FAIR-WEATHER SEPTEMBER ISSUE

If the incredulity of this summer’s humidity had you wondering if it would be possible to step outdoors again, believe that fall is prepared to rectify the social life that-was-not with a forecast of much art, artists and art fairs.

Starting the season is the Affordable Art Fair New York, September 27-30 2018, The Metropolitan Pavilion, NYC where my works, “Chair 1” (2016) and “Equal” (2016), will show in advance of their 2019 exhibition at BoxHeart Gallery, Pittsburgh PA, at their Stand 1.31.

Left to Right, both Andrew Ooi: Chair 1, 2016 | 9 x 8 x 6.5 inches, 23 x 20.5 x 16.5 cm | Gampi paper, acrylic, ink and Equal, 2016 | 6 x 7.5 x 7 inches, 15.5 x 19 x 18 cm | Gampi paper, acrylic, ink

A realization of my signature style in three-dimension, “Chair 1” and “Equal” demonstrate ideas pertaining to genarcha, or family head, as conceived for the exhibit by the same name similarly attributing artist Pablo Picasso’s iconic painting “Guernica” as the ageless bastion of artistic and political opposition.

Of specific consideration are the psychophysiological implications of rebuilding after destruction, utility of space as both a private and public medium and abstraction as a way to understand reality from multiple points of view. Part of a series of three, “Chair 1” tests the limits of the traditional criteria defining a chair through its extreme interpretation of Cubism among its counterparts. “Equal” is a manifestation of Picasso’s position on “discarded finds”–the transformation of a picture at its absolute due to the successive destroying of “pretty discoveries” an artist makes against becoming their own connoisseur.

In all however, the thematic artworks are about reimagining how life could seem if the ethos of our reality was accepted as an occasion to engage thoughtfully; much like the paintings of artists Joshua Hogan, Nicole Renee Ryan and Augustina Droze. Exhibiting concurrently, their topographies evoke the spiritual, remembrance and fulfillment–personal and universal–respectively, we, as human beings, constantly seek and often do, in sunny climes too. For the heat-addled, that sunshiny spot can now be had at BoxHeart Gallery’s Stand during regular fair hours and online, at their Shows web page on Artsy.com where the probability of making the scene has never looked so good.

Thank-you to “Creative Boom” magazine for their timely post about me and “Genarcha” artworks on their website and Instagram.