Adam Putnam
03 Sep - 17 Oct 2009
ADAM PUTNAM
September 3 - October 17, 2009
Opening Reception Thursday, September 3rd, 6 to 8 pm
A tower (not unlike a tomb, a chimney, a well or a clock tower) stands erect as a marker in time –
a monument to:
Being there and not there
Being wrapped in a moment
A compression of space
That old confusion of where bodies begin and end
The unspeakable thing
Standing perfectly still
Standing in front of a mirror and losing track of your reflection
Going deep (a vertical tunnel; a bottomless pit)
Verticality (a vertical axis is formed through the gallery as if to defy the idea that one’s life is but a series of moments moving from past to future but are rather, stacked in a pile.)
Time passing in peculiar ways (like watching a steam engine in a de Chirico painting endlessly arrive) An obscure ritual where every gesture made is a stand in for something else Perhaps it would be best to think of it as a clock, seconds build up like bricks (or the other way around) while from a center point at the very top, a pendulum swings gently down through the floor ticking off another kind of time in the basement. These bricks that fit so snugly into the palm of your hand can so easily become an atomic measure. Like words on a page, days in the year, cells in a body, the grain in a photograph, or buildings in a city.
This is Putnam’s second solo exhibition at Taxter & Spengemann. Recent exhibitions include the 2008 Whitney Biennial, The Whitney Museum of American Art, New York; Changing Light Bulbs in Thin Air, Bard Center for Curatorial Studies; Perspective, curated by le bureau, Maison populaire, Centre d'art Mira Phalaina, Montreal; Void Blank Blank, curated by Yoko Ott, Lee Arts Center, Seattle; International & National Projects, P.S.1 Contemporary Art Center, Long Island City; Between Two Deaths, ZKM Center for Art and Media Karlsruhe; The Uncertain States of America, Astrup Fearnley Museum; Oslo.
September 3 - October 17, 2009
Opening Reception Thursday, September 3rd, 6 to 8 pm
A tower (not unlike a tomb, a chimney, a well or a clock tower) stands erect as a marker in time –
a monument to:
Being there and not there
Being wrapped in a moment
A compression of space
That old confusion of where bodies begin and end
The unspeakable thing
Standing perfectly still
Standing in front of a mirror and losing track of your reflection
Going deep (a vertical tunnel; a bottomless pit)
Verticality (a vertical axis is formed through the gallery as if to defy the idea that one’s life is but a series of moments moving from past to future but are rather, stacked in a pile.)
Time passing in peculiar ways (like watching a steam engine in a de Chirico painting endlessly arrive) An obscure ritual where every gesture made is a stand in for something else Perhaps it would be best to think of it as a clock, seconds build up like bricks (or the other way around) while from a center point at the very top, a pendulum swings gently down through the floor ticking off another kind of time in the basement. These bricks that fit so snugly into the palm of your hand can so easily become an atomic measure. Like words on a page, days in the year, cells in a body, the grain in a photograph, or buildings in a city.
This is Putnam’s second solo exhibition at Taxter & Spengemann. Recent exhibitions include the 2008 Whitney Biennial, The Whitney Museum of American Art, New York; Changing Light Bulbs in Thin Air, Bard Center for Curatorial Studies; Perspective, curated by le bureau, Maison populaire, Centre d'art Mira Phalaina, Montreal; Void Blank Blank, curated by Yoko Ott, Lee Arts Center, Seattle; International & National Projects, P.S.1 Contemporary Art Center, Long Island City; Between Two Deaths, ZKM Center for Art and Media Karlsruhe; The Uncertain States of America, Astrup Fearnley Museum; Oslo.