Mark Your Calendars: Pop-Up Living Room Art Exhibition Coming to Red Hook

“Live in your world / Play in ours” is a group exhibition that will present works by New York-based emerging artists who work with different media. This exhibition, curated by Red Hook artist Kyoko Hamaguchi, is meant to simulate common elements of a living space. For example, pedestals will be replaced by a dining table on which several artworks will be displayed.

“In this environment, furniture and belongings take on a temporary and ephemeral quality and attachment becomes a liability, rendering the lives of individuals more ethnographically removed, anonymous, and even abstract,” Hamaguchi said.

This pop-up living room reflects the instability of living in New York City where people constantly move around and lose track of their neighbors. The show, whose title derives from Playstation’s famous slogan, will invite the viewer to play around in the space with the understanding that it references the simulation of reality.

The nine participating artists are: Theo Chin, Jonathan Yukio Clark, Robin Crookall, Minami Kobayashi, Andy Ralph, Kristina Schmidt, Adam Shaw, Stipan Tadić and Matthew Weiderspon.

Chin will present a computer-generated living space populated by figures made from photographs of hand airbrushed analogue drawings. For this show his work refers to a novel as a basis for considering technology and romance in contemporary life. Clark’s sculptures partition/frame the surrounding space – including one that pairs shoji screen paper with casts of natural right-angle volcanic stones, which his grandfather collected and incorporated into the corners of his house. Crookall’s sculptures capture the moment of an object’s life almost like a photograph.

“Her artificial dying plants ironically point out our desire to make our living situation look fresh by trying to make the inside look like the outside, playing with boundaries,” according to Hamaguchi.

Kobayashi uses egg tempera to paint transitory moments of private domestic interaction. Ralph constructs sculptures from disposable daily objects like Coca-Cola cans, Wonder Bread and cardboard boxes. His use of repetition emphasizes processes of consumption, waste, and reuse, pointing to the overwhelming similarities of day-to-day life among all individuals. Schmidt capitalizes on the concurrency of ceramics’ vulnerability and stability. Shaw renders time in his painting through the addition of a clock, which begs to question how the familiar becomes unfamiliar. Tadić’s paintings provide a detailed look at the living situation in the neighborhood he grew up in while conjuring memories of our own living situations, past and present. Weiderspon’s piece involves one of the dining table’s supporting legs, which contains burning incense (causing smoke to be released from underneath the table).

“[Weiderspon] considers ephemeral sensation to be important in a living space and is attentive to metaphors of support, the body, natural phenomena and elemental transference,” Hamaguchi said.

This site-specific exhibition will be held at Compère Collective @ Realty Collective (351 Van Brunt St.), May 12 to 22, everyday from noon to 6 pm. The opening reception will take place on May 12, 6-9pm.

Compère Collective’s mission is to nurture and host diverse artistic practice and thoughtful dialogue, understanding that art should be used as a catalyst for critical thinking. It has hosted a diverse set of exhibitions, events, and artists since opening its doors in 2012 by Victoria Alexander, the owner of Realty Collective.

For more information, visit liveinyourworldplayinours.tumblr.com.

Photo courtesy of Hamaguchi