BAYNE PETERSON
Mirage
October 18 - November 12
PRESS
The Brooklyn Rail
Amanda Gluibizzi
Nov 2, 2022
The gallery is delighted to announce a solo exhibition of eight new sculptures by Bayne Peterson. This is the artist's fourth solo exhibition at the gallery. Please join us for an opening reception on Tuesday, October 18th from 6-8 pm as well as the Madison Avenue Fall Gallery Walk, organized by the Madison Avenue BID, on Saturday, October 22nd from 11am-6pm.
Bayne Peterson's dyed plywood sculptures are perceptual journeys of undulating lines and expansive forms. The surfaces of his sculptures distort the precise order of an orthogonal grid into a winding, optical topography. Peterson carves each sculpture by hand, coaxing complex patterns from an initial aggregate of multiple pieces of patterned wood joined together at specific angles. Fluid outlines and amorphous negative spaces look to the works of modernist predecessors such as Joan Miró and Barbara Hepworth. To this history Peterson adds that of optical painting, extending his sculptures into the realm of the playful through the use of energetic colors. References to biomorphism continue within Peterson's new works, as does his ongoing contemplation of the condition of viewing an object underwater, an idea that he began to think about during his 2020 exhibition 'Mantis Shrimp Eye.' At that time, Peterson also began sculpting dyed plywood bases to support the upper segments of his works. He continues to explore this theme now, sculpting platforms that appear to melt into ambiguous forms.
For his previous 2020 exhibition, Peterson did thematic research into the fascinating optical capabilities of the eye of the Mantis Shrimp, giving the exhibition the title 'Mantis Shrimp Eye.' For this new exhibition, "Mirage," Peterson shifted his research to anomalies occurring within his own eyesight, and incorporated aspects of his experience of two particular conditions, visual migraines and Macular Pucker, into his works. During periodic visual migraines, called 'scintillating scotomas,' the artist's normal view of the world is replaced with an explosive visual cacophony of patterns and colors. Small circular forms appearing in the sculptures 'Precursor 1' and 'Precursor 2,' as well as the intense multidirectional motion suggested by the sculpture 'Mirage' express some aspects of the visual migraine's onset and climactic states. The Macular Pucker occurring in Peterson's left eye instead causes him to perceive straight lines as wavy in the left eye while capturing the same view normally in his right eye. His sculpture entitled 'Macular Pucker' includes a large perfect circular form on the left accompanied by an angular star-shaped form to its right, in similar scale. Conceived as though looking out towards the viewer, the sculpture reflects on the artist's contrasting way of perceiving the visual field differently in each of his eyes.
Bayne Peterson was born in Palo Alto, CA in 1984 and lives and works in Rhode Island. His sculptures are included in the collections of the Museum of Arts and Design, New York, NY, the RISD Museum, Providence, Rhode Island, the Hallmark Art Collection, Kansas City, Missouri, and the Fidelity Investments Corporate Art Collection, among others. Group exhibitions include ' Universes 5,' The Hole, New York, NY, 2022, 'The Shallow Act of Seeing,' The John Michael Kohler Arts Center, Sheboygan, WI, 2020, 'The Future of Craft Part 1: MAD Collects, Museum of Arts and Design, New York, NY, 2018, 'Underlying System is Not Known, Western Exhibitions,' Chicago, IL, 2017, and 'Abstraction in Art Since 1950: Modern and Contemporary Selections from the Collection,' RISD Museum, Providence, RI, 2016. A full color catalogue, 'Bayne Peterson: Mantis Shrimp Eye,' was published on the occasion of the artist's previous eponymous exhibition. It includes a commissioned essay by Dominic Molon, Richard Brown Baker Curator of Contemporary Art, RISD Museum, Providence, RI.