The Visual Arts Department at The Episcopal School of Dallas is pleased to present Relative Density: Material Processes. This group exhibition features work by five artists from the Dallas community who explore different technologies, methods of fabrication, and materials in their artmaking processes. Light, directions, and pathways are built into their works, activating the spaces within and around each piece. The reception in honor of the artists will be held Tuesday, September 12, 6:00-8:00 p.m. in the Jennifer and John Eagle Gallery in the Susan M. Frank Center for Arts & Humanities.
At the exhibit's entrance, Nida Bangash is showing The Tree House iii, a meticulous painting made of gouache, and silver and copper metalpoint on paper. On the opposite entry wall, her performance video work, This Bridge Called My Back, plays on the gallery monitor. Bangash is an interdisciplinary artist formally trained in Persian and South Asian miniature painting. Bangash's works explore the difficulties of immigration, colonialism, culture, and race by incorporating personal identity and experience through the use of intricate patterns and meticulous details.
Martha Elena's soft sculptures ¿Erres extraterrestre? & ¿ertserretartxe serrE? animate the north wall of the gallery with their mirrored, oversized, stuffed bodies. The breadth of Elena's work explores the idea of getting lost in translation. The work begins as a phrase converted using the Wingdings 3 font. These indecipherable phrases create a bridge between Elena's native Spanish and evolving English, a code only she can understand and manipulate. The soft, tangled forms are born from the desire to connect.
Ryan Goolsby shows two of his vibrant wooden sculptures on the two west-facing gallery walls. Employing both digital technologies and traditional art practices, Goolsby's work explores ideas of form, structure, and the search for meaning in everyday objects. The works in the show feature undulating lines oscillating with an energetic tension.
Carmen Menza is showing three of her light works in the exhibition, offering a different color spectrum and a sense of wonder. Menza is an interdisciplinary artist creating fine art and technology-based installations utilizing light, painting, interactive software, and music composition. Her work explores themes of time, space, color, perception, and human connection. Her intimate light-based worlds evoke a sense of engagement and defamiliarization.
Hannah Rotwein is showing two industrial sculptures. Untitled (Gooey Cheese) is a leaning wall piece made of wood glue, and Untitled (Yard Sign) employs the crunchy textures of cement and chicken wire, diverging from the clean edges of the environment and smooth surfaces of the other works in the show. By nodding to the shared cultural aesthetic of home, the work becomes relatable, resonant, and alive even though it is inanimate and abstracted.
Relative Density: Material Processes is curated by Makenzie Heinemann, Dane Larsen, and Juan Alberto Negroni. Special thanks to Jennifer and John Eagle and Jordan Hale.