Featured image: Gay Summer Rick, Stand By
bG Gallery is pleased to present “Transfigure,” an online exhibition curated by Trevor Coopersmith. 20% of sales will be donated to help support Ukraine.
Dates: April 29th – July 29th, 2022
Watch the zoom reception here:
Featured artists:
Peter Böhnisch, Molly Gambardella, Uwe Henneken, Rachel Ostrow, Jakob Oksbjerg, Gay Summer Rick, and Benjamin Terrell.
Curatorial Statement:
Towards the end of the Great Depression, a group of artists discussed and perpetuated artwork in response to social realism promoted by Regionalism, the Ashcan school and the economic uncertainties of the times. Situated in Taos, New Mexico in the early 20th Century, the Transcendental Painting Group formed to explore heightened visions of American landscapes with an emphasis on imagery derived from the collective unconscious. Scenes were portrayed innovatively with new life, transfigured and spiritually alive. These artists sought to evoke profound sensations of experience, nature, philosophy, music, imagination and experimentation beyond the constricting realms of the physical world. New concepts of space, color, light and design conveyed themes of idealism and spirituality which has underpinned an artistic foundation to expound upon for nearly a century. A resurgence in biomorphic compositions and a search for the spiritual, alongside international political turmoil has shaped this exhibition. How has the Transcendental group of artists, well-known and relatively unheard of (such as Agnes Pelton, Emil Bistram, Raymond Jonson, Florence Miller Pierce) shaped how contemporary artists respond to political, economic and existential uncertainty? What type of work will arise in response to power dichotomies, uncertainty and conflict?
“Transfigure” seeks to emphasize works influenced from the TPG and to extend beyond the current political, economic and existential conflicts today.
– Trevor Coopersmith
