| This March at Color Elefante gallery in Valencia, Spain, curator Tchera Niyego premiered "Sleep," a group show which brought together five artists under the premise: "Sleep is 1/60th of Death." The manner in which these artists reacted to such a lofty concept was as individual and unique as their individual styles. |  |
Sleep – Simone Cappa
This March at Color Elefante gallery in Valencia, Spain, curator Tchera Niyego premiered "Sleep," a group show which brought together five artists under the premise: "Sleep is 1/60th of Death." The manner in which these artists reacted to such a lofty concept was as individual and unique as their individual styles. Yet, grouped together Niyego has conjured up a haunting concoction.
Kai Lintumaa is a digital artist who manipulates his photography to express that much more than simple film can capture. His work is truly cinematic in essence. His piece, Sleep, is an image that recalls a Hitchcock flick, a floating butcher knife over comfy rustled bed—insert maniac and dozing beauty and we have some action here. But leaving the composition open, mysterious—the lighting in this image does most of the storytelling: dark, angled—we are left with only a glimpse of what may be. And like any good mystery, the viewer is left with a joyful suspense.
Brooklyn-born Robert Iannicelli went for a more loaded view on sleep. In Mary, we find the Virgin Mary hovering over a pimped-out ride. Is this a social comment on a generation being taken for a ride by the ideologies of yesteryear? Juxtaposing a divine symbol with a modern day status symbol begs the question: where does our loyalty lie? In the here and now, or in a dreamy after-life that some archaic text promises? Is our generation at sleep, coasting quickly through life, trying to have it both ways?
Cris Mitchell aligns himself with a similar take on the human predicament. His untitled offering is a bold apocalyptic view, with the form of a mushroom cloud overwhelming that of a burnt tree. Positioning shape over shape reveals our progression towards an unnatural end to this all, an end to nature, an end to that which nourishes us. A fiery red sky looms over the fields of the earth, which are littered with missiles and skulls. How is it that we do not see how we are destroying ourselves, our future? Will we one day wake up and wish it all away as a nightmare, only to see there is no going back?
Shi-Hye Park brings the show back to a more meditative state. Her Landscape oil painting is a delicate snapshot of the water’s edge at the beach. The realistic depiction uses soft colors to reflect on that place where two worlds meet, where the known and unknown come together—like the ebb and flow of sleep and waking state. The rich sand and textured waves are created with a patient technique from this Korean artist. One can almost hear the hushed murmurs of the sea, the swallowed noise of the world, the distant birds enjoying the breeze.
Finally, Clifford Faust’s The Lovers wraps the show up on a sensitive, human note. Two lovers lie facing each other, their hands touching, a candle lit between them. One can just imagine that these are the early moments of love and commitment captured, when all is bliss. Faust creates an aura of calm, pleasure, satisfaction. The two individuals are entranced by the love in the room, the sensual beauty of life. Dozing off, they move together into the beauty of sleep.
