August 13, 2020
Amy Kim Keeler
Future Jupiter
Lowell Ryan Projects
July 18 - August 29, 2020
Amy Kim Keeler
Amy Kim Keeler's intimate works could best be described as drawings made with colored cotton thread that has been carefully stitched onto brown corrugated cardboard. Using the undulations of the corrugation as a guide, Keeler creates geometric patterns that flow along the vertical lines dictated by the cardboard, but also sometimes ignores the striations to create more naturalistic images. Both approaches are labored processes as the small stitches take time to accumulate. In Another Universe (2019), Magnetic Mountain (2019), Just Below the Surface (2019), Threshold Consciousness (2020) and Neither Day nor Night (2020), Keeler's stitches become horizontal lines that overlay the rises in the corrugated surface. These works reference the landscape, depicting sky, mountains and land as textured abstractions. Though not specific places, they offer something tangible and familiar.
Works including Finding the Way, Before and After and Astral Evolution (all 2020), are non-representational. Here, Keeler creates basic geometric shapes -- concentric circles or triangular patterns -- in rainbow colors surrounded by black outlines. Her color stitching follows the vertical lines of the corrugation transitioning to different hues between black borders that form circles or are placed horizontally and diagonally. From Now On (2018) and They Know The Way (2019) are compositions featuring more organic and geometric shapes in natural soft tones resembling woven tapestries rather than hard-edged geometry, whereas the rectangular shapes in Everything is Connected (2019) and Old Moon Consciousness (2020) are softer renditions of geometric patterns.
In Between Death and Rebirth (2020) Keeler creates three overlapping trapezoids -- one green, one yellow and one blue -- each outlined in black. Where they intersect, she creates new shapes by combining their colors. The form as a whole is set against a light stitched ground. As the title suggests, Keeler's works explore spaces between — what exists between life and death, day and night, past, present and future.
Keeler is interested in natural forms and rhythms. The patterns within her works are derived from sound, light and ocean waves, yet rather than reference didactic scientific depictions Keeler infuses her works with spirituality. Her practice grows out of Anthroposophy, a philosophy that postulates the existence of an objective, intellectually comprehensible spiritual world, accessible to human experience. According to the principals of Anthroposophy, Future Jupiter will be the next condition of consciousness -- perfected imagination.
Looking at Keeler's pieces through the lens of Anthroposophy, they reflect the execution of a humble task -- sewing or stitching. Here, her repetitive gestures and labor intensive process beget subtle and beautiful works that allude to infinite ways to imagine the natural world.
Future Jupiter
Lowell Ryan Projects
July 18 - August 29, 2020
Amy Kim Keeler
Amy Kim Keeler's intimate works could best be described as drawings made with colored cotton thread that has been carefully stitched onto brown corrugated cardboard. Using the undulations of the corrugation as a guide, Keeler creates geometric patterns that flow along the vertical lines dictated by the cardboard, but also sometimes ignores the striations to create more naturalistic images. Both approaches are labored processes as the small stitches take time to accumulate. In Another Universe (2019), Magnetic Mountain (2019), Just Below the Surface (2019), Threshold Consciousness (2020) and Neither Day nor Night (2020), Keeler's stitches become horizontal lines that overlay the rises in the corrugated surface. These works reference the landscape, depicting sky, mountains and land as textured abstractions. Though not specific places, they offer something tangible and familiar.
Works including Finding the Way, Before and After and Astral Evolution (all 2020), are non-representational. Here, Keeler creates basic geometric shapes -- concentric circles or triangular patterns -- in rainbow colors surrounded by black outlines. Her color stitching follows the vertical lines of the corrugation transitioning to different hues between black borders that form circles or are placed horizontally and diagonally. From Now On (2018) and They Know The Way (2019) are compositions featuring more organic and geometric shapes in natural soft tones resembling woven tapestries rather than hard-edged geometry, whereas the rectangular shapes in Everything is Connected (2019) and Old Moon Consciousness (2020) are softer renditions of geometric patterns.
In Between Death and Rebirth (2020) Keeler creates three overlapping trapezoids -- one green, one yellow and one blue -- each outlined in black. Where they intersect, she creates new shapes by combining their colors. The form as a whole is set against a light stitched ground. As the title suggests, Keeler's works explore spaces between — what exists between life and death, day and night, past, present and future.
Keeler is interested in natural forms and rhythms. The patterns within her works are derived from sound, light and ocean waves, yet rather than reference didactic scientific depictions Keeler infuses her works with spirituality. Her practice grows out of Anthroposophy, a philosophy that postulates the existence of an objective, intellectually comprehensible spiritual world, accessible to human experience. According to the principals of Anthroposophy, Future Jupiter will be the next condition of consciousness -- perfected imagination.
Looking at Keeler's pieces through the lens of Anthroposophy, they reflect the execution of a humble task -- sewing or stitching. Here, her repetitive gestures and labor intensive process beget subtle and beautiful works that allude to infinite ways to imagine the natural world.