Boothe and Cohen created the piece while completing a collaborative residency at the Corning Museum of Glass in 2012. Interested in 14^th to 19^th century Tibetan Thangka paintings, the two artists worked to create a large-scale glass installation that would interpret the rich imagery while existing in a space between ancient metaphor and personal imagination.

Intuitively proximate to Buddhist philosophy, the piece is about the inter-relatedness of things. Each glass part appears sentient and in direct communication with the others. In a Thangka painting, none of the forms are meant to be isolated but work together to invite the viewer to take the painting in at once, as a whole. Similarly, all of the pieces in Boothe and Cohen’s installation contribute to a sense of continuous breath or movement, which is enhanced by light reflecting through the glass.

One viewer remarked that the installation reminded her of reading, “The Dream of the Red Chamber,” a Chinese classic novel that encompasses an entire Chinese Dynasty’s history. She remarked that the piece was like the book, not only because of it ancient imagery but also because of its panoramic quality and the consequent sense of undertaking an adventure.

Moving through the piece, Between Seeing and Knowing is like going on an adventure—an adventure that is historical, deeply personal and fresh. The show will be up at the Accola Griefen Gallery on West 27^th street through October 12^th.

By Elizabeth Crawford

The post Between Seeing and Knowing by Anna Boothe and Nancy Cohen appeared first on NY Arts Magazine.

Here are a few of my favorites:

I hope Judy Pfaff had as grand a time creating Night Blooming Ceres as we have in experiencing it.  It hangs on the wall, lit from behind, with florescent tubes expanding its delicacy and translucence. Pfaff ‘s wry humor is in full display as we recognize her unlikely materials. Ranging from honeycomb cardboard, melted plastic, paper coffee filters, and Chinese lanterns.  They brilliantly create a glowing flora of texture and light.

Structural Detour 13 is a fine example of Nicola Lopez’s eloquence with the chaotic geometry of urban structures. With a bright red orange background, she has layered printed remnants of girders and steel beams, fragments of an exploded construction site.

Delicate plastic filaments and cooper wire shimmer like jewelry in Nancy Cohen’s Contradiction in Terms. In the soft green and aqua colors of sea-tossed glass, a multitude of gem-like transparent and opaque surfaces are entangled together, as though they were caught in seaweed and found washed up on the shore.

Imaginary constellations are formed in Victoria Burge’s lyrical meditations on space. Ink washes over the faint echoes of a map to give depth and the impression of clouds within her illuminated skies. There is ample room for conjecture as interpretation can veer between stars, flight paths, or city lights; those secret connections in the darkness.

In stark contrast, Susanna Heller’s work bursts with the frenzied use of paint, impasto strokes and drips of the expressionist hand. With a strong color palette, variations of warm and cool grays are a background to teals, pale yellow, sienna, and the occasional shock of red.  Necklace of Stones depicts the violence of demolition at the edge of a city. Urban imagery is shown at a high point of disorder and transmutation.

Melvin Edward Nelson brings a sense of spiritual fervor and intimations of transcendence. His dreamlike, visionary images are riveting. Planetary Ladder, 1964 is a work of pastel pinks and vibrant violet watercolor. A strong black grid dominates the center of the page as it reaches towards an otherworldly sphere. If you look closely you’ll see faint lines and handwriting showing through from the back side of the paper. It has obviously had a prior life.

By A. Bascove

The post The Land Before and After Time appeared first on NY Arts Magazine.