Group Show: Commune

                                         Image: Brian Bress, Still from 'Baby', DVD, 9 minutes, 2009 /  ©Brian Bress

                                         Image: Brian Bress, Still from 'Baby', DVD, 9 minutes, 2009 /  ©Brian Bress

Press Release / May 21 - June 27, 2009

BLACK & WHITE GALLERY is pleased to host COMMUNE – group exhibition organized by the independent curator and critic Dominique Nahas.

COMMUNE brings together twenty four nationally and internationally recognized artists whose diverse and surprising works examine networks of forces brought to bear by exchange through the social bond, be it through family, fellowship of friends, lovers, school affiliations, secular and religious organizations, class structures, collectives, and nations.

Noriko Ambe, Erik Benson, Brian Bress, Osvaldo Budet, Carolina Caycedo, Jared Clark, Blane De St. Croix, Oana Farcas, Caoimhghin O Fraithile, Charley Friedman, Chitra Ganesh, Oded Hirsch, Hidenori Ishii, Steve Keister, Julia Kunin, Oliver Lutz, Julian Montague, Maurizio Pellegrin, John Powers, Michael Rees, Peter Rostovsky, Julianne Swartz, Jacques Louis Vidal, Roberto Visani 

COMMUNE assembles works that, in keeping with the dual aspect of this word, address an intensified sensation of being unified with one’s surroundings as expressed by artists in subtle and unpredictable ways. The term COMMUNE creates a manifold site of relations that pertains to shared experiences in places of congregation, architectural notations, technological networks, geopolitical parameters, social engineering, as well as to the subject of an enhanced experience with one’s immediate surroundings. As a noun A COMMUNE invokes a gathering of people, closely knit. The verb TO COMMUNE insinuates the taking-in of one’s surroundings in an intensified way, invoking suggestions of a sublime experience with nature.

“I’ve established deep personal and professional bonds with each artist in COMMUNE. They are my friends. Organizing this summer show at Black & White Gallery for me has been akin to the creating of a fantasy island. On this island distinct artworks co-exist in mutuality, as visions of possibilities and impossibilities are marooned, fated to converse, to sing and laugh together, endlessly, communally.” Dominique Nahas, New York, April, 2009.