Opening Reception: Wednesday, July 12th, 6–8 PM
“Are ye fantastical?” – asked Banquo of the Wyrd Sisters in the first act of Macbeth. Long before the murder of Duncan, Macbeth himself described his thoughts of murder as fantastical. In the context of Shakespeare's works, the term "fantastical" is used to characterize elements that are imaginative, whimsical, or magical. The term refers to the supernatural aspects which deviate from the ordinary or natural world. For the New York based artists in The Fantasticals - LaKela Brown, Ann Craven, Nick Doyle, Sarah Esme Harrison, Yanjun Li, Azikiwe Mohammed, Rose Nestler, Willie Stewart, Kit White and Ryan Wilde - the use of the fantastical allows for the exploration of deeper psychological and emotional truths, often found in the most subtle disruptions of normality.
Through her strong grasp of symbolism, LaKela Brown (b. 1982 in Detroit, MI, USA) shares Shakespeare’s penchant for non-traditional storytelling. Her plaster relief sculptures of chain necklaces and door knocker hoop earrings reference 1990’s hip hop culture, while repetitive chicken heads and Egyptian death-masks evoke hieroglyphic carvings and cuneiform tablets. These elements are transfigured into powerful symbols by the artist to reckon with the historic representation of Black women. Directly in response to these textured surface and gender-charged narratives comes the work of Nick Doyle (b. 1983 Los Angeles, CA, USA), who is best known for sculptural wall works made from collaged denim. Utilizing seemingly innocuous imagery such as a wall plug, Doyle lends fantasy to the mundane, and infiltrates the vocabulary of American mythology. His mechanical miniatures stand as a reminder of the dangers of nostalgia, with Voyeurs highlighting the consequences of greed, excess, and toxic masculinity.
Ann Craven (b. 1967, Boston, MA, USA) is internationally known for her serial works portraying birds, flowers, and the moon. Craven’s predilection for the copy - both from referent photographs and from her own plein air paintings - is both an homage to Pop Art and an exploration of remembrance. Craven’s paintings serve to archive both a moment in history and her own memories. Her addition of bright greens, pinks and oranges to otherwise dark nighttime scenes creates an otherworldly sense of fantasy to “the moment just past”, as she puts it. Expanding the tradition of plein air painting, Sarah Esme Harrison (b. 1990, New York, NY, USA) begins her paintings outdoors in observance of nature and then moves to the studio to add a symbol of human invention in the form of a gate, creating a duality in her subject matter. By building wedge-shaped supports for the painted panels, she further exaggerates that they are other-than-natural.
The uninhibited exploration of the fantastic is at the crux of the Azikiwe Mohammed’s (b. 1982, New York, NY, USA) practice. Mohammed is a multi-disciplinary artist whose work is deeply rooted in personal experience and an exploration of identity, culture, and social issues, preferring to create an immersive experience, similar to theatre, rather than a single image or object. At their core, his installations and sculptures aim to engage viewers in dialogues surrounding race, history, and the complexities of contemporary society. Willie Stewart (b. 1982, Gallatin, TN, USA) is known fororganizing ordinary objects such as lamps and flower vases on banal household displays such as shelves or a nightstand. Through mixing the language of trompe-l'œil and Pop Art, Stewart invents a place of in-between for his work to exist. In Our Lure of Absolution, the artist employs his techniques of stacking and collage to physically and psychically create a real and illusionary space that mirrors the composite of human existence.
Art world veteran Kit White’s (b. 1951, West Virginia, USA) work has recently taken the form of photo image transfers mixed with gestural paint strokes. His series of black and white paintings were born from contested spaces and collective trauma. Many feature images of politically charged barriers, such as walls between Israel and Palestine, or the U.S. and Mexico, battlefield demarcations, or ancient sites that signified the clash of cultures. Colonnade, in particular, depicts the ruins of Palmyra after its destruction by ISIS. In contrast, the richly colored, psychedelic work of Yanjun Li (b. 1998 Kunming, China) uses painting as a means to create boundless space, both formally and spiritually. Her work Catalyst takes its name from the catalyst as an agent of change - triggering profound shifts and transitions in both life and death - and marks her interest in the potential of abstract painting to transcend the limitations of language and culture.
“What is it about fairytales we’re drawn to?” asks Rose Nestler (b. 1983, Spokane, WA, USA). For The Fantasicals, her soft sculptures are based on objects of desire, handbags and flowers linked to the feminine. The piece Bleeding Heart flips the evil queen narrative by revealing its “heart”: its insides and its sexuality in the mirror base, rather than “the fairest of them all”. These plays of perception and interpretation are at the heart of Nestler’s deeply feminist sculptures. Building on her career in millinery, Ryan Wilde (b. 1980, New York, NY, USA) uses felt and other fashion materials to throw a spotlight on the theatrics of gender and the development of female identity and self-preservation. She is particularly interested in the molds we create when mirroring fetishized personae. Wilde’s sculpture, Toy Tataz, accentuates an uncanny extreme woven into the objectification of women and the fetishization of clothing.
For Shakespeare’s characters, the use of the fantastical provides a canvas for them to confront their fears, desires, and internal conflicts. By transcending the boundaries of reality, this group of artists delve into the human imagination. The Fantasticals remains the perfect moniker for this group who, through eclectic mediums, invent their own narratives and elevate the mundane to the fantastic.