If you have not seen it yet, this week is your last chance to check out Jenene Nagy’s Brilliant Exhibition at PDX Contemporary Arts in Portland, Oregon. Nagy is Anderson Ranch’s Artistic Director for Painting, Drawing, & Printmaking and the Artists-in-Residence Program. Do not miss this if you are in the area!
object 2, Jenene Nagy, 2014.
palladium gilded papier-mâché and concrete
59″ x 16 1/4″ x 12 1/2″
brilliant
New Work by Jenene Nagy
Sept. 2-27, 2014
PDX Contemporary Art
925 NW Flanders
Portland, OR 97209
For more information please visit:
pdxcontemporaryart.com/brilliant
jenenenagy.com
Artist’s Statement
The works in brilliant are an investigation into notions of value and perception. The boundaries of image and object are blurred by the variable of light behavior and its relationship to the physical properties of graphite. Basic materials and techniques are used to create a dialogue surrounding our understanding worth.
Conceptually, the work is in response to a culture based on class. Gemstones, in particular diamond cuts, are used not only as a launching off point for abstraction but also to create a tension between the high and low. The valueless (ie. a rock) becomes elevated to an object of status through countless hours of carving, rubbing, scrapping. The obsession associated with this type of labor is manifested in the large drawing. Similar to the act of diamond cutting, the build up of this labor transforms the simple materials of paper and graphite into an object of worth.
Bio
Jenene Nagy is a visual artist living and working in Aspen and Los Angeles. She received her BFA from the University of Arizona in 1998 and her MFA from the University of Oregon in 2004. Nagy’s work has been exhibited nationally and internationally at venues including the Portland Art Museum, Weatherspoon Art Museum, Torrance Art Museum, Takt Kunstprojektraum in Berlin, Germany, and Dam Stuhltrager in NY, among others. She has received grants from the NY Foundation for Contemporary Art, the Ford Family Foundation, Colorado Creative Industries, and the Oregon Arts Commission. Her work was named by the Huffington Post as one of the Northwest’s Top Ten Exhibition Picks of 2010. Along with a rigorous studio practice, Nagy is one half of the curatorial team TILT Export:, an independent art initiative with no fixed location, working in partnership with a variety of venues to produce exhibitions. From 2010-11 she was the Curator-in-Residence for Disjecta Contemporary Art Center in Portland, Oregon. Nagy currently serves as the Artistic Director of Painting and Printmaking at Anderson Ranch Arts Center and sits on the Board of Directors for ARTPAPERS.
