The Surreal Life sets up a dialogue between the work of two artists, Gerry Snyder and Marco Rosichelli, who share a desire to create alternative universes both familiar and strange. A Surreal Life opens at the New Mexico Museum of Art on September 25, 2009.
Snyder and Rosichelli present in their art extremely well known elements – Snyder’s beautifully crafted paintings with their Renaissance inspired backdrops and Rosichelli’s finely crafted playground toys. However, they juxtapose these artistic elements with surreal content, Snyder with amorphous balloon-like cartoon shapes and Rosichelli with fetus-like forms.
Rosichelli’s sculptures evoke common objects reminiscent of childhood icons and toys. He says, “…the viewers are enticed to interact with the work.”
The figures in Snyder’s paintings have an unruly organic quality that suggest Darwinian principles run amok; they can’t stop growing extra breasts yet lack basic necessities like arms or mouths.
We are asked to consider the anthropomorphic forms represented in both artists’ work, either through our subconscious dream-fueled mind or as literal symbols. Is the Rosichelli sculpture in the exhibition, “Spring Fetus 2,” the realization of some dream gone bad or more literally a hobby horse common to children’s playgrounds? Is Snyder asking us to look at the forms in his paintings as if through a window or is the canvas a mirror?
Exhibition curator Tim Rodgers, Ph.D., said that he hopes the viewer will, “…find such art inspiring in that it opens up new possibilities and alternative worlds.”
Snyder earned his BFA from the University of Oregon and his MA, Art and Media, at New York University. Snyder lives in New Mexico. His work has been exhibited internationally and is in the Whitney and DeYoung Museums’ permanent collections. Rosichelli received his BFA in sculpture and design from Southern Oregon University in Ashland, Oregon. He recently earned an MFA in sculpture from Arizona State University, in Tempe, Arizona. He was recently the recipient of a public art commission through the Scottsdale Public Arts Commission, in Scottsdale, Arizona. Rosichelli currently lives in Arizona. Rosichelli has mostly shown in Arizona and Oregon and The Surreal Life is a good opportunity to see an emerging and more established artists’ take on this topic.
The Surreal Life: Gerry Snyder and Marco Rosichelli opens Friday, September 25, 2009 with a reception hosted by the Women’s Board of the Museum of New Mexico from 5:30 p.m. to 7:30 p.m. Admission is free. The exhibition will run through January 31, 2010.
