Presence in the Pause: Interiority and its Radical Immanence

May 20, 2023–September 17, 2023

Curated by Rachel Adams, Chief Curator and Director of Programs

“Presence in the Pause: Interiority and its Radical Immanence focus on the complexity of our everyday relationships through portraits and domestic scenes that examine personhood, memories, and the speeding up and slowing down of contemporary life. Artists are often known to be solitary creatures and their practice dictates long periods spent alone with their materials, thoughts and research, memories, and futures. Harmonizing these aspects together through painting, this exhibition highlights a group of artists who examine and celebrate ideas around interiority through their unique viewpoints, whether by means of domestic spaces filled with memories, inner monologues that flit between past, present, and future, or the visual expression of emotion. What happens when the space of the canvas allows for both subtle and radical interpretations of reality?”

“Specifically, Presence in the Pause spotlights a group of women and non-binary artists born between 1975-1985, who collectively uncover and chronicle the intimate and immanent aspects of daily life, spotlighting interiority as not only personal but political. In revealing the presence of daily challenges, memories, and the wants and needs of our bodies, the works touch upon what we continue to yearn for–personal growth, fulfillment, and space to be ourselves and be with ourselves. By simultaneously embracing and shattering the gendered expectations thrust upon them, the artists highlight how, in the sometimes mundaneness of everyday life, domesticity, identity, and memory collide together to create an all-encompassing radical immanence.”

Artists include Mequitta Ahuja, Lilli Carré, Andrea Joyce Heimer, Kyoko Idetsu, Kathy Liao, Danielle McKinney, Maia Cruz Palileo, Molly Prentiss, Preetika Rajgariah, Celeste Rapone, and Becky Suss.”

This focus on the “intimate and immanent aspects of daily life” explores the complexities of correspondence in human relationships with place and one another. Their paintings resonate on personal and political levels.

It is important to realize that the interiority explored in this study goes in the opposite direction. It is more directed towards transcendence than immanence. It explores a new experience that is not homocentric, but ecocentric.

https://www.bemiscenter.org/exhibitions/presence-in-the-pause?mc_cid=48dd2e01c5&mc_eid=1047f763da

To see more paintings from this exhibit, copy and paste this link from the Bemis Center for Contemporary Art website.