Exhibition runs: July 10 - August 8, 2009
Exhibition hours: Wednesday 2 to 6pm, and Thursday through Saturday from 12 to 6 p.m
Opening reception: Friday, July 10, 2009 from 7pm to 9pm
In his first solo exhibition with Civilian Art Projects, artist Ryan Hill curates content from the “digital museums” of Google, YouTube and Flickr and reassembles it as works on paper in the gallery space. Quoting, tracing, and drawing from internet images, the artist describes his intimate installations as “a free range of associations, from the gothic to the absurd.”
Using tracing and transfer paper, colored pencils, inks and gouaches, Hill draws and paints humorous, sometimes dark, and varied images of heads, skulls, castles, bubbles, and chrysanthemums. According to the artist, “I view all these as fragile and self-contained worlds floating in the abyss of the blank paper.” Heads and skeletons dominate the work.
Referencing his thought process, a background in conceptual performance, and free association, the drawings are exhibited in seemingly disparate groupings encouraging the viewer to form connections within the work. “Overall, my work consistently aims for a direct address, keeping the gestural qualities of my mediums to a minimum,” says Hill. “I view the installation of the drawings, their juxtaposition on the wall and in the gallery space, as when they become invested with meaning. When drawing I see what I make as partial objects, props that complete each other when put together in front of a viewer. They have no real relevancy until they become cultural entities.”
Considering a range of concepts such as growing older, mortality, and myth, Hill’s inspiration for the series grew out of a personal photograph of his father “when he was staring off into space.” Hill writes, “reflecting on how he was growing older, my understanding of his values and how much society stopped reflecting them back to him made me also think about myself. My father is the first iteration of Baby Boomers and myself is the last – ideas of progress, the Great Society, loving one another were constructed by his generation and deconstructed by mine. In that moment I saw that this whole social project was going to vanish with us and something we would never fully comprehend would take it’s place through another generation.”
Hill is a Los Angeles born, Washington, DC based artist who also writes and performs. He earned a Master’s degree in studio art from the California Institute of the Arts and a Master’s degree in film and television from University of California. His drawing installations have been shown in Los Angeles, CA, New York City, NY, Washington, DC, and Melbourne, Australia. He has performed at colleges and art spaces including the L.A. County Museum of Art and LAX><ART in Los Angeles, White Box Gallery in New York, and Sculpture Center in Long Island NY, and P.S.1 Contemporary Arts Center in Long Island City, NY. Hill currently teaches drawing and painting courses at George Washington University, serves on the Board of Directors for the arts organization Transformer in Washington, DC, and organizes public education programs and at the Hirshhorn Museum & Sculpture Garden.
July 10 - August 8, 2009
Opening Reception: Friday, July 10, 2009, 7 - 9pm
In his first solo exhibition with Civilian Art Projects, artist Ryan Hill curates content from the “digital museums” of Google, YouTube and Flickr and reassembles it as works on paper in the gallery space. Quoting, tracing, and drawing from internet images, the artist describes his intimate installations as “a free range of associations, from the gothic to the absurd.”
