Mark Brosseau “Wordspace”
June, 2006
Philadelphia, PA - The Bridgette Mayer Gallery is pleased to present a solo exhibition of new paintings by Philadelphia artist Mark Brosseau. The show will run from May 31 – July 1, 2006 with an opening reception on First Friday, June 2nd, 6:00-8:30pm. An installation of drawings entitled “Up in the Attic and Under the Bed” by Jenny Brown will also be on view in the Gallery vault room.
Mark Brosseau’s paintings are a chronicle of experience grown from the lively play of spatial components, colors and forms. He is influenced by a diverse variety of elements such as the movement of a sine wave, the relationship of negative space to geometric shapes, and the architecture of industrial spaces. Brosseau explores and abstracts these and other visual experiences in his paintings to create an environment designed to engage the viewer’s eye and communicate the experience through visual exploration.
Brosseau works with painted elements much as a linguist constructs, deconstructs, and explores the elements of language. The position or color of a line in Brosseau’s work becomes most meaningful when observed in relation to the surrounding forms, just as a letter denotes more meaning when linked with other letters in a word or words within a sentence. In this way Brosseau creates intricate visual spaces that are more than the sum of their individual components.
Brosseau speaks about his artistic process in creating the painting Meandering, a colorful construction of scalloped lines, stripes and patterns on view in this show:
It started as a sine wave traveling through space. For me it's the language of math in a very visual form. The wave wanders through the space and sets up a rhythm across the surface of the canvas. I was interested in juxtaposing that language and rhythm with a decorative one and getting these two different ideas, one scientific and essential and the other frivolous and aesthetic, to interact with one another. So I used sets of scallops to mirror the rhythm set up by the sine wave and then used individual scallops to demark points in space of the painting. The result was this kind of wandering rhythm in and out of the canvas, and across the canvas. Hence the title of the piece, "Meandering". – Mark Brosseau
This exhibition will also include an installation of drawings called “Up in the Attic and Under the Bed” by Jenny Brown. Brown is an artist whose practice stems from a desire to illuminate the links between the everyday landscape and her imagined worlds. With dark charcoal she expresses both the strength and softness of a host of rich imagery. The brooding and beautiful shapes in her drawings are the emotions of a dream made visible.
Mark Brosseau received his M.F.A. from the University of Pennsylvania – School of Design, Philadelphia in 2001 and his B.A. from Dartmouth College, Hanover NH, in 1998. He received a Fulbright Fellowship to study painting and printmaking in Iceland in 2001 and was an Artist in Residence at Straumur International Art Commune, Hafnarfjordur, Iceland from January through August 2002. Brosseau has had a recent solo show at St. Joseph’s University entitled “Vocabulary” in November of 2005. He has also had solo shows at the Straumur International Art Commune, Hafnarfjordur-Iceland, Galleri Skuggi, Rykjavik-Iceland. “WordSpace” will run through July 1, 2006. The artist will be present at the opening reception, First Friday, June 2nd from 6:00-8:30 p.m. The event is free and open to the public. Gallery hours are Tuesday-Saturday 10:00 - 6:00 p.m., other days by appointment. For additional information please contact Bridgette Mayer, 215.413.8893 Fax 215.413.2283
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