Locust Projects presents Natalya Laskis / Project Room: Emmett Moore
Opening reception: March 10, 7-10pm
Locust Projects
3852 North Miami Avenue
Miami, FL 33127
with food by Harry’s Pizzeria
Walkthrough with Emmett Moore, March 28, 6pm
Conversation with Natalya Laskis, moderated by Fred Snitzer, March 28, 6:30pm
On view through April 27, 2012
Gallery hours: Tuesday – Saturday, noon – 5pm and by appointment
Natalya Laskis: Shortness Of Breath
Locust Projects is pleased to announce Shortness of Breath, a solo exhibition by Miami-based painter Natalya Laskis. Featuring the largest scale paintings made by the artist to date, Shortness of Breath showcases the latest phase in the evolution and maturation of the artists’ technique – using improvised tools such as broom brushes and skis to apply paint – and narrative. Moving beyond the scenes of socially exclusive groups, such as motorcycle gangs and isolated farming communities that characterized Laskis’ former work, Shortness of Breath pushes the artist’s exploration of social archetypes into a realm of engagement rather than observation. Connections between individual works are fluid, with the narrative moving from one another and in between. Mining personal experiences for source material in this new body of work, Laskis departs from encapsulated representational scenes to an increasingly abstracted and emotionally-tuned visual language that transcends a single frame.
Working within an intuitive studio practice, the inter-woven narrative, imagery and palate of Shortness of Breath are a product of personal photographs, sourced objects, and found images. Using photography as a research tool, Laskis documents activities designed to confront her own fears, a fundamental area of investigation for the artist. From this, Laskis creates immersive experiences that enfold the viewer in a singular perspective – that of the photographs – at times dissolving into pure color. Seeking an emotional connectivity rather than representational accuracy, Laskis’ loosened application of paint resists recognizable signs and symbols and melts from reality to abstraction in a manor akin to Francis Bacon and Cecily Brown. The results are catalytic moments of exploration and vulnerability, that resonate with the viewer’s own emotional sensitivity.
Natalya Laskis was born in 1979 in Miami, where she lives and works. She received a B.F.A from the Maryland Institute College of Art, Baltimore, and attended the New World School of the Arts in Miami. The artist recently participated in the group exhibition, Gloria Hole at The Fireplace Projects in Easthampton, New York. Laskis’ solo exhibition, American Odyssey, was presented at Frederic Snitzer Gallery, Miami in 2009. The artists’ work has also been included in exhibitions at David Castillo Gallery, and the Boca Raton Museum of Art, and the Art and Culture Center of Hollywood. Following her exhibition at Locust Projects, Laskis will be preparing for a solo exhibition in 2012 entitled Is This Love? at Galleria Glance, Torino, Italy.
Project Room: Emmett Moore: High, Low And In Between
Locust Projects is pleased to announce High, Low and in Between, an exhibition by Miami-based artist and designer Emmett Moore. The site-specific installation will inaugurate the Project Room of Locust Projects’ new location on North Miami Avenue in Miami’s Design District. A hybrid of interior design and sculpture, High, Low and in Between represents Moore’s most deliberate blurring of the two disciplines to date. Operating as an all-encompassing, immersive environment, the installation incorporates various design elements that work together to create a cohesive whole. Though following the logic and aesthetic tenets of interior design, architecture, and furniture production, High, Low and in Between resists functionality in favor of aesthetic experience.
Fascinated by patterns both manufactured and natural, Moore has fabricated by hand, a series of relief wall panels, and sculptural-architectural adaptations using a grid-based design process. Sourced from a variety of everyday patterns such as the security print found on the inside of envelopes, laminates, wood grain, and the covers of composition notebooks, the patterns in High, Low and in Between appear recurring, yet upon closer inspection, do not repeat exactly. By covering both two and three-dimensional surfaces with such patterns, Moore both recontextualizes these patterns and de-centers viewers by disrupting scale and depth perception.
The surfaces in High, Low and in Between draw upon the legacy of design and emphasize clever methods to conceal fabrication and structural elements. The result is an installation in which Moore investigates reality versus illusion, the impression of facades and the vulnerability of their core structures.
Emmett Moore is an artist and designer specializing in furniture born in 1988 in Miami, where he lives and works. He attended Design and Architecture Senior High in Miami’s Design District and completed a BFA in Furniture Design at Rhode Island School of Design in Providence. Recent exhibitions include a solo project with the Tom El-Saieh Presents project in Wynwood Arts District, Miami 2011. He has also been included in group exhibitions at Primary Flight His Wife, Her Lover in 2011 and at Praxis International, Home: Dream Home. Moore works with the design team of Architecture at Large in New York and for custom design projects for OHWOW Gallery in Los Angeles, CA (formerly of Miami, FL). Moore is preparing for an exhibition in Gallery Diet in Miami, FL in September 2012.
