Allison Gildersleeve exhib

Allison Gildersleeve, an artist in Brooklyn, opens a new installation, “In The Retelling”, at CYNTHIA-REEVES located on the MASS MoCA campus in North Adams. The exhibition formally opens with an artist reception on Saturday, September 29th, 5 – 7 pm. During the week prior, Gildersleeve will be on site from the 25th through to the opening day, creating an installation in the gallery based on recent drawing and collages. The gallery will be open to the public during the working session, giving audiences an opportunity to speak with the artist and observe firsthand the development of the installation. The signature, large scale collage will be complemented by large mixed-media works on paper and paintings. The exhibition runs through November 3rd.

Gildersleeve continues to bend the landscape genre into a different language — a painting language — that takes history, memory, and time all into account and turns them into tangible elements of her landscape. Gildersleeve achieves this synthesis by playing overtly with the canvas’ positive/ negative shapes, often beginning her paintings in black and white as she describes the clear shapes in each tangle of branches or the cross sections of stonewalls. The high density patterning serves a dual functionality: firstly, it flattens the painting, and puts the viewer’s gaze on the warp and weft of her composition; and secondly, it provides the artist with the intricate lacework through which she can weave her high pitch of color.

Press Release (pdf)