Geary Contemporary will be hosting an opening reception for the artist Thursday September 8, 6 – 8 PM. This will be Turner’s second solo exhibition with the gallery.
Turner uses many materials in her new work, including acrylic resin, breast milk, charred sticks, and ash along with her former use of textiles. As she continues to explore the use of textiles and their historically engendered properties, Turner is now combining the softness of that material with resin to create hard, wall mounted works. In new floor works, Turner uses breast milk mixed with resin and acrylic paint to create a base for burned sticks and other charred material. These large pieces embody dissident emotions; maternal nourishment and the destruction of fire are combined and safely encased within an abstract form.
The title of this show, Bells & Burn Piles, speaks to the contrast of harmony and dissonance which the works embody. As Alex Fialho of Artforum writes in the catalogue essay, “a bell’s womb-like, ovular shape reflects its pregnant possibility to be filled with sound.” Turner’s pieces oscillate between visual dissonance and harmony.
Turner’s exhibition at Geary Contemporary celebrates the feminine and the maternal through a simultaneous deconstruction and rebirth of the pregnant bell form. By weaving together materials typically germane to the decorative world of the home, Turner channels a character on the edge, standing before the flames, ready to welcome something new into the world.