Krista Buecking
OBJECT LESSON/STUMBLING BLOCK
30 Nov 2017 - 03 Feb 2018
Opening on Thursday, 30 November 2017 from 6 to 8 p.m. and continuing through to 3 February 2018, the Susan Hobbs Gallery is pleased to present an exhibition of new works by Krista Buecking.
OBJECT LESSON/STUMBLING BLOCK, an exhibition of new work by Krista Buecking, presents a series of prints that combine linguistic tropes of positive affirmations with professional product photography. In each, the disembodied living currency of a young woman’s manicured fingers push, grope, hold, seduce, caress, and engage various consumer objects and data visualizations. As the title suggests, the work offers a paradox – an opportunity to reflect upon the complicated and contradictory relationship we have with the material and dematerialized effects of free market capitalism.
On the one hand, an obsessive reliance on gel sanitizer and cold press juice or the craving for millennial colour spectrums and sans-serif font describe manifestations of neoliberalism and the aspirational desire to feel calm, safe, and in control. On the other, each scenario performs a visual gaffe: the carrots are not farm fresh, the slender arms are too tense, the tags are showing, the arrow is dropping. Each of these slips exposes how the pervasive quest for personal fulfillment often results in trying, absurd, desperate, and awkward consequences.
As wellness becomes an ideology that collapses social problems with personal failure, it has worked to pathologize individual subjects in order to undermine collectivist action. In turn, systemic inequalities and structural violence are sublimated under the pressure for individuals to take responsibility for their own improvement, productivity, and management. For instance, a precarious gig-economy is presented as the freedom to be one’s own boss, or as the soft yellow text on one of Buecking’s prints asserts, A TRUSTED TEAM OF ONE.
Krista Buecking was born in 1982 in Brampton, Ontario, and is a graduate of the University of Guelph’s Studio Art program. She completed her MFA at CalArts in 2012. Recently, she has had solo exhibitions at Susan Hobbs Gallery, Toronto (2009, 2012, 2015) and Mercer Union, Toronto (2010). Her work has been included in group exhibitions at Commonwealth & Council, Los Angeles (2014), Optica, Montreal (2007), and Art Metropole, Toronto (2007) among others.
Susan Hobbs Gallery is open to the public Wednesday to Saturday from 11:00 a.m. to 5:00 p.m. and by appointment. The gallery is located at 137 Tecumseth Street, Toronto.
For more information about this exhibition or the Susan Hobbs Gallery, please give us a call at (416) 504.3699 or visit www.susanhobbs.com.
OBJECT LESSON/STUMBLING BLOCK, an exhibition of new work by Krista Buecking, presents a series of prints that combine linguistic tropes of positive affirmations with professional product photography. In each, the disembodied living currency of a young woman’s manicured fingers push, grope, hold, seduce, caress, and engage various consumer objects and data visualizations. As the title suggests, the work offers a paradox – an opportunity to reflect upon the complicated and contradictory relationship we have with the material and dematerialized effects of free market capitalism.
On the one hand, an obsessive reliance on gel sanitizer and cold press juice or the craving for millennial colour spectrums and sans-serif font describe manifestations of neoliberalism and the aspirational desire to feel calm, safe, and in control. On the other, each scenario performs a visual gaffe: the carrots are not farm fresh, the slender arms are too tense, the tags are showing, the arrow is dropping. Each of these slips exposes how the pervasive quest for personal fulfillment often results in trying, absurd, desperate, and awkward consequences.
As wellness becomes an ideology that collapses social problems with personal failure, it has worked to pathologize individual subjects in order to undermine collectivist action. In turn, systemic inequalities and structural violence are sublimated under the pressure for individuals to take responsibility for their own improvement, productivity, and management. For instance, a precarious gig-economy is presented as the freedom to be one’s own boss, or as the soft yellow text on one of Buecking’s prints asserts, A TRUSTED TEAM OF ONE.
Krista Buecking was born in 1982 in Brampton, Ontario, and is a graduate of the University of Guelph’s Studio Art program. She completed her MFA at CalArts in 2012. Recently, she has had solo exhibitions at Susan Hobbs Gallery, Toronto (2009, 2012, 2015) and Mercer Union, Toronto (2010). Her work has been included in group exhibitions at Commonwealth & Council, Los Angeles (2014), Optica, Montreal (2007), and Art Metropole, Toronto (2007) among others.
Susan Hobbs Gallery is open to the public Wednesday to Saturday from 11:00 a.m. to 5:00 p.m. and by appointment. The gallery is located at 137 Tecumseth Street, Toronto.
For more information about this exhibition or the Susan Hobbs Gallery, please give us a call at (416) 504.3699 or visit www.susanhobbs.com.