, my paintings capture timeless moments through a contemporary lens. Since 1998, I have focused on creating portraits of a broad range of individuals, painted in oil or gouache on paper and board. Consciously rooting my works in the rich tradition of genre painting, I place figures, often women, in domestic settings. My figures are reticent and static, endowing my scenes with a mysterious and solemn aura. Though my work is clearly inspired by traditional art forms, I maintain its relevance through the quiet presentation of issues of gender and race, informed by personal history.
I use color and pattern in my paintings to evoke emotion, to tell stories of daily life and to draw the viewer into an intimate world. In many of my works, I incorporate collaged decorative elements, sourced from old catalogs, field guides and vintage books. By meticulously cutting and pasting significant motifs and images, I develop intricate designs, rendering my surfaces more distinctive and my works as a whole more visually complex.
TREY HILL
My new body of work springs from the lure of attraction, seduction, sensuality, beauty, and grace. I am fascinated not only by the sensuality and grace of the human form, but also the exploration of the prosaic. I pull forth emotions that are at once, beautiful and raucous, yet elemental and essential, all the while exploring our human hesitancies.
The work employs anatomical fragments along with other recognizable images to create pieces that reflect these complex inquiries. By employing segments of the universality of human experience, my work alludes to the hauntingly delicate beauty of the exterior that masks the emotion and strength of structure that lies beneath the surface. Using various forms as building blocks to create larger works, I am able to able to deeply explore my curiosities and maintain a technically challenging studio environment.
I aim to seduce the senses while exploring the fragile boundaries that weave human sexuality, strength, power, emotion, and vulnerability into one cohesive identity.
ALLEGHANY MEADOWS
My search is for emotion, feeling, content and form in objects meant to be experienced and used in the intimate spaces of a home. I believe that ordinary domestic rituals can have a profound impact on the human condition. My work is connected to our bodies through these rituals and through form, scale, food and nourishment. It is activated most when in use, when engaging the senses of touch, sight, sound, taste and smell. I wish for my work effect the experience of time while inspiring creative decisions in actions such as sipping a moment of tea, preparing a soup, or arranging two daffodils in spring. I imagine a cup remaining in use and active for centuries; yet, I am acutely aware that the intended context carries risk, is transitory, where the cup can in one breath caress someone’s lips and in the next become shattered in the sink.
Memory, and my understanding of memory, are intimately connected to relationships with objects. A new cup enters my life, becoming familiar, holding my attention as I trace its subtleties, the pace and rhythm of its handle, the weight and balance when full, the transferring of its heat into my touch, the way light passes through its contents. Through time and use, this cup acquires a patina of memories which changes my understanding and relationship with it. Holding it, steam rising from tea, memories connected with the cup echo back, the long shadows of the sun rising one morning, a conversation with a passed friend, my youngest daughter taking her first step, marking moments in time which give life meaning and richness.
I work within a long history of ceramic traditions, searching for beauty and freshness, structure and meaning. I often draw inspiration from details in nature, the form of the sky seen from a solitary hilltop, the tension in a peony blossom squeezing outward during a warm week in late June. I love to work physically hard, long hours in the studio. Repetition and rhythm in my process are how I search for subtleties, forms, surfaces, patterns. I am fascinated by the potential when related elements stack and arrange, becoming something greater than a sum-total of parts. A series of soup bowls nesting together evokes an emerging flower, yet transforms into a stage for breaking bread with loved ones, then nests back to a flower, poised and alert for their next experience.
Exhibition Images
More About The Artists
LUCY FRADKIN
Lucy Fradkin is a self-taught artist whose passion for art and art making has informed her life for as long as she can remember. She was raised in and near New York City and has had the great fortune to use the myriad museums as a resource for intensive personal study. The iconography of the graphic and design styles of the 1940s and 1950s, from which she draws her early aesthetic sensibilities, influences her work to this day. She has dedicated her life work to developing a personal voice and a skilled craft.
Fradkin is the recipient of numerous prestigious awards including a Pollock-Krasner Grant, an Adolph and Esther Gottlieb Foundation Grant, a Sharpe Foundation Space Grant, two Fellowships in Drawing/Works on Paper from the New York Foundation for the Arts, five Artist-in-Residence Grants from the New York Foundation for the Arts, an Artist-in-Residency at Altos de Chavon, an affiliation of Parsons School of Design in the Dominican Republic, a Solo Exhibition Grant from Artists Space and an Artist Grant from the Vermont Council for the Arts.
Fradkin currently lives on Staten Island. She has lived in rural Vermont and travelled extensively in Mexico, Guatemala, Italy, Greece, the Domincan Republic, Haiti, France, Turkey, Spain, Morocco, Jamaica, Venezuela which has had profound influence on her artistic viewpoint.
Fradkin has exhibited widely in the US and Europe at venues including the Smithsonian National Portrait Gallery, the American Academy in Rome, MoMA/PS 1, The Queens Museum, the Brooklyn Museum, The Weatherspoon Art Museum, The Holter Museum of Art, The Bellarmine Museum, The Nicolaysen Museum, The Brattleboro Museum, The Park Avenue Armory, The Alternative Museum and many other national and international venues.
Fradkin’s work has been reviewed, featured and received critical acclaim in many publications including New York Times , The Boston Globe, ArtsObserver.com, ARTSlant, Art in America online, Hyperallergic, ArtLog, Visa Magazine (Japan), Southern Vermont Arts Magazine, Yankee Magazine , The Keene Sentinel, Casper Star Tribune, SMITHSONIAN NATIONAL PORTRAIT GALLERY Catalog, NATIONAL PORTRAIT GALLERY Magazine, Canberra, Australia, Mutts Magazine (Japan), New American Painting Number 32″, The Westchester County Times, New York Press, Exibart,Siglo 2, and the Village Voice among others.
Throughout these years, in addition to exhibiting, and teaching, I have lectured on my work at many institutions including Civitella Ranieri Foundation in Umbertide, Italy, Anderson Ranch in Aspen, Colorado , Hunter College in New York City, Sala Convegni Camera di Commercio in Cagliari, Italy , Rhode Island School of Design Rome Program in Rome, Italy, Temple University Rome Program in Rome, Italy, The American Academy in Rome The Islip Art Museum in East Islip, NY and The New York Public Library.
TREY HILL
Trey Hill is a professional sculptor and Associate Professor at The University of Montana where he teaches in both the ceramics and sculpture. His colleagues include Beth Lo and Julia Galloway. He received his BFA from Bowling Green State University in 1999 and his MFA from San Jose State University in 2002.
His work has been shown in galleries and museums throughout the United States and internationally. Trey has extensive travel and creative experiences through his vast artist residencies including: The Archie Bray Foundation in Helena, MT; the LH Project Joseph, OR; Da Wang Cultural Highlands, DaWang, China; HAP Studios, Beijing, China; Fule International Ceramic Art Museum, Fuping, China; and the Rojal Art Laboratory, Roja, Latvia.
ALLEGHANY MEADOWS
Alleghany Meadows is a nationally recognized studio potter, mentor, gallery owner and curator, non-profit board member and artistic entrepreneur – all centered around his love of art. He received his BA from Pitzer College, MFA from Alfred University, studied in Karatsu, Japan with with Takashi Nakazato, and received a Watson Foundation Fellowship for a year study of potters in Nepal. He has been an invited artist, lecturer and panelist at numerous universities, art centers, museums and conferences nationally, including, Penland, Kansas City Art Institute, Huntington Museum of Art, RISD, School of the Art Institute of Chicago, Alfred University, Anderson Ranch, NCECA, Arrowmont, Archie Bray Foundation, Haystack and University of Georgia, Cortona, Italy. His work is in many private and public collections, including the Museum of Fine Arts, Houston, New Orleans Museum of Art, Everson Museum of Art, Long Beach Museum of Art, American Museum of Ceramic Art and the Huntington Museum of Art, where he was honored with the Walter Gropius Master Award.
Alleghany is also known for his social outreach and entrepreneurial projects, including Artstream Nomadic Gallery, Harvey/Meadows Gallery, Studio for Arts + Work (SAW) and Artstream Ceramic Library. Artstream is a traveling exhibition space in a restored 1967 Airstream trailer. Currently in its 18th year, it has exhibited work by more than 150 artists in over 400 venues across the country. While on tours, the travelling artists present workshops, are visiting artists at universities, and participate in symposiums. Locations range from street corners to museums, colleges, universities and conferences, putting art on the street, introducing thousands to the language of contemporary studio potters through its innovative and accessible context. During its 14 years, Harvey/Meadows Gallery, Aspen, became one of the top galleries in the country for contemporary ceramics. It exhibited and promoted ceramics, works on paper, sculpture and painting by emerging artists and internationally recognized masters, educating the public and connecting artists with patrons and museums. The project continues as the Harvey Preston Gallery. Studio for Arts + Works, Carbondale, also 14 years old, is a for-profit project where 25 individual artists rent spaces and work collectively on open studio events and collaborative projects. Co-founded by Alleghany, in 2011 he became the sole owner and expanded to the current location, tripling the size and scope of the project. Lastly, Artstream Ceramic Library is a collection of 38 cups by nationally recognized contemporary potters. It functions similarly to a book library, where borrowers check out a cup for a week and experience it in their own contexts. It is hosted by venues nationally, and there is no monetary exchange. The library has seen more than 2,500 individual borrows across the country.