access 2009

When: Friday, November 13th, 2009.
Opening reception, Friday, November 13th, 6:00 – 9:00 pm

Where: Downtown,Main St., Sumter, SC 29150

Accessibility 2009: Cross Currents is Sumter's eleventh annual exhibition of public installation art. The annual Accessibility exhibitions feature contemporary art that is installed in and around Main Street businesses, alleyways, unoccupied buildings, sidewalks and other "public" areas of Sumter's historic downtown area. This highly regarded contemporary art exhibition is considered by many to be one of the most important art events in South Carolina and aims to cultivate dynamic interest in the Sumter and regional art scenes.  Accessibility 2009: Cross Currents will focus on New Media, Film and Video art installations as well as site-specific art installations of varying mediums. Featured installation artist Jarod Charzewski will be creating monumental pieces in two central locations in downtown Sumter. He will be working in a public forum in the Sumter community, providing many unique opportunities for the public to gain insight into the 'process' of installation and for social interaction with the visiting artist. In addition to these works there will 8 new media, film and video installations by nationally and internationally recognized artists from Taiwan to Israel, Buenos Aires to Winnipeg and from New York to California. In addition to this melting pot of artists there will also be an exhibition of local and emerging artists including Terrance McDow and Jamie Caplinger, as well as a number of works from local high school students in the McDuffie Furniture building on S. Main. This years Accessibility is curated by Frank McCauley, Assistant Director and Curator for the Sumter County Gallery of Art.

Featured Installation, New Media, Film & Vieo artists:
Jarod Charzewski’s art examines landscapes and people, man-made structures among nature, the sometimes static, and often-fluid designs that rise from dual environments. Space motivates his concepts. The visual characteristics of bridges and railroad tracks, tunnels, urban communities at large, cast against the strength of natural landscapes, reflect the relationship between viewer and the work. He enhances this relationship through accessible installations, monuments to nature, to man, and to our cohabitation. The art reveals the mystery of individual perceptions and develops a platform where ideas gain scope.

Yaron Lapid is an Israeli artist currently living in London who’s work, “The New Zero”, plays on the nature of photography and its ability to assemble and disassemble layers of history. In 1999 Yaron Lapid found on the floor of a recently demolished area in Jerusalem, several envelopes containing hundreds of black and white photographs and negatives, which were probably the leftovers of a former photographic studio. Lapid has reprocessed the found material to create an atypical “family album” composed of moving portraits that fluidly fade into black before revealing their main features. By reversing the conventions of documentary editing, the video focuses on marginal details such as body posture, clothes and accessories to suggest the habits and costumes of Jerusalem in the 70s, providing hints of the atmosphere of that time.

Clint Enns resides in Winnipeg, Manitoba and is currently a masters student in mathematics at the University of Manitoba. His interests include cinema, model theory of rings and modules, natural language as a biological phenomenon and the logical vocabulary of natural language. Clint has been an avid cinephile for many years, and has only recently started making films. “Sacrificial Memories”, is an experimental film made from discarded film footage found in thrift shops and flea markets in Winnipeg, Manitoba.

Blu is a graffiti artist and muralist from Bologna, Italy and is known for his very large, often surreal and aggressive but always-breathtaking pictures in the public space. His playful and comic-style works often carry an ethnic, political or moral message, yet without being patronizing. What is unique about Blu’s work is that it is very process oriented. He creates large-scale drawings on walls all the while taking photographs of its evolution and then uses these pictures to create mesmerizing animated/ stop motion films.

Robert Fraher’s New Media work, “No Horse In Particular”, explores the concept of meaning in visual imagery. “No Horse” is a mixed media piece combining photography, digital illustration, interactivity, and custom software development. The composition utilizes shape simplification, quantitative reduction, and software aided simplification as modes of abstraction. Through interaction, viewers are able to explore the continuum of representation, from depiction to abstraction. The purpose of this exploration is for people to develop a more acute mode of interpretation in light of the complexity of today’s New Modern imagery.

Jen-Kuang Chang work, “OM”, is an audiovisual piece, which explores the universal sacred syllable found in various Eastern religions. Both sampled and computer generated sounds are incorporated in order to achieve the intended variety of sonic landscapes to match the vivid, but delicate visualization.

Magsamen & Hillerbrand, a collaborative husband and wife team, work with video and installation while investigating ideas about relationships, perception and our daily interactions with each other. Using abstraction and illusion to create a new lens or way of looking at the world they create visceral works of which include everyday visual vocabulary of our lives such as bubble gum, a kiss or a cup of coffee. They show the familiar to us in an unfamiliar and cinematic way.

Bill Domonkos, “The Ambient Medium”, is a beautifully nuanced fusion of manipulated archive film footage, special effects and animation. “The Ambient Medium” is a testament to the powers we may not see but can certainly feel. This work takes inspiration from 19th century spirit photography, the experiments of Nikola Tesla, science fiction and paranormal phenomena

The overall goal of the Accessibility 2009: Cross Currents is to enrich the lives of the Sumter-area community through an ongoing series of very public art projects that will include the visual, performing, and media arts. Accessibility 2009 public art events will include art education projects in order to give Sumter-area teachers and student’s insight into the process of the art forms being featured during the various exhibitions. Regional schools, colleges and universities will be encouraged to participate in the event as well. The Sumter County Gallery of Art will play a major role in the education component by conducting site tours and conducting discussions about the art forms being featured during each exhibition.
Accessibility 2009:Cross Currents takes place on Sumter’s “Main Street Corridor” and will promote collaboration with Main Street businesses, organizations and agencies. The focus on the Main Street Corridor will, hopefully, provide increased pedestrian traffic along Main Street’s sidewalks encouraging area commercial businesses to participate in and promote ongoing revitalization through future Accessibility projects. Accessibility 2009 plans to use the art and the increased pedestrian traffic to showcase the architecture and beauty of the historic buildings located along the Main Street Corridor.

CONTACTS AND INFORMATION:
Frank McCauley, Asst. Director, SCGA, 803.775.0543, frank@sumtergallery.org

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To camp in a bivouac.