NYC GALLERY OPENING - [ Ссылка ]
Jessica Rohrer
Bloomfield
May 28 – June 27, 2015
Opening Reception: Thursday, May 28, 6-8pm
P·P·O·W is pleased to present Bloomfield, our
fourth exhibition with artist Jessica Rohrer. This
exhibition continues Rohrer’s decade long project
of depicting the homes and neighborhoods in
which she has lived; from Wisconsin to Brooklyn
to New Jersey. Bloomfield is comprised of twenty
three new paintings and eighteen works on
paper of interior settings, street scenes and
garden views of her domestic suburban life
derived from her immediate surroundings. Each
exhibition, or chapter of her life, reflects her
journey as she travels a road familiar to many.
Rohrer tells a tale that is at first glance a picture
book story of domesticity but upon closer look is
ridden with a palpable sense of heightened
anxiety.
Rohrer’s stylistic approach combines elements of
traditional miniature paintings with
photorealism. Her obsessive freehand rendering,
seemingly photographic but hand painted from
life and self-taken photographs, allude to the
works of Jan van Eyck, Vermeer and other old
masters whose technique challenge our
credulity. The compositions of each painting also
hint at more contemporary artists such as
Thomas Demand and Jeff Wall, whose
photographic re-enactments are realistic but
disturbing in their “slightly off” feeling. Pop artists
are also brought to mind in relation to Rohrer’s
depiction of mundane and branded objects;
stacks of books, toys, shelves of spices, craft
boxes, cabinet doors and potted plants. Rohrer
weaves through art history while accomplishing
her seemingly humble biographical project.
Carefully manipulating each scene by emptying
them of figures and detritus, Rohrer creates a
sense of sanitized orderliness. Odd perspectives
and tight cropping add to the anxious and
ominous tone. Her precisely staged and
meticulously painted vignettes balance that
which is omitted and that which is rendered in
painstaking detail. In this exhibit Rohrer ventures
further afield than her own home, giving a
glimpse of rooftops and neighbors’ yards which
seem eerily similar to her own.
Jessica Rohrer (b. 1974) in Wisconsin. She
graduated from Northwestern University (1996)
and the Art Institute of Chicago (1999) and
received her M.F.A. in painting from the Yale
University School of Art (2001). She has exhibited
in numerous exhibitions in the United States. She
lives in New Jersey, with her husband and two
young daughters.
