Prey: Caught in a Web of Fragile Ecosystems
Wednesday March 21, 2007
-
Sunday April 22, 2007
from
12:00pm - 5:00pm
Viveza Art Experience, 2604 Western Ave., in Seattle, presents Prey: Caught in a Web of Fragile Ecosystems, new work by New York artist Cara Enteles. This exhibit will run from Wednesday, March 21 through Sunday, April 22. The public reception is from 6 to 10 p.m. on Friday, March 23. Enteles will be present at the opening reception. Gallery hours are noon to 5 p.m. Wednesday through Sunday.
Enteles combines industrial materials with natural themes to visualize the complex balance of Predator/Prey relationships. The works are both beautiful and conceptually deep, depicting the formation and evaporation of interlocking, biological systems in vibrant color on aluminum. She abstractly relates the dramatic narrative of nature by imbuing her work with biting commentary through precarious, sometimes moody, sometimes ironically colorful, compositions.
Enteles, in her Pennsylvania shed turned studio, became interested in the relationships in the natural world when she observed the complex interactions between the resident spiders and moths. "I wanted to take a magnifying glass to nature," she said. "When you’re surrounded by nature you can’t help but have a huge respect for natural forces and what they can teach you."
In her work the symbiotic relationship between predator and prey is presented ominously, but with a fascination that appreciates its necessity. From spiders and moths to owls and hummingbirds, Enteles deals with animals that are at once menacing and palpably fragile. The web of a spider, an almost invisible and delicate killing trap, is cautiously transposed on the web of the food chain and the exponential ramifications of upsets to ecological systems. Inspired by the fatalistic children's rhyme, the Itsy Bitsy Spider, Enteles' Spider Series turns the notion of the spider as the hunter upside down. Here, the spider is the victim of the water spout, an uncontrollable aspect of nature for the determined arachnid. Repeating spider and moth silhouettes interlock in decaying networks, a nod to the power of uncertainty in such complicated, interconnected arrangements. The fragile relationships between all of the elements and the way they seem to drip, slip and evaporate off of their surface, call to question what holds this ecosystem together at all.
On the surface Enteles's works appear as delicate as the relationships they represent, but the aluminum and plexiglass on which she paints have the cold, impersonal surface of the automated, industrial era. Surface plays an important role in these works; their reflective materials interact with the light in their environment, giving a surprising and unpredictable glow to the work. Furthermore the different stains and textures of aluminum affect the mood of each piece, as light is dulled, absorbed or reflected. Enteles says that "the industrial surfaces are used to contrast the organic content, and add to the language of what paint can achieve on its own. I wanted to beat up my medium and canvas just couldn't take it. I wanted to be able to build up layers of paint as well as take them away." in this subtle way, the microcosmic ecosystem, composed of layered drips, splats, stencils and strokes of oil, is affected by (and reflected onto) the environment in which its placed.
Viveza Art Experience is the first and only Seattle venue to show Enteles' work. Her work has been exhibited all over the country and she is represented in both Florida and New York. She studied at the Ecole Nationale Superieure des Beaux-Arts in Paris as well as at Parsons School of Design.
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