DeCordova Museum Shows 'Big Bang! Abstract Painting'

Written by Ronald Wilson Monday, 13 September 2010 22:31

LINCOLN, MA — Abstract painting is not dead!  Big Bang! Abstract Painting for the 21st Century heralds the revitalization of non-representational painting for a new century.  This thematic group exhibition features works by fifteen contemporary artists active in the Northeast whose imagery is informed by computer technology, cosmology, quantum physics, information theory, genetics, neurology, complexity theory, remote sensing, and other ways of analyzing, representing, and processing vast amounts of ever-shifting and morphing data.  The paintings in Big Bang! surge with energy, explode with color, and immerse viewers in parallel universes of stunning visual experience and sheer imagination.  And despite the insistent references to science and the digital world, each artwork is completely painted by hand, juxtaposing cutting-edge and age-old technologies.  On exhibition 20 January until 22 April, 2007.

This new generation of artists aims to resuscitate abstract painting, and make it entirely relevant to the broadest philosophical concerns of 21st-century life.  During the first half of the 20th century, non-representational painting was at the very forefront of Modernism, but as the century progressed, the importance and vitality of the style waned. Abstract painting was eclipsed by the aesthetic innovations of sculpture, installation art, and art-and-technology, and itself became a victim of stultifying formalism and the ironic and self-reflexive excesses of Postmodernism.  Now, abstract painting is no longer about Cartesian geometries, the Freudian id, the Existentialist gesture, fields of pure color, or deconstructions of these great themes of Modernism.  Big Bang! presents a new aesthetic, based on the structures and patterns of the universe, the mind, and the technologies that link them – Art for the Information Age.  Abstraction is made meaningful – and beautiful – once more.

Big Bang!

is displayed throughout DeCordova Museum’s new wing and fourth floor galleries, and includes paintings by: Peter Barrett (Woodstock, NY), Thaddeus Beal (Somerville, MA), Steven Bogart (Maynard, MA), Sean Foley (Worthington, OH), Reese Inman (Boston, MA), Clint Jukkala (New Haven, CT), Julie Miller (Boston, MA), Meg Brown Payson (Freeport, ME), Jon Petro (Worcester, MA), Cristi Rinklin (South Boston, MA), Terry Rose (Providence, RI), Sarah Slavick (Jamaica Plain, MA), Laurel Sparks (Jamaica Plain, MA), Barbara Takenaga (Williamstown, MA), and Sarah Walker (South Boston, MA).

This exhibition is part of the 2007 Boston Cyberarts Festival, a biennial celebration of artists and high-tech professionals who use computers to advance traditional visual and performing arts disciplines.  The Festival includes exhibitions of visual arts; music, dance, and theatrical performances; film and video presentations; educational programs; and lecture/demonstrations and symposia.  The Festival runs April 20 - May 6, 2007.  Please visit www.bostoncyberarts.org for more information.

Big Bang!

is organized by Curator Nick Capasso and Lisa Sutcliffe, Mary Levin and William Koch Curatorial Fellow, and is accompanied by a catalogue with an essay and full-color reproductions.

General Information: DeCordova Museum is open Tuesday through Sunday, 10 am to 5 pm and on selected Monday holidays.  General admission during Museum hours is $9 for adults, $6 for senior citizens, students, and youth ages 6–12.  Children age 5 and under, Lincoln residents, and Active Duty Military Personnel and their dependents are admitted free.  The Sculpture Park is open year round during daylight hours.  Visit www.decordova.org