Space - Sight - Line, our Spring show, explores the way artists play with visual perception. The perspective of the viewer is a key dynamic in this show. The works included are playfully deceptive, often using ingenious techniques that invite the viewer to stop and rethink where they are and what they are seeing. Surprising uses of space, light, and unexpected media and approaches to art-making empower the art. It makes us look at ourselves looking and invites interaction – and will bring a whole new level of drama and delight to experiencing the iconic architecture of The Church.
In 1968, Keith Sonnier started making art with neon tubes. Curious and restless, he used other materials over the span of his lengthy career, but neon has come to define him, especially his abstract constructions of lines, circles, and squares. Challenging the solemnity of Minimalism, Sonnier and the Post-Minimalist artists of his generation playfully appropriated the noise and material surplus of the urban areas around them. Sonnier’s choice of neon colors was audacious and unmissable: baby blue, hot pick, lime green, tropical yellows, and candied orange. This piece was created to occupy a corridor and give the viewer a sense of discovery as they advanced through the passage. It has been modified by the artist’s studio to curl its way around The Church’s library and expand out onto the Mezzanine, recapturing that original sense of exploration as the viewer follows its course.
