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Swarm Gallery

June 2 - July 9, 2012

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560 Second Street Oakland, CA 94607
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On Looking at Things, Empty and Otherwise Ethan Worden, No Sharp Boundary (2012), Paper, masking tape, glue, 15 x 31 x 25 inches
Gallery | On Looking at Things, Empty and Otherwise | Ethan Worden Project | Christopher Lopez Swarm Gallery is pleased to present a solo exhibition of multi-media works by Ethan Worden, "On Looking at Things, Empty and Otherwise," on view from June 2 - July 8, 2012. An installation by Christopher Lopez is in the project space. "On Looking at Things, Empty and Otherwise" presents a new body of work that takes as a starting point the compulsive negotiation, demarcation and articulation of unbound space. This basic act - the act of carving out a meaningful space - is as essentially beautiful and aggressive as it is tenuous and delicate. Ethan Worden thinks of the phrase "drawing a line in the sand" as a phrase that expresses a gesture so arbitrary, even ridiculous, yet somehow still clear and definitive. This is the kind of conflicted gesture he is drawn to. With a focus that leans heavily toward abstracted and absurdly complex structural arrangements, the work for this exhibition characterizes this confusion, asserting itself formally and physically while simultaneously flirting with an apparently inevitable collapse and dissolution. These are compromised objects - ones that, as the title of the exhibition suggests, attend to our experience of space through a complex interplay of contradiction: integration and disintegration, compression and expansion, present and absent, empty and otherwise. Christopher Lopez's latest series of works is used to illuminate the social relationship between the viewers and the objects as a means of examining social psychological behaviors. These works bring awareness of his own personal experience with generalized anxiety onto the audience - bridging the artwork, the viewers and his mental state. Through installation, video and performance art, Lopez is consciously redirecting his feelings, which can be defined as a type of a psychological phenomenon related to transference. These are visual representation of his own anxieties that he is attempting to transfer onto the viewers by observing the interaction and interpretation of the art by those experiencing his work. In this piece, The State You're In, Lopez takes a critical view of social psychological experiences. He attempts to redirect his own personal experiences of mild generalized anxiety into the work for the viewers to explore and react. This piece is activated when the viewer enters the space. The walls slowly move in making the viewer very much aware of their space within the work. In addition, the audio track is looped with a voice asking, "Are you feeling okay?" The power of suggestion may lead the viewers to ask themselves that same question.