Call for Art
Press Release
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE : SEPTEMBER 2011
A BOOK ABOUT DEATH SEATTLE : AN UNBOUND BOOK ON THE SUBJECT OF DEATH
Almendra Sandoval
QUETZALCOATL GALLERY
3209 Beacon Ave S
Seattle, WA 98144
United States of America
OPENING: November 10 - 6 PM - 9 PM
EXHIBITION: November 10 - December 10, 2011; Monday - Friday, 2PM - 10PM
WEBSITE: http://abadseattle.blogspot.com/
SEATTLE, WASHINGTON – The QUETZALCOATL GALLERY is pleased to present A BOOK ABOUT DEATH, a sprawling, collaborative unbound "book" on the subject of death. The exhibition is set to take place from November 10 - December 10, 2011. The exhibition brings together Seattle artists with international artists in a global exhibition. The exhibition is open to all artists, designers and photographers. Please see the website for details.
The ABAD SEATTLE exhibition, curated by Seattle artist Kathleen McHugh, is the 24th in a series of exhibitions that launched at the Emily Harvey Foundation Gallery in New York City in September 2009. Kathleen contributed to that first A BOOK ABOUT DEATH exhibition and joined artists from all over the world by contributing an edition of 500 postcard-sized artworks image that honored, explained or drew upon the subject of death, the most profound and humbling human experience. Since the inaugural show in New York, more than 5000 artists have participated in exhibitions around the world.
For Seattle, artists will contribute and exhibit works up to 8"x10" at the QUETZALCOATL GALLERY, and many will provide 100 4" x 6" cards for gallery visitors to pick up and keep. "While death is a difficult subject often cloaked in denial and confusion, artists in the project have drawn upon a vast richness of their own community and talent to construct a poetic path of common humanity, that explores and meditats upon how death touches our lives," explains Kathleen McHugh. "I’m very happy to bring this exciting project and exhibition to Seattle."
Conceived and organized by Matthew Rose, a Paris-based American artist, A BOOK ABOUT DEATH is comprised largely of artists' postcards from original art and work created specifically for the exhibit. These pieces collectively form the pages of the "book." While many of the artists involved in the original New York City exhibition are internationally known – Yoko Ono, Eric Andersen, Peter Schuyff, Geoffrey Hendricks, Carolee Schneemann – many are not, yet all the artists share the stage equally.
For the NYC exhibition visitors to the Emily Harvey Foundation Gallery were encouraged to freely take "pages" away with them to create their own book about death. The exhibition was designed to "disappear." Many collected the entire exhibition including New Yorks Museum of Modern Art and The Los Angeles County Museum of Art; the work remains in their permanent collections. In the spirit of the original exhibition, many artists in the Seattle exhibition have chosen to provide cards for visitors to the gallery to take to create their own book.
"Understanding death in any complete sense, doesn't seem at all possible if you're alive, but these artists have fleshed out many hundreds of approaches," says Matthew Rose, reflecting upon the original NYC exhibition. The artist paid tribute to his own mother, Doris, who died during the project, with a photograph of her taken on her wedding day, January 18, 1948. "I'm pleasantly astonished at the intellectual breadth and high humor of the works, and I think both Ray and Emily – and even my mother – would be, too. It's a fascinating book."
Since the original show in NYC, A BOOK ABOUT DEATH has become a global phenomenon, as well as becoming part of the permanent collections of the Museum of Modern Art and the LA County Museum of Art Research Library. The project has been exhibited at MoMA Wales, MUBE Brazil, The Otis College of Art and Design, The Queens Museum (NY), among many other venues from small churches to universities, arts festivals and art spaces across Europe and the United States. For more information about the scope and history of the project, please visit the archive: http://abookaboutdeatharchive.blogspot.com/
"The first show had to open in New York City – it was and remains a global touch point for so many people involved in the project…and the opening at The Emily Harvey Foundation Gallery was absolutely mobbed," says Matthew Rose. "We broadcast it live on the Internet for folks in Europe, Asia, South America and the US, but more than 1500 people came to see it live. The response was a collage of people, something perhaps Ray Johnson might have envision – a collage of people, some living some dead, yet all very much a part of this very special happening. And it goes on."
The project has taken off in a viral way via FaceBook, e-mail, Twitter, a dozen artist and social networks across the world and of course word of mouth in artist communities from Spain and Belgium to Australia and Brooklyn. FaceBook was a particularly powerful organizing medium: a group was formed and an event page was created. Artists began to network, talk to each other and collaborate on performances, posters and, of course getting feedback on their works. A Book About Death has served as a model platform for self-directed and artist-curated shows, with the two dozen, linked ABAD websites providing a massive amount of video, posters, catalogs of the shows, as well as texts, photographs and insight. The exhibitions continually feed off each other and offer local artists and curators the opportunity to create anew in their own way and in their own city.
And now Seattle… All artists and amateurs alike are invited to participate. Please see the project/exhibition website for the artist call and all details.
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FOR ALL INFORMATION, INTERVIEWS, IMAGES, PLEASE CONTACT :
Kathleen McHugh E: mchughart@gmail.com
Almendra Sandoval, Director, QUETZALCOATL GALLERY
TEL: 206.334-0749 E : almendra@almendrasandoval.com
Matthew Rose: MATTHEW.ROSE.PARIS@GMAIL.COM
