Claire Ashley: (((CRZ.F.4NRS.AAK)))
September 15 – December 3, 2017
808 Gallery
Opening Reception: Saturday October 14, 3-5pm
Claire Ashley’s large-scale inflatable objects combine painting, sculpture, installation, and performance to defy a singular definition. The coded title of the exhibition translates to “Crazy Female Foreigners Alive and Kicking” referencing Ashley’s Scottish nationality and alluding to the instability of global politics, and the temporal existence of her sculptures inhabiting and moving through space. In her debut solo exhibition in New England, Ashley offers a humorous critique of art world trends and expectations of the human body. Her vessels are boldly colorful on the exterior while supported on the interior solely by air. Ashley’s objects exist at an intersection between imposing yet vulnerable, bloated yet sagging, while combining painterly characteristics of Abstract Expressionism, the playfulness of large scale Pop art, and the psychedelic spectrum of Day-Glo fluorescent colors. The exhibition will include approximately thirty inflatables varying in scale and thirty small paper pieces.
About Claire Ashley
Claire Ashley (Scottish, born 1971) earned her BA in 1993 from Grays School of Art, Aberdeen, Scotland and an MFA (Painting and Drawing) from The School of the Art Institute of Chicago (1995)… As seen in this exhibition at 808 Gallery, Ashley’s recent work explores inflatable objects as painting, sculpture, installation, and performance costume. In her artist statement, she describes, “I mine the language of painterly abstraction, monumental sculpture, slapstick humor, and pop art to transform mundane industrial materials into inflatable painted sculptures and performative props.”
Ashley challenges assumptions about form, boundaries, and perception, working “within a deeply feminist critique of the contemporary art world. I use humor, acidic color, obnoxious scale, and absurd pop-culture references to challenge art historical precedence and current art world power dynamics. My work is particularly invested in exploding the structural possibilities of abstract painting, expanding the kinetic possibilities for monumental sculpture, and enlivening the dialogue around contemporary art across class, gender, age, and education.” Find more at http://www.claireashley.com
Reviews
The Boston Globe, Claire Ashely’s inflatables take over 808 Gallery, September 28, 2017
Big Red & Shiny, Claire Ashley is Alive and Kicking in Boston, October 31, 2017
The Daily Free Press, Inflatable art creates larger-than-life presence at BU’s 808 Gallery, September 14, 2017
BU Today, Inflatable Art Fills 808 Gallery Top to Bottom, October 20, 2017
The Artery, Artist Creates Inflatable Sculptures that Resemble Clouds Sagging to Earth- and Ponders Big Ideas, October 23, 2017
Boston Hassle, Big 3 Art: Claire Ashley: (((CRZ.F.4NRS.AAK))), October 1, 2017