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Time and Measure

For Immediate Release: November 1, 2007

For more information contact:
Julie Ann Cavnor 410-962-8565 / jcavnor@mdartplace.org

Maryland Art Place presents: Time and Measure

Exhibition Dates: November 13 - December 22, 2007

Friday, November 30: Gallery Talk 6 pm / Reception 7 pm

Baltimore, Maryland—Maryland Art Place is pleased to announce Time and Measure—an exhibition featuring installation-based work by three artists working in different media with subtly overlapping intentions.  Each artist has a different means of exploring the notion of timing as it relates to perception, determining the basis for which a work is measured by way of interpretation.

R.L. Croft builds large colorful metal sculptures constructed from scavenged consumer and industrial materials intended to create the effect of two conflicting forces—that of despair, juxtaposed with anxious humor and a haven through work.

The two sculptures included in the exhibition, Guardian and Perpetual Notion Machine, are members of the railcar/dolly series—traveling platforms that reference fragments of the artist’s thought process, combining elements of humor, absurdity, and tragedy, along with personal autobiographical content.

Croft describes his work as, “mental self-portraits of an introspective nature, changing in form and content, yet retaining recognizable traits from one to another.”  The structures, which are primarily aluminum, are assembled using standard steel hardware, fasteners, and aluminum pop rivets.

Also on exhibit is a selection of Croft’s drawings, which are made independently from his sculptures. Created using graphite on paper, the images “are loosely traced objects that are interconnected, overlapped and sometimes arbitrarily arranged in pursuit of a visual plot tied together by a title.”

Kevin Wolff creates sound and video installations that examine the idea of perceptual versus conceptual interpretation, and the relationship that exists between the two. In speaking about his work, Wolff comments, “It arises from an interest in how one’s view of external, purportedly objective reality may necessarily be filtered through or even created by internal, subjective states of mind.”

The works being shown each have multiple video channels that incorporate original video footage which has been edited and manipulated, often frame by frame. The video and sound, once combined with a variety of sculptural elements, comprise the three installations contained in the exhibition.  

Christopher Whittey examines the way in which industry perceives the individual as an instrument in the labor process through his three part installation series, The Body of Work. In the first of this three part series, One Hand Washes the Other, the artist displays 16,000 cast fingers on the gallery floor to represent the number of fingers amputated in labor-related situations annually. The wall panels that accompany the installation represent the three different technologies through which the laborer is processed—the industrial, the medical and the aesthetic, contributing to the notion that the laborer is viewed as a commodity—freely exchanged between these technological areas.  

Whittey notes, “The aesthetic technologies/panels are based on the “white on white” paintings of Malevich, and are studies of the configuration of the floor work, the number of fingers, that is, that can be fitted into a given square area. Moments in time can obviously have—perhaps demand—their historical Other, and I attempt to define our present, dystopian moment (regarding labor) relative to Malevich’s utopian one."

Time and Measure will remain on view through Saturday, December 22nd. Please make plans to join us on Friday, November 30th at 6 pm for a Gallery Talk with participating artists, followed by a Reception at 7 pm.

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Maryland Art Place (MAP) is a not-for-profit center for contemporary art established in 1981 to: develop and maintain a dynamic environment for regional artists to exhibit their work, nurture and promote new ideas and new forms, and facilitate rewarding exchanges between artists and the public through educational leadership. Gallery hours are Tuesday through Saturday, 11am to 5 pm. There is no admission charge to enter the gallery or to participate in MAP’s regular programs and events.