PARAGONS: feat. DIANE SILVER (main gallery) AND DOUG PEARSALL (projects room)

The Loft at Liz’s is proud to present new works from artists Diane Silver and Doug Pearsall. Each of these emerging artists first began their exhibiting careers in our gallery, each to critical acclaim and to the fervent interest of collectors. PARAGONS will showcase new works from both artists.

DIANE SILVER (Main Gallery)

Diane Silver burst onto the art scene in our December 2013 exhibit “Luminosity” alongside featured artists Miri Chais, Larry Bell, Lisa Soto, Andy Moses, Luigia Martelloni, Linda Sher Salzman, Snezana Petrovic, Steven Fujimoto, Judith Hendler, Kenneth Ober and Shana Mabari.

Her site-specific installation titled “Let there be light” included the use of crystals and painted binary code, providing a powerful introductory impact to guests entering the exhibit.This was followed with Silver’s follow-up exhibition (Dec. 2014) featuring in HWIT. Her featured series of mixed media works quickly found their way into some very respectable private collections. Also featured was yet another site-specific installation “Man-Made Snow (winter 2085)”. Silver had created billowing piles of snow from thousands of unique paper strands, each containing embedded binary code. Other featured artists of “Luminosity” included Natalie Arnoldi, Patrick Bonneau, Carlos Grasso, Eric Johnson, Stuart Kusher, J.J. L’Heureux, Elizabeth Orleans and Zadik Zadikian.

Silver has developed an entirely new body of work for feature in “Paragons”.

The Loft at Liz’s is truly excited to introduce the artist’s new series.
Click here for review in Artscene.

Artist’s Statement:

“Seeing Virgins”

“Humans have a need to project images and ideas on otherwise benign patterns. Diane Silver in her new work explores the role Apophenia, the primal human instinct to perceive a connection in random visual information, plays in non-representational art.

Alien spacecraft, conspiracy theories and Virgins of Guadalupe (real or imagined) attest to the human compulsion to connect the dots. Science on the other hand is cause and effect, trial and error; scientific method. The two tend to collide in religion. Using binary code and silver leaf as a screen between the virtual and the spiritual Diane Silver’s paintings examine the enigma of how our brains react to random imagery.”

DOUG PEARSALL (Projects Room)

Upon first discovering Pearsall’s work via social media (facebook), The Loft at Liz’s Gallery Director, Randi Kreeft, reached out to the artist with interest in a particular series works to feature in DIVERTED DESTRUCTION – an annual exhibit (at that time in its 6th year) focused on works created from re-purposed materials or found objects. “From a brief corner-screen glimpse I was immediately hooked by his work,” said Kreeft. “The images seemed achingly familiar, sparking an immediate sense of nostalgia – yet I couldn’t put my finger on any defining derivative.”

For his inaugural feature with The Loft at Liz’s, Pearsall had developed a series of consisting of both abstracted and figural works comprised of Trader Joe’s shopping bags (Pearsall’s Imploding Grocery Bag series). The works directly referenced both the ecological concerns central to the exhibition’s theme as well as the nature of 21st century consumerism.

Of his DD6-featured work, the artist states, “I selected grocery bags as the source materials because I noted two things – the power of advertising in focusing attention and the stimulation of interest in a product within which brands become so familiar they obtain iconic cultural status. Hence the Imploding Grocery Bag was born. Working with grocery bags transformed my creative direction in collage.” Pearsall continued this exploration with a new series of collages pertinent to the IGB concept. This group exhibition also included works from artists Timothy Washington, Charles Dickson, Dale Brockman Davis, and Max Finkelstein.

The following year Pearsall was invited to show once again in The Loft at Liz’s, Diverted Destruction 7. His series, titled “Elevated Ephemera”, continued the artist’s exploration wherein impermanent waste can be made permanent through its transformation into art. His Scatterfield series continued to demonstrate how familiar imagery reformatted and rendered ambiguous maintains innate, subconscious recognizance.

“All of the art I construct for presentation is an amalgamation of ideas. I know this is true for every artist but specifically since my work is founded on process I see each project as a ratchet increment forward along a path of discovery.

In many ways this art makes no statement, it is about nothing. By that I mean it’s nonobjective and there are few if any associative references in its nuances. Does that mean the work is only about technique? This is true but there’s more to it because intrinsically my source material-junk mail, contains numerous cultural references because it consists of imagery that is designed for commercial consumer advertising. So even though these objects don’t refer to anything figurative or otherwise recognizable, subtle hints of the origin of their components are visible-retaining at least part of their visual potency. Additionally this work incorporates some of my explorations into utilizing some of the principles of gestalt therapy, though on a more subtle level than my previous renderings.

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