Trace Elements Exhibition

Press Release:
TRACE ELEMENTS

November 30, 2007–January 26, 2008

Margarete Roeder Gallery is pleased to present a group exhibition entitled Trace Elements with works by Rudolf De Crignis, Frauke Eigen, Tayo Heuser, Christine Hiebert, Tom Marioni, and Susan York from November 30, 2007–January 26, 2008. A reception will be held on Friday, November 30, from 6–8 PM.

Rudolf De Crignis’s works, executed in colored pencil on board, present almost imperceptible veils of evanescent color. Like his stratified paintings constructed from many layers of blue and white paint with one or more layers of another color deeply inserted into them, these drawings are not illustrations, a visual expression of a theoretical position, but rather a rendering of that which cannot be expressed in language: the entirely direct and accessible sensations that the viewer experiences in front of these works.

Frauke Eigen’s photographs, all images of the “real” world confound us with the purely quotidian, images that are simultaneously unfamiliar and entirely ordinary. Taken in locales as diverse as Los Angeles, Bosnia, and Tokyo—immediately familiar to their inhabitants and entirely foreign to each other—their formal precision resonates with feeling. Often details, these black-and-white-photographs of orthogonal architecture and variegated nature create an immediacy of mood with the contingency of their apprehension.

Tayo Heuser will show one work from a recent series of large drawings executed in ink on burnished and stained paper. Predominantly circular, the scale, around 4 x 4 feet, provides an encompassing image; but the realm that Heuser invites us to enter is not spatial but something less tangible. Investing in an understanding of both the immediate (the work itself) and the elusive, the exhibited work is dedicated to Agnes Martin. “Anyone who can sit on a stone in a field awhile can see my painting.”

Christine Hiebert’s new, large drawing demonstrates her ongoing engagement with charcoal on paper, and a desire to evoke space and animate it. Constructing her work in a highly intuitive way, she uses line to lead thought. It could also be said that she uses line to leave thought behind: meaning on the one hand, that she subordinates conscious thoughts to those that arise out of the searching line, and on another, that she leaves for us a trail of those searching moments.

Tom Marioni’s work, from a new series entitled Out-of-Body Free-Hand Circles is made by drawing circles with a pencil attached to a bamboo stick. Thus literally “out-of-body” in that the pencil is not grasped by the artist’s hand, the double entendre phrase also refers to the space the drawing occupies as well as that of the body that created it. The artist wrote, “My circles are tracings of themselves—by going over and over the circles each time getting them more correct I am tracing the circles underneath.”

Susan York’s drawings, installations, and sculptures are all composed from graphite, variously rubbed and polished on paper or directly on the wall, or cast in solid graphite. Evidencing the artist’s interest in duality, specifically tension and tranquility, the drawings here manifest tension through their material geometry and surface, tranquility through the infinitely fine modulation of the surface and repetitive effort in their production. Less seen than felt, ultimately these dualities fall away and distill into the sublimity of the present moment.

For further information and images please contact the gallery at 212 925 6098
or email info@roedergallery.com