SPRING/BREAK ART SHOW
MARCH 1-6, 2017
4 TIMES SQUARE, NYC
Room #2243
gateway
leah piepgras
We are all made of stardust. We are as old as the stars. 99% of the mass of the human body is made up of six elements: oxygen, carbon, hydrogen, nitrogen, calcium, and phosphorus. Under different heat and pressure, we could have been rocks instead of people.
In Gateway, we present a solo exhibition of work by Leah Piepgras who deals with how subtle shifts in a conscious state affect the relationship with the seen and unseen environment. Under a veil of cognitive science, physics, cosmology and the human time scale, she examines indefinable universal truths. Taking the concept of a black mirror (or "Claude mirror"), a small personal object that provides an individual viewer with a pointed reflection of the world, Piepgras turns it outward- providing the viewer with tools to instead reassess their position within the universe. Gateway uses Piepgras' autobiographical works not only as a way to force the viewer to see themselves in someone else's reflection, but as a way to encourage consideration of their place in the visible universe.
Consider that there are two timelines; the human timeline, one which has humanity at its center and pushes everything else outside of consideration. The other is that of the universe; one of rocks and trees and sky and earth. Gateway is of the latter: a separate experience that exists in tandem with our own, found through a search for personal phenomena. It is Piepgras’ belief that we are more than the individual, more than a single self- but instead, connected through unseen tethers.
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Leah Piepgras received her MFA from Carnegie Mellon University in 1997, and has since exhibited and performed throughout the United States. She has work in the permanent collection of, among others, Wilmer Hale, New England Biolab and Fidelity Investments, and has been featured in Beautiful Decay, The New York Times and The Boston Globe.
leahpiepgras.com