Frank Rodick Exhibit at Andrea Meislin Gallery

Saturday, 02 September 2006 11:44

New York City - Andrea Meislin Gallery is pleased to present Arena, the first New York solo exhibition for Toronto artist Frank Rodick.  The exhibition opens 7 September and runs through 7 October 2006.

Arena marks the third and most recent body of work by Frank Rodick.  In the artist’s own words, the title of this exhibition refers to “a place of spectacle, a place of combat and/or entertainment, a place where we come together to watch other members of our species encounter each other in ways that perhaps take us simultaneously outside of ourselves and deeper within.”  Each photograph within the series evokes a wide spectrum of primeval human emotions, taking the viewer on “a journey into primal territory.”  The imagery is often highly sexual, suggesting pleasure and ecstasy, while concurrently evoking pain and death.

Each work in Arena is a conventionally photographed “moment” taken from video recordings.  Using various techniques to manipulate the composition of each image, and several processes in the darkroom to further adjust their appearance, Rodick achieves an indeterminate, dark and gritty quality that characterizes the superficial impression of these photographs.  All of the images are hand printed and toned by the artist, with each work becoming unique as a result of variations in toning and materials used, such as filters.

A selection of photographs from Arena was chosen by Katherine Ware, Curator of Photographs at the Philadelphia Museum of Art, for inclusion in the Discoveries of the Meeting Place exhibition at FotoFest 2006.  Frank Rodick’s work has been exhibited internationally, including solo exhibitions in Asuncion, Paraguay; Buenos Aires, Argentina; and Toronto, Canada. His photographs are in the permanent collections of major museums and private collections including Museet for Fotokunst, Denmark and the Museum of Fine Arts, Houston.