Pretty Tough: Contemporary Storytelling
June 21, 2009, to January 3, 2010. Exhibition Reception: June 21, 2009; 3 to 5 pm.
The women in this exhibition, although formally distinct, all reclaim storytelling as a strategy to address contemporary discourses on warfare, the environment, and female struggles. The artists focus on narrative representation and figuration. Their fairytale-like depictions are in reality reflections on submerged violence, played out through refined, delicate, and meticulous work. The artists look back at traditional modes of expression, such as storytelling, as well as engaging traditional or vintage techniques that require a labor—intensive process—obsessive, elaborate, yet impeccable manufacture. This highly stylized work—pretty—offers profound assessments of our contemporary world—tough—by relying on storytelling as a subversive strategy that permeates the public sphere more efficiently than confrontational discourses.
http://www.aldrichart.org/exhibitions/future.php
