WILMINGTON — Wilmington College is hosting an exhibit of works by Dayton artists Annie Lee and Brian Zimerle, titled Collective Memory,” Jan. 24 through March 10 in Harcum Art Gallery in Boyd Cultural Arts Center.
An opening reception in honor of the Zimerles will be held Wednesday, Jan. 24 from 6 to 8 p.m. Normal gallery hours are weekdays from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m., and by special appointment coordinated by gallery curator Hal Shunk, professor of art.
The public is invited free of charge.
Annie Lee Zimerle said her artwork explores the act of moving from one culture or language to another, “cast against a corresponding, more inexorable move” from childhood to adulthood.
“I am drawn to movement rather than static differences across cultures and languages because within lies the true lived experience, the collision and merger and displacement as we encounter them,” she said, noting her work often leans on children’s tales and make-believe, which speak to both the displacement (odd duckling, changeling) and the mask of storytelling (magic and fairies), “itself a further metaphor for the real in the imaginary, as well as the illusory in the real.”
She added that, for want of language, children find in dressing up and superheroes a means of explaining and coping with their displacement.
“My work with objects and scenes of domestic life is a variation on the theme of transplantation,” she said. “Chairs, light fixtures, radiator heaters and shopping carts are stationary points of modern existence. They are significant and yet characterless in themselves, like mathematical constants.
“I look to displace these seemingly immovable objects.”
Brian Zimerle noted that, throughout his work, there is subtle play of what knowledge is and how this interaction works in art, artist and viewer. This “epistemological journey” is rooted in his own struggles with the nature of art.
“Beyond the beautiful and the grotesque, the philosophical and the vacuous, what makes something art or not and what is my role” all provide insight into his journey of knowledge.
“Wielding idiosyncratic elements from art history and culture, I exploit what is familiar and known to me,” he said. “I create sculptural tableaus, objects that are recognized or abstracted, alone or in pairs. This deployment is the critical junction whereby I manipulate the viewer in questioning what they know and how they ultimately decipher the work.”
