A Conversation
Curated by Michael St. John

June 30 - July 31, 2004

Marvelli Gallery is pleased to present in its project room A Conversation, a painting exhibition curated by Michael St. John. The show will include 12 artists organized thematically in four groups. Over the course of the exhibition, three paintings by three different artists will be displayed each week. This will provide a point of departure for a dialogue about painting to take place. Events and discussions will be integrated into the rotating exhibitions.

The opening week (June 30 - July 10), “The Picture Makers” will present Elizabeth Deull’s paintings which reflect on current interest for the history of painting expressed by contemporary artists such as Peter Doig and Jochen Klien; Chad Marshall’s paintings from bible stories and race-related issues, which reconfigure a narrative of faith, doubt, and social investigation and Leslie Lerner’s paintings of personal narratives.

In the second week (July 13 - 17), “Political/Historical” will include Charles Browning’s paintings that reflect upon the “what if?” of America’s past with humor and compassion; Negar Ahkami’s paintings that present the problem of being “the other” in her own country, growing up in the United States as an Iranian woman, and Monica Moran’s embrace of abstract painting’s failure, both historical and political.

“Abstraction?” during the third week (July 20 - 24), will present Joe Fyfe’s interest in Blinky Palermo and surface/support; Adrian Ting’s work which reveals an interest in Ellsworth Kelly and Andy Warhol creating the opportunity for an idiosyncratic narrative to be distilled into an aesthetic experience, and Jason Duval’s paintings which begin as automatic drawings and develop through an accumulation of actions.

The final week (July 27-31) is, as Sean Bateman says “Rock and Roll,” including Nate Lowman’s investigation of the underbelly of American culture; Allison Jarvella’s ecstatic religious paintings of performance pictures of indie bands and Alex Staiger’s personal cosmology from the junkyard of consumerism. For more information or visuals of the works included, please contact the gallery at 212-627 3363 or info@marvelligallery.com.