Gallery two:

Music to my Eyes:

Rob grad and James van arsdale

July 25 — august 29, 2020

Music is basic to human experience, in all cultures, throughout all of our (known) history. It touches us subjectively in ways that no other art form can. But some musicians, like van Arsdale and Grad, push these experiences into the realm of sculpture as committed artists too. Their experiments in trying to tie aspects of the two practices together finds two very different outcomes presented in this exhibition.

van Arsdale explores psychological development, through the youth and drug experiments of our lives, via memory, nostalgia and sub-cultural referents to place his inquiry within a dialogue concerning the role music plays in forming our understanding of ones own place in the world. We are not separate from this entangled existence, not objective with any real emotional distance - our musical histories a significant part of who we are and what we think.

Grad uses a more formal approach focusing on issues of layering, placement and rhythm, searching for a visual equivalency to the experience of music and its construction. His abstract works closely align with music formation and the interplay of sound and instrument to form a harmonious whole.

Both artists utilize assembling as a tool, much like different musical instruments in a band. They both share a performative aspect of placement and composition, with the ability to transport us through time, to bring into bright focus our own memories and experiences with music as a soundtrack to our lives.

Combining emotive and subjective depths with formal rigor, conceptual underpinning and aesthetic complexity they present us with the Utopian hope embedded in both art and music.

EXHIBITION PHOTO GALLERY