POP-UP exhibition featuring works by Irene Garibay, Ava Howard, Ruzica Ivanovic, Celia Garcia Nogales, Sophia Schultz and Sarah Viviana Valdez, curated by Sarah Viviana Valdez.
The work in Second Skin explores tactile interconnectivity. The artists’ ideas have naturally merged by means of interactions with all sorts of materials to define the context of the second skin. These artists have in common an understanding of the body as an entity that expands out its physical contour. Dynamic semiotic materials that form diverse bodies that co-shapes one another. Donna Haraway mentions in When Species Meet that “ … figures have always been where the biological and literary or artistic come together with all of the force of lived reality. My body itself is just such a figure, literally.” She curiously observes the doubleness of our world, where we exist in mundane synergy.
The skin has sensors, consumes experiences, provides a shelter, retains memory, can be subtracted, added or manipulated, changes through time, sheds and regenerates. It interconnects a collection of memories that play an essential role for species when they respond and relate to one another. The final result of this survey is guided through a series of works created with methods that exist outside of the material and transport the spectator and the artist inside the body.
Artists Bio’s:
Irene Garibay (Mexico City, 1991) received her B.A. in Fine Arts from Ringling College of Art and Design in 2016 with a trustee scholarship. She is currently working on a grand sculpture for Ringling Collage’s library through the Nancy Markle sculpture grand.
Sophia Schultz is an Anthropology thesis student receiving her B.A at New College of Florida. Born and raised in Sarasota her art focuses on the body as a home for trauma and healing. She works primarily with installations, photography, and video to engulf the audience into a narrative.
Ružica Ivanović comes from Bosnia and Herzegovina, she is currently a senior in Fine Art in Ringling College of Art and Design, with a main interest in sculpture and installation work.
Ava Z. Howard is an interdisciplinary artist, activist, and organizer in Sarasota, Florida. She is currently working on her B.A at the New College of Florida, as well as organizing with Nothing Arts Collective. Ava studies and is active in the social sciences and art, and allows these intersections to inform her work.
Celia Garcia Nogales (Madrid, Spain) is a student of Fine Arts at Ringling College of Art and Design. She concentrates on printmaking processes and collage.
Sarah Viviana Valdez is a multi-disciplinary artist and independent curator based out of Sarastoa, FL. She received her B.F.A from the Ringling School of Art and Design Fine Art department in 2010.
Artworks:
Celia Garcia Nogales and Ruzica Ivanovic
Dermis
Canvas, wood, projectors and digital video.
(Performance during the opening reception)
In collaboration we have made a video projection piece that speaks about the composition of the skin layers and the hidden events under its superficial tissue.
Ava Z. Howard and Sophia Schultz
‘my home holds me in, and what seeps through’
Canvas, natural dyes, wood, cyanotypes photographs, plants, steel rod, found objects
This piece recognizes the second skin as being one of multiple layers. When descending past the surface it reveals what cannot be seen and what is protected. Remnants of the self, vulnerability, growth, and memory are found within this actualized space.
Irene Garibay
Trozos Alrededor (Slices Around)
Scoby (cultures of bacteria and yeast present during production of kombucha), hemp string and light bulb.
Trozos Alrededor is a sculpture that intends to reveal fragmented materiality. The sculpture is the space, the sculpture is the smelly body in decay, drying out and cracking.
Sarah Viviana Valdez
Biodegradable Gorget : Prototype I
Scoby (cultures of bacteria and yeast present during production of kombucha, mycelium chest plate (root of a mushroom), corn stalk, flour, concrete blocks and hemp rope.
This gorget accessory is part of a series of prototypes that biodegrade and merges biology with design. The materials propose a needed identity for me and to our developing counter culture—to establish a true connection to the natural decaying world.
Intra-Figure
Guache, salt water, cold press rag paper
Solace Death: Critter I
Digital Animation 00:00:30 Loop
This animation and painting is part of a series where each figure goes through a stage in death.
Exhibit runs until November 5th
Gallery Hours: Monday thru Saturday (10 am – 4:00 pm)
Art Center Sarasota
www.artsarasota.org
707 N. Tamiami Tr, Sarasota, FL 34236
941-365-2032