COASTAL COVEN
Featuring: Anna Fidler + Katy Stone
Show Runs November 6, 2015 – January 23, 2016
Reception: Friday, November 6, 5-8pm
In Coastal Coven, Anna Fidler and Katy Stone toy with the relationship between the natural world and the supernatural realm just beyond, with the boundary between constantly melting in and out of focus. The artists sculpt in layers of metal, paper and paint unearthing radiant mythical bursts of energy from their homeland in the Pacific Northwest.
Anna Fidler creates topographic landscapes of uncanny rituals. In her hallucinatory visions, bodies contain as many layers as sedimentary rocks, though all solidity is replaced with pure energy and color. Inspired by ‘70s science fiction book covers by luminaries like Ursula K. LeGuin and Madeleine L’Engle, Fidler infuses the retro imagery with the spirit of fairy tales that never were, leaving the viewer to parse the real from the unreal. Fidler begins her process by pouring paint with rapid pace and great bodily motion, reminiscent of action painter Helen Frankenthaler, then working to carve her canvas into figurative topographies. Inviting the viewer to piece together a story true or imagined, Fidler crafts elliptical tales that peel back to infinite new revelations.
Katy Stone renders hard-edged silhouettes suggestive of leaves and plants–exaggerated forms floating between the natural world and a fantastical simulacrum. Her painted aluminum shapes cascade through space, casting wild shadows that seem to be in constant flux, even in stillness. Reminiscent of both pop art from the 1960s and ‘70s and early 20th century abstraction, Stone alludes to the psychedelic and the cartoonish while maintaining a close relationship to mother nature. Floating, melting, blooming and hiding, her works collapse the space between the familiar and the fantastical, leaving the viewer to wonder if she’s experiencing a visceral memory or something preternatural. Her animated bodies of flora and phenomena activate the imagination, alluding to an entire universe just beyond our comprehension.
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