Place Names: manuel arturo abreu and Christopher Paul Jordan
March 20, 2018 – May 20, 2018
Closed March 30 – April 1, 2018 (Easter Weekend)
Christopher Paul Jordan, Latent Home Two 326, scanned negative, 2007-2017.
Opening Reception:
March 18, 2018, 5:00 to 7:00 p.m.
Place Names is an exhibition by regional artists manuel arturo abreu (Portland, OR) and Christopher Paul Jordan (Tacoma, WA). Through painting, sculpture, built environments and explorations of language, Place Names explores the abstracted visual and emotional cues that influence how a sense a “place” is communicated. The artists each construct visual narratives from notions of the geographical and cultural locales that have been generative to their thinking as artists and poets. The works in Place Names appropriate objects such as stray window frames, graffiti-laden panels, well-worn maps, and evocations of their workspaces as signifiers of the cultural, economic and racial influences within inherited identity.
manuel arturo abreu (b. 1991, Santo Domingo) is an artist and writer from the Bronx. They received their B.A. in Linguistics from Reed College in 2014, and currently lives and works in a garage in southeast Portland. Recent group exhibitions with Rhizome and the New Museum (online), the Cooley Gallery (Portland), Chicken Coop Contemporary (Portland), Veronica project space (Seattle) and AA|LA Gallery (Los Angeles). Recent publications in Art in America, Rhizome, CURA, SFMoMA Open Space, AQNB and et al. abreu is the author of List of Consonants (Bottlecap Press, 2015) and transtrender (Quimérica Books, 2016), and their debut collection of critical writing is forthcoming 2018.
Christopher Paul Jordan integrates virtual and physical public space to form infrastructures for dialogue and self-determination among dislocated people. Jordan’s paintings and sculptures are artifacts from his work in community and time-capsules for expanded inquiry. Jordan is a recipient of the 2017 Neddy Artists Award for painting, the Jon Imber Painting Fellowship, the GTCF Foundation of Art Award, the James W. Ray Venture Project Award, and the most recent summer commission for Seattle Art Museum’s Olympic Sculpture Park.
manuel arturo abreu, Tan Arm, Antilles, Etant Donnés Door, 2014.
Place Names is the inaugural exhibition curated by Ashley Stull Meyers, the Robert and Mercedes Eichholz Director and Curator of the Art Gym and Belluschi Pavilion at Marylhurst University.
Art Gym
Marylhurst University
17600 Pacific Highway (Hwy. 43)
Marylhurst, OR 97036-0261
theartgym.org
Gallery Hours
Tuesday – Sunday, Noon to 4 pm
Admission
Free to the public.
Parking is free. The gallery is located on the third floor of the central building on campus – BP John, on the south side of the building.
Class visits and special tours of The Art Gym exhibitions are available for classes and groups with advanced planning. Let us know if you need the gallery opened at other times, we are happy to accommodate your group visit. Please email the artgym@marylhurst.edu to make arrangements.
About Art Gym
Since 1980, the Art Gym has been recognized as a venue that exhibits some of the most significant and timely art of this region. The mission of the gallery is to increase public understanding of the contemporary art of the Pacific Northwest through exhibitions, artists’ projects, publications, and public engagement.
The Art Gym is a non-collecting, non-commercial gallery that supports artists in creating ambitious, risk-taking projects at key stages in their careers. As an art space working within an academic venue, we are committed to providing artistic and intellectual freedom. The Art Gym’s catalogues continue to be among the greatest records of the contemporary art history of the Pacific Northwest, contributing to the discourse on contemporary art and representing the region. We are dedicated to making knowledge accessible and connecting artists and community.
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For more information or photos, please contact Kathleen Murney, kmurney@marylhurst.edu