Terrain

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Press Release

JACKIE NICKERSON

Terrain

January 16 – February 15, 2014

Opening reception: Thursday, January 16th, from 6 – 8 PM at 513 West 20th Street.Jack Shainman Gallery is pleased to present Jackie Nickerson's third solo exhibition with the gallery. The show includes her latest series of photographs titled Terrain, comprised of images taken in Kenya, Zambia, Zimbabwe and South Africa.Terrain is an investigation into the relationship between individuals and the landscape in relation to food production and farming practices. In these photographs, utilitarian and natural objects have been stacked, coiled, balanced and held, obstructing the subject and forming classical geometric compositions. Nickerson’s sculptural, hybrid beings provide as much visual information on food cultivation as they do about the people depicted.

In her representation of the process where crops and raw materials become consumer products, Nickerson transcends marginalizing her subjects, which can be an effect of photographic documentation, by taking the focus pointedly away from individual identity or even a collective characterization. She comments that, "gazing steadily at the point at which one element meets another, Terrain asks us to think about these imprints left by the material processes of work as the evidence of our presence on the earth, and to think about how contemporary human beings, living in a western urban environment, can relate to the metaphysics of the labor which enables our lives."

The series also includes images that focus on inanimate objects and materials that have become ubiquitous at the sites of almost any type of production. Plastic sheets embody a veil of separation between the viewer and the subject that poetically protrudes and presses against it. What we may consider detritus has become central to the landscape and is infinitely repurposed. As described by the artist, these become "lived spaces of human activity" where "hands and plants, limbs and fabric, bodies and soil hold close to one another". With a formalist approach that weaves shape, color and subjectivity into delicate depictions, Nickerson remains rooted in her firm and tightly honed visual language.

A new monograph, Terrain, was published by TF Editores in November, 2013 and is currently available at the gallery.

Jackie Nickerson was born in Boston and now divides her time between Ireland and southern Africa. A selection of international exhibitions include Jackie Nickerson: Terrain, Light Work, Syracuse, USA (2013); Jackie Nickerson: The Past is Another Country, Millennium Court Arts Centre, Portadown, Northern Ireland (2011); and Jackie Nickerson: Faith, which traveled to the Centre Culturel Irlandais, Paris, France (2008); and Accademia d’Arte, Bologna, Italy (2013); among other locations. Recent group exhibitions include The Oppenheimer Collection, Nerman Museum of Contemporary Art, Overland Park, USA (2013); Portrayal/Betrayal, Santa Barbara Museum of Art, Santa Barbara, USA (2012); Sense of Place, Palais des Beaux-Arts, Brussels, Belgium (2012); Twenty, Hereford Museum, Herefordshire, UK (2010); Press Art, Museum of Modern Art, Salzburg, Austria (2010); Collecting the New, Irish Museum of Modern Art, Dublin, Ireland (2010); and The Photographic Portrait, National Portrait Gallery, London (2006-2007). Her work is included in numerous public collections including the Museum of Modern Art, New York, USA; Irish Museum of Modern Art, Dublin, Ireland; Vatican Museums, Rome, Italy; and the National Gallery of Ireland, Dublin, Ireland.

Concurrently on view at 524 West 24th Street is Radcliffe Bailey: Maroons from January 16th through February 15th.

Upcoming exhibitions at the gallery include Richard Mosse: The Enclave at 513 West 20th Street, which opens on February 22nd, and Leslie Wayne: Rags at 524 West 24th Street, which opens on February 20th. The opening receptions for both exhibitions will be on Saturday, February 22nd and they will both remain on view until Saturday, March 22nd.

Gallery hours are Tuesday through Saturday from 10am to 6pm. For additional information and photographic material please contact the gallery at info@jackshainman.com.