Emily Vey Duke and Cooper Battersby
13 Dec 2008 - 22 Feb 2009
© Emily Vey Duke and Cooper Battersby
Beauty Plus Pity (installation view), 2008.
Courtesy Jessica Bradley Art + Projects, Toronto. Photo: Rafael Goldchain.
Beauty Plus Pity (installation view), 2008.
Courtesy Jessica Bradley Art + Projects, Toronto. Photo: Rafael Goldchain.
EMILY VEY DUKE AND COOPER BATTERSBY
"Beauty Plus Pity"
13 December 2008 – 22 February 2009
Opening Reception
Friday 12 December | 7:30 PM
ombining ditties, stories, cartoons, scavenged video footage and the installation of taxidermic animals and other sculptural elements, 'Beauty Plus Pity' investigates the perverse ethical, emotional and existential relationships among adults, children, animals and God. Syracuse-based Canadian collaborative artists Emily Vey Duke and Cooper Battersby suggest that generational legacies and natural cycles both comfort us with their promise of continuity and entrap us in destructive patterns. They are fascinated by how redemption can sprout from the present as a tree from a seed. Reciting Philip Larkin's poem about parental dysfunction, 'This Be The Verse,' they urge us to "get out as early as you can" from our parents’ grasp "and don't have any kids yourself." Although children are not good, the narrator claims, they contain the potential for goodness.
'Beauty Plus Pity' testifies to life's simultaneously sublime and horrific qualities, and the beauty and shame of existing. Justifying his pleasure in killing animals, the hunter-narrator claims that "we want to touch them and hold them." This longing for closeness casts his fellow hunters' morbid rituals in a new light. Meanwhile a senile God stumbles around and makes a fool of himself and the Catholic Church casts out a grieving mother, blaming her for her daughter's death (or so an outraged little mouse tells us). The mouse is part of an animal chorus called The Spirit Guides, who deliver directives to humanity and an ultimatum to the God whom humans have created in their own image. The video piece, and its accompanying sculptural and installation elements, is part apologia and part call to arms.
Emily Vey Duke (born 1972, Halifax) and Cooper Battersby (born 1971, Penticton) have been working collaboratively since 1994 in printed matter, installation, new media, curation and sound, with their primary practice single-channel video. Their work has been exhibited internationally including at the Walker Art Center, Minneapolis and The Renaissance Society, Chicago and nationally at the Vancouver Art Gallery. In Toronto their work is represented by Jessica Bradley Art + Projects.
Emily Vey Duke and Cooper Battersby: 'Beauty Plus Pity' is curated by Jennifer Matotek, Assistant Curator of Exhibitions at The Power Plant.
SUPPORT DONORS:
John & Peggy Clinton
James Lahey and Pym Buitenhuis
"Beauty Plus Pity"
13 December 2008 – 22 February 2009
Opening Reception
Friday 12 December | 7:30 PM
ombining ditties, stories, cartoons, scavenged video footage and the installation of taxidermic animals and other sculptural elements, 'Beauty Plus Pity' investigates the perverse ethical, emotional and existential relationships among adults, children, animals and God. Syracuse-based Canadian collaborative artists Emily Vey Duke and Cooper Battersby suggest that generational legacies and natural cycles both comfort us with their promise of continuity and entrap us in destructive patterns. They are fascinated by how redemption can sprout from the present as a tree from a seed. Reciting Philip Larkin's poem about parental dysfunction, 'This Be The Verse,' they urge us to "get out as early as you can" from our parents’ grasp "and don't have any kids yourself." Although children are not good, the narrator claims, they contain the potential for goodness.
'Beauty Plus Pity' testifies to life's simultaneously sublime and horrific qualities, and the beauty and shame of existing. Justifying his pleasure in killing animals, the hunter-narrator claims that "we want to touch them and hold them." This longing for closeness casts his fellow hunters' morbid rituals in a new light. Meanwhile a senile God stumbles around and makes a fool of himself and the Catholic Church casts out a grieving mother, blaming her for her daughter's death (or so an outraged little mouse tells us). The mouse is part of an animal chorus called The Spirit Guides, who deliver directives to humanity and an ultimatum to the God whom humans have created in their own image. The video piece, and its accompanying sculptural and installation elements, is part apologia and part call to arms.
Emily Vey Duke (born 1972, Halifax) and Cooper Battersby (born 1971, Penticton) have been working collaboratively since 1994 in printed matter, installation, new media, curation and sound, with their primary practice single-channel video. Their work has been exhibited internationally including at the Walker Art Center, Minneapolis and The Renaissance Society, Chicago and nationally at the Vancouver Art Gallery. In Toronto their work is represented by Jessica Bradley Art + Projects.
Emily Vey Duke and Cooper Battersby: 'Beauty Plus Pity' is curated by Jennifer Matotek, Assistant Curator of Exhibitions at The Power Plant.
SUPPORT DONORS:
John & Peggy Clinton
James Lahey and Pym Buitenhuis