The show will be on view January 9 –February 7, 2015 at 185 Varick Street, NY. Using their respective choice of materials, process, and imagery, Gil and Goldstein embrace the open-ended interpretation of their surroundings, inviting the viewer to join in the search for surprise meaning and unpredictable relationships. In distinctly different styles, there is an optical quality to both artists’ work that forces the viewer’s eye to continually adjust its focus, a visual reinforcement of the multisided questions that serve as the basis of their expression.
Sally Gil’s two-dimensional work is built up from layers of collaged materials creating a ground of patterned imagery that lends physical depth to the piece. Order and randomness are two factors that, from Gil’s point of view, play an important part in the definition of beauty. “ I am interested in the relationship between logic and intuition,” the artist has said. “I believe they are interdependent. Since I tend to work intuitively I’ve learned [that] intuition [is] generated by information. Intuition is actually based on logic and careful observation to all apparent clues.”
Rebekah Goldstein’s works have a similar sense of an undefined, but actively thinking space. The artist has developed a complex process of fabricating three- dimensional tableaux (which resemble abstracted still lifes) in her studio, fragments of which are then translated to her two-dimensional work. “Throughout a body of work, I build up my own pictorial language with a specific set of symbols, shapes, forms, and colors. These fragments become reoccurring characters that appear throughout multiple works. In a single painting I reassemble, fracture, and choreograph these visual elements, working improvisationally until I arrive at an image held together by its own internal logic.”
Sally Gil, based in Brooklyn, received her BA from UC at San Diego and her MFA from Hunter College, CUNY. She has had solo exhibitions at 571 Projects, NY (2010), University of North Carolina, Charlotte (2009), and Dean Bergen Gallery, NYC (2007). Her work has been featured in group exhibitions at The Brooklyn Museum, NY (1997); and White Columns, NYC (1999), among other venues. The artist was a Fellow at Apexart (2013) and a Visiting Artist at University of North Carolina, Charlotte (2010). A selection of her work is held in The Viewing Program, The Drawing Center, NYC.
Rebekah Goldstein currently resides in San Francisco and received her BA from Sarah Lawrence College, NY, and her MFA from California College of The Arts, San Francisco. She is represented by CULT/Aimee Friberg, San Francisco. Solo exhibitions of her work have been held at Cult Exhibitions San Francisco (2014), 50 Fremont, San Francisco (2014), and City Limits Gallery, Oakland(2013). Her group exhibitions include shows at The Battery, San Francisco (2014); Alter Space Gallery, San Francisco (2013); and the Berkley Art Center, Berkley (2013). In addition to residencies at The Atlantic Center for The Arts, New Smyrna, Florida (2012), CCA’s New York Studio Program, AICAD Studio, Brooklyn (2011), Goldstein founded The Painting Salon in 2012, a monthly forum that fosters conversation about contemporary art practice.