Spin Cycle - a show by Oliver Halsman Rosenberg & David Aron
hpgrp Gallery
529 West 20th Street #2W
New York, NY 10011
212-727-2491
hpgrpgallery.com
July 29th to August 27th, 2011
Opening reception Friday, July 29th, 2011 from 6 to 8pm
Artists Oliver Halsman Rosenberg and David Aron present a show that explores spirituality, energy, the mind, and body in their show Spin Cycle. Both artists are influenced by Eastern culture and practices and channel that through their work.
Rosenberg has been traveling for the past three years to India and Indonesia where he has been studying traditional folk art. Much of his work in the show uses a channeled, calligraphic script evocative of Asian or Arabic font forms. This script is used to create larger forms and work as atoms, cells, or even organs, energy wisps and blips. He uses them like building blocks within beings, places, or to create time and space on the page. Some of the pieces use a batik technique he learned in Bali. The fabric evokes fluidity through material and the bright colors express immense amounts of light and spirit. In addition to these Eastern ideas and techniques, Rosenberg mixes in Jewish culture as well as Jewish mysticism in his large scroll paintings that hearken back to sacred texts and in his totem series based on the Sephirot of the Kabbalah.
Aron has been meditating through Vipassana, an ancient Buddhist technique from Burma, for many years. In contrast to Rosenberg’s vast use of color, Aron uses a decidedly monotone palette for this show with the idea that the simple and unburdened is of clear thought and something he wishes to attain. His main pieces are white painted, wood sculptures evoking a sense of togetherness or community or oneness, and peaceful protest with a happy ending. He uses universal, simple shapes to convey a quiet optimism.
As the title of the show implies, the exhibition incorporates circles and natural cycles but also is about cleansing; like the finishing off stage in a washing machine spin cycle. Although both artists come at this idea of cleansing from different angles, both have strong individual interpretations about the human condition and how one might start on the path of attaining a higher state of mind and being. Together they show us what our eyes may not see but what may exist right now under our breath.
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Oliver Halsman Rosenberg was a recent recipient of the J.B. Blunk residency in northern California. He edited the book “The Unknown Halsman”, a collection of the more unusual photographs from his grandfather Philipe Halsman’s archive, which Oliver also illustrated and designed. His work is in the Dakis Joannou and Berkeley Art Museum collections.
David Aron was one of the founding artists shown at the legendary Alleged Gallery. In the past few years he has traded urban skateboarding for making art and experimental music in the quiet country. His band Koi Pond will be releasing a new record in the near future.
This show is curated by Hanna Fushihara Aron. As the former Director of Little Cakes, she and her gallery graced the pages of everything from The New York Times, Paper Magazine, Tokion, to The Journal. She now lives in the Hudson Valley.
