April 13- June 2, 2013
Opening reception Saturday April 13th, 6-10pm
Room 1:
Anne Boudreau
From seed pods to constellations, natural systems are amazing because they are both simple and complex. Their physical structures and cooperative functions provide endless inspiration. The forms I make are patterned, modeled and constructed with wire, twine, fabric and paint. They are both stable and fragile much like all things living. Within the installation, the suspended forms are ungrounded, at times kinetic, and give the viewer an opportunity to be a part of the environment. I am a native of New Orleans and have been an art maker for over twenty years. I am also an arts educator and currently reside in Lafayette, Louisiana.
Room 2:
Audrey Mandelbaum
In 2003, 2007, and most recently in 2013, I photographed 26 psychotherapists in the Los Angeles area. I wanted to translate my personal experience of therapy into a portrait project that explored a variety of practitioners and office settings. Fourteen of those portraits will be presented at The Front. My work stems from a documentary impulse, a desire to investigate a subject through direct interactions. A healthy skepticism about photography’s capacity to describe experience is central to these investigations, especially given the staged aspect of the portrait sessions. With this series, I wondered about the photograph’s potential to “capture” therapy, and whether looks of empathy and compassion are endemic to the process of therapy. I posed these questions to my subjects during each shoot, and the resulting pictures are, if anything, an outgrowth of the complicated and fascinating conversations that ensued.
Audrey Mandelbaum grew up in Seattle, Washington and earned an MFA from The School of the Art Institute of Chicago. She has exhibited widely in Los Angeles, Chicago, and New York, including solo shows in Los Angeles at Venice Arts, Haus Gallery, and the Center for the Arts, Eagle Rock; and group shows at The Art Institute of Chicago, Watts Towers Art Center in LA, Millard Sheets Gallery/Pomona Fairplex, Hudson Franklin Gallery in New York, and the Torrance Art Museum. She lives with her husband and son in Los Angeles, and works at Antioch University Los Angeles, where she coordinates the MFA program and teaches art.
Room 3:
Barrett Langlinais
The photographs in the exhibition Strata depict tattered and deteriorating surfaces. These abstracted layers unveil a micro-cosm analogous to the constant change in our urban and natural environments. The effects of human interaction, time and the elements provide unexpected compositions of planes, textures and colors. Two of the exhibited series were photographed at locations throughout New York City. Expanding upon the graphic nature of these discoveries, a process of cutting, scraping and painting the photograph’s surface is utilized in direct response to the formal qualities of each image. Another series in the exhibition was created by photographing collages that were created in the studio. I always try to imbue my art with a sense of ambiguity, both in what the work depicts and how the work is constructed.
Room 4:
Colleen Ho
Colleen Ho’s drawings allude to visual patterns found in nature. Images oscillate between topographical and biological forms, gestural and designed compositions. They are created by ripping paper with a thumbtack repeatedly, leaving a delicate, tactile relief to the surface. It is an intuitive process of mark-making; primal, obsessive, and meditative.
The Brooklyn-based artist was raised in Youngstown, Ohio. She graduated from the University of Notre Dame with a Bachelors of Arts degree in 1993, and moved to New York City the same year. In 1997, she received a Master of Fine Arts degree from Pratt Institute of Art. Colleen was a participant in the Bronx Museum Artist in the Marketplace Program. She has exhibited her work internationally at Kurt im Hirsch Gallery, Berlin; Chongro Gallery, Seoul; The Bronx Museum of the Arts, PS 122, Brooklyn Arts Council, Columbia University in New York, and at the Acadiana Center for the Arts in Lafayette, Louisiana.