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Jayne
H. Baum
Susanna Cole and Erin Donnelly
Elena Filipovic
Ingrid LaFleur
Trong G. Nguyen
Olu Oguibe
Chika Okeke
Sandhini Poddar
Praxis
Ashkan Sahihi
Marketa Uhlirova
You cataracts and hurricanoes, spout
Till you have drench'd our steeples, drown'd the cocks!
You sulphurous and thought-executing fires,
Vaunt-couriers to oak-cleaving thunderbolts,
Singe my white head!
–King Lear Act III 2
Vision and reflection reveal themselves as guiding forces in the choice of artist and work as we regard the premise of “The One.” Monica Goetz’s Convex/Concave consists of two mirrors, one concave and one convex, placed next to each other on the wall, resembling a pair of oversized eyes. However, these eyes do not engage you and you do not gain access to their vision. Standing in front of the concave mirror, the one sees oneself as an upside-down reflection and when walking closer one’s image flips and one sees an enlarged image of oneself. The convex mirror positions the viewer at the center of an extremely wide-angle view of the interior. Reflecting an unfamiliar and distorted yet recognizable image back at the viewer they force a maddening and disorienting sort of self-recognition. A stereoscopic view into both is unattainable which the artist describes aptly: “In fact, it is impossible to process the information simultaneously, one has to choose and focus on one of the mirrors.” Examining the power that our own senses have over our ability to reason, Convex/Concave forces us to focus on that ethereal moment that overwhelms our perception and reason and turns them over to our senses. They constitute a power by which even kings may be ruled.
About the curators
Erin Donnelly and Susanna Cole have worked as a curatorial team since they met in the Whitney Independent Study Program five years ago. They have collaborated on numerous exhibitions including at ‘the lab’ at the Roger Smith Hotel, Kunsthalle Exnergasse in Vienna and The Peekskill Project, among others. Erin is residency director and curator at the Lower Manhattan Cultural Council and Susanna is a doctoral candidate in art history at Columbia University.
