When looking at Tsehai Johnson’s pieces, one can see her demonstrate an impeccable skill with working porcelain. The layouts of the pieces illustrate an amazing sensibility in creating interesting compositions that allow for “discovery”. Her inspiration sites her intellectual insight to personal discourses as she teases out individualized reactions through loosely identifiably objects. Her wall shifts draw from Baroque wallpaper and organic forms pulled from chaotic instances that occur within nature. By creating a hybridization of these two ideas, Tsehai calls to question where the fine line lies between organized beauty and anarchic occurrences. At first glance, her wall shifts appear to be somewhat symmetrical; upon closer inspection one can find each individual piece is actually asymmetrical. It is only through visual balance and subtle similarities that these pieces appear to be a set pattern.
Tsehai choose shapes that can distantly be affiliated with actual objects pending on the viewer. This creates a dynamic tension through utilizing shapes that fall just short of something actual and something imagined. In turn, each individual is forced to carve out his or her own understanding to the piece and how the series relates as a whole.
The color palette, placement of components, as well as the organization of the pieces has evolved in this series in comparison to previous bodies of works. Tsehai states that these aesthetic choices are meant to illustrate the playfulness of these wall shifts. The magnetic bright colors are used to highlight how these works draw from a childlike imagination. The hues also helps generate visual interest by making the viewer question what mediums where employed to create the pieces. Another intriguing aspect to these works are the “floating” components which hang from fishing wire and hover above Exploding Carpet.
The surreal effect is somewhat nerve racking as these obviously weighty pieces of porcelain are suspended above the cement floor. By employing these approaches, disorderly creates a deeply personal experience that leads to endless exploration.
Andy Miller’s current show Flat and Empty is by far the artists most conceptual body of work to date. A divergence from his prior exhibitions is evident as hard edges and industrial materials give way to biomorphic shapes rendered in a muted organic palette. The majority of the pieces hang from the walls in large drooping sweeps that allow light to play on the surface to create intriguing curvaceous shadows.
Along with the work itself, the process used to execute it has undergone a transformation as well. Similarly to the pieces, ridged formatting such as intense preliminary sketches and blue prints have been abandoned for an intuitive methodology. With these incorporations, the pieces move into a naturalistic fluidity which creates an in depth dialogue between the audience and the work.Organic shapes and hues have always been a focal interest for Andy Miller; however, they have not been fully expressed until now. All aspects of life have the capacity to bleed into an artist’s artwork and frequently do. This statement holds true for Andy as his fabrication and design work has visibly taken root within his pieces prior to this July’s exhibition. He sites his strong architectural design; sheen industrial materials and the symbolic references where derived from his fabrication work and had been subconsciously interjected into his pieces. This seemingly deviating exploration of biomorphic shapes was spurred to center stage by a recent proposal devised by Andy for a public sculpture. He made it a point to gravitate away from precise angles and highly saturated colors and towards macrobiotic allusion. This conceptual design subsequently then segwayed Andy into the current series Flat and Empty. Andy’s concerted efforts to maintain to naturalistic attributes found within the environment can be considered successful ones. However, structural motifs seem to inherently emerge in the diptych piece Flat and Empty #4 (green and yellow). Andy stated that these where the last pieces to be created within the series and his will to create strictly organic designs must have began to wane.
With out a doubt Flat and Empty exercises Andy Miller’s ability to manipulate unusual materials that create ominous forms that weld a commanding presence.
This series has certainly opened doors to new ideas for the future not only with the process and installation but with the media as well. However, Andy states that he never feels truly finished with any series and always has the intentions of revisiting past series to expand upon them. On this note, it will be beyond interesting to see what is on the horizon for this exceptional conceptual artist.Both shows will run from July 18th through August 23rd and are must to see in person to experience the full impact the exhibition.
