End of Chaos, End of Emptiness
Front Porch Forum Gallery
Curator Talk & Artist Reception
Thursday, August 2nd, 6PM
ARTISTS
Jason Galligan-Baldwin
Robert Waldo Brunelle, Jr.
Marc Awodey
Gowri Savoor
Phil Whitman
Ric Kasini Kadour
En Masse
Curated by Ric Kasini Kadour, “End of Chaos, End of Emptiness” is an exhibition of artwork that explores visual representations of community and the role of the artist in community. In addition to the art in the show demonstrating an aspect of community (family, affinity, collaboration, time, and geography), the makers of the work have a strong community element in their practice.
The gallery is made possible through the support of Front Porch Forum.
The exhibition title is a reference to psychiatrist Scott Peck’s theories of community building which suggest that individuals only experience true community when they move beyond the negativity of chaos and the biases that foster emptiness and into a place of listening and understanding.
Montreal-based En Masse is a drawing collective which will illustrate a 4’x4’x4’ cube that will stand on point in the middle of the gallery. This community of artists comes together to make elaborate illustrations on canvas, wall, and rooms.
Phil Whitman’s “Devil’s Den Drawings” create an artificial community based on the affinity for Devil’s Den at Gettysburg National Military Park. Whitman sources photographs of tourists visiting the site online and then re-draws the photograph by hand, subtly altering the people in it. This act unwittingly puts the anonymous people in a fairly intimate community with the artist.
Gowri Savoor’s “Treehouse” Series explores the notion of community and its adaptation to our changing environment. As time goes on, relationships with the land and our communities become more disparate and unwieldy. Treehouse structures, shacks, houses, farmsteads, villages, towns and cities – part factual, part imaginary – depict a dreamscape of a potential future where safe, sustainable housing and an abundance of natural resources are increasingly beyond reach.
Jason Galligan-Baldwin’s “Agent” Series is a collection of portraits on skateboards that document a social and friendship network. Collectively, they are a reminder of our individuality and the role of the individual in our own circles of friends.
Painters Marc Awodey and Robert Waldo Brunelle, Jr. are staples of Vermont’s art community. Brunelle’s “August Afternoon” series explores a neighborhood without people, a community abandoned for the respite of a good nap and quietude of a summer afternoon. By contrast, Anne Galloway, in a review published in Vermont Today, describes Awodey’s paintings, “His dramatic, haunting paintings…are a study in alienation, disconnection and melancholy. He creates landscapes that are like no place you’ve ever seen; they more aptly picture the way you’ve felt in a particular place.”
Ric Kasini Kadour’s sculpture, End of Chaos, End of Emptiness, is an attempt to visually render community using 2″x2″x48″ sticks connected with nuts and bolts. The result is an amorphous and oddly shaped structure where all the sticks are connected and interdependent.
“End of Chaos, End of Emptiness” takes place in the Front Porch Forum Gallery which is part of the Winooski Pop-Up Gallery District, June 22nd to August 4th. A curator talk & artist reception will take place on Thursday, August 2nd at 6PM.
The exhibition is available for circulation. Inquiries should be directed to info@kasinihouse.com.
