MOTHER-IN-LAW”S PRESENTS:
INDOOR INSTALLATION:
Darkening Skies by Pamela Longobardi with
Craig Dogonski and Susan Knippenberg
curated by Kathleen Vance and Daniel Aycock of Front Room Gallery
OUTDOOR EXHIBITION:
Par·ley curated by Field Projects
featuring Amelia Biewald, Amanda Browder, Lauren Cohen, Andrea Sherrill Evans, Rachel Frank, Paul Gagner, David Herbert, Alison Kudlow, Leander Knust, Casey Miller, Marianna Peragallo, Lara Saget
Mother-in-Law’s
140 Church Avenue
Germantown, NY 12526
ON VIEW: July 21- Sep 4, 2023
Upstate Art Weekend : July 21-24
Artist Reception : July 22, 6-8pm
Closing Party : Sep 4th, 2023
Lauren Cohen performs “Brian’s Yard Sale”
July 21st 12-6pm, July 22nd 12-8pm, July 23rd 12-6pm
OUTDOOR EXHIBITION:
Par·ley curated by Field Projects
featuring Amelia Biewald, Amanda Browder, Lauren Cohen, Andrea Sherrill Evans, Rachel Frank, Paul Gagner, David Herbert, Alison Kudlow, Leander Knust, Casey Miller, Marianna Peragallo, Lara Saget curated by Field Projects
Mother-in-Law’s is pleased to present Par·ley, a group exhibition curated by Field Projects taking place on the surrounding grounds outside of the exhibition space.
The curtilage of our homes has always been a space where we negotiate with Nature. We plant, prune, uproot, foster, weed, govern and curate this space. Nature, in turn, does everything possible to reclaim, reroot and rewild it, reminding us that for now we may manipulate nature but we are also governed by Nature.
Par·ley brings together a group of artists under the arch of this negotiated space and examines different methods of living with and parallel from nature.
INDOOR INSTALLATION:
Darkening Skies by Pamela Longobardi with
Craig Dogonski and Susan Knippenberg
curated by Kathleen Vance and Daniel Aycock.
Mixed media installation with video and audio compositions and assemblage sculptures, created from collected ocean plastics addressing isolation, migration and climate change. In the installation a pair of large mirrored eyes, refract and double the projected video, abstracting it into a new constructed reality, while black detritus birds circle the space.
Special Event:
Friday, July 21; Saturday, July 22; & Sunday, July 23 @ 12 - 6 PM - Brian’s Yard Sale. In the depths of her emotional solitude during the pandemic, artist Lauren Cohen embarked on a creative venture, making fictional characters who are in pursuit of love. Brian emerged as a composite embodiment of all that Cohen cherishes and fears in the opposite sex. Rooted in her personal odyssey of mental well-being, the mending of deep-seated traumas, and the exploration of love’s intricate dynamics, Cohen’s artistic endeavors manifest as an introspection of the human condition.
DARKENING SKIES
Darkening Skies, a new site-specific installation by Pamela Longobardi with Craig Dongoski and Susan Knippenberg, reinterprets the film ONAR (repair the dream). The film, which addresses isolation, migration and climate change, was shot on a deserted beach in 2019 on a remote part of Kefalonia, Greece, the island that has supported Drifters Project research for many years. The film’s concept evolved from Drifters Project work on the island of Lesvos, Greece with some of the 600,000+ refugees that have migrated there. The title Onar, comes from a word that was printed on one of the refugees’ discarded life-vests. Onar is a Turkish life-vest manufacturer, but the word also has other meanings. In Arabic, onar means ‘repair.’ In ancient Greek, it means ‘dream.’ Onar is also an anagram of ‘Rona,’ American slang for the corona virus.
Within the mountains of life-vests that are now a permanent landscape of Lesvos, there were also gold survival rescue blankets, which Longobardi has been utilizing as performance material for the past several years. Thin, cheap and plastic, they are critical in at-sea rescue efforts, but also have tremendous metaphoric potential. In the film, Longobardi and Knippenberg have made floating gold “islands of refuge” that are animated by Longobardi moving underwater while Knippenberg films. The islands depart from a sea cave after undergoing a transformation and escape as blue islands on the blood-red sea.
In this new installation Darkening Skies, inspired by Longobardi's eponymous painting of 2023 (also shown as part of the installation,) the artists create a tableau with a pair of large mirrored eyes which refract and double the projected ONAR video, abstracting it into a new constructed reality, while black detritus birds (created in assemblage of collected global ocean plastic) circle the space.
Craig’s Dongoski’s electroacoustic work adds a haunting audio element to the installation. The artist’s audio work is a multi-channel sound scape of electroacoustic signal that employs processing of humpback whales along with electronics produced by ciat-lonbarde electronic instruments. Layering and sequencing of the sound sources are intended to complement the installation, as well as induce a cave-like atmosphere within the physical space that evokes mystery through non-human communication.