Anna Gray+Ryan Paulsen and Storm Tharp: Schneider Museum of Art

Anna Gray+Ryan Paulsen and Storm Tharp will be exhibiting new work at Southern Oregon University's Schneider Museum of Art in two separate, but concurrent shows.

January 19th – March 17th 2018
Opening Reception: Thursday, January 18th 5:00 – 7:00 PM

Anna Gray+Ryan Wilson Paulsen
"Between the Beginning and the Middle"

"This collection of artworks augment and pull from grade-school reading and writing worksheets. Starting from the simplified activity structures of rudimentary learning tools, the work infuses complex and whimsical questions about society, being, and representation that get asked by children rather than to them—questions like “If you erase something in the computer, does it get erased in real life?” or “Can you not have any more kids because you ran out of milk?”.

The work explores the complexity of the acts of reading, seeing, and understanding and is grown from a love of the ways that kid logic and hypotheses can re-frame what we believe to be true. "

Storm Tharp
"Fierce Last Stand"

"This work arose from a variety of impulses, most of which came from a desire for glorious change. These impulses reflect my life as a citizen of the United States in this era of seismic unrest and perversity as well as the more personal and mysterious impulse to start over again in my work; imposing a new chemistry in the studio reflecting what this all feels like. Never before has my exterior world and the interior self been more inextricably connected by the same voice. It has been virtually impossible not to make art about the time we live in. But the methods remain the same: the same paper, same gesture as before but with much greater ease (it seems). The parts and pieces coming together to build a whole. Like ingredients or footnotes in a larger composition. The images are transfers from painting on glass, creating allowances for the irregular, the haphazard and the uncanny. I am not interested in refining results or making improvements once the image has been lifted. Burn Yr’Self A Bridge and find your way."

Schneider Museum of Art at the Oregon Center for the Arts
555 Indiana Street
Ashland, OR 97520

images clockwise from top left: Storm Tharp "Castlebuilding II", 2017, monotype, 75" x 50"; Storm Tharp "Wolves at the Door", 2017, monotype, 75" x 50"; Anna Gray+Ryan Wilson Paulsen selection from "Between the Beginning and the Middle", 2017, chalk and paint on panel, 24" x 48"