THESE AMERICAN LIVES March 18 April 30, 2016 Opening Reception March 18, 6-10pm FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

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1 THESE AMERICAN LIVES March 18 April 30, 2016 Opening Reception March 18, 6-10pm FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE Rena Bransten Gallery is pleased to present our opening exhibition at 1275 Minnesota, These American Lives, exploring the collision of past and present, humor and horror, beauty and tragedy. Themes that are simultaneously part of the human experience and uniquely American: the vanishing west, urbanization, surveillance, displacement, insurrection, and the increasingly unattainable American Dream, are explored by artists John Baldessari, Dawoud Bey, Lee Friedlander, Rupert Garcia, Doug Hall, Lewis Hine, Hung Liu, Chip Lord, Vik Muniz, Tameka Norris, Aaron Siskind, Lava Thomas, John Waters, and, among others. This exhibition presents a multiplicity of voices, narratives and subjects, sometimes reframing and sometimes affirming the American experience. Dawoud Bey, Hung Liu, and John Waters address events from America s history. Bey s portraits from The Birmingham Project mark the occasion the fiftieth anniversary of the 1963 bombing of the 16 th Street Baptist Church. Hung Liu contemporizes Russell Lee s FSA image of a migrant family, and John Waters, ever one to revel in the ride from the sacred to the profane, corrupts stock images of the Kennedys as they deplane Air Force One in Dallas, and an iconic image of a segregated drinking fountain. Rupert Garcia and Lava Thomas respond to unconscionable events and circumstance with a beauty that both abates and enhances the reference. Thomas addresses the recent Charleston shooting using a silent chorus of black tambourines; Rupert Garcia s politically charged silkscreens from the late sixties and early seventies use intense color and pop culture imagery to decry social and racial injustice. Through photography, performance, and painting, Tameka Norris claims the right to her body and image as she explores issues of race, gender, and politics. Drawing on her experiences, Norris assumes a range of identities: a black woman, a sexy woman, an educated elite, a hip hop star, and an artist with roots in the deep American South. Doug Hall s Neighborhood Watch considers advances in camera technologies as tools of surveillance, demonstrating the anxiety that accompanies these innovations. Using a central image taken from a bird s eye view, Hall extracts and enlarges details exposing people at work or children at play, unaware of being caught on camera. Similarly anxiety invoking, s photographs reveal hidden domestic life, as with the ironically titled Pink Cup, a black and white image of a cup balanced precariously on a countertop. Vik Muniz and Chip Lord pay homage to American car culture and comment on the automobile as a manifestation of financial success and the promise of the open road. Vik Muniz, cutting and collaging personal, vintage, black and white photographs and their inscriptions to create Album: New Car, 2014, presents an image that recalls all our family albums a man proudly posing in front of his house with his foot on the fender. Chip Lord has partnered with Hayden Pedigo, a 21 year old musician and native of Amarillo, TX, to produce a single channel time based video, Greetings from Amarillo.

2 These American Lives March 18 April 30, 2016 Dawoud Bey The Birmingham Project: Braxton McKinney and Lavone Thomas, 2012 Archival pigment prints mounted to dibond, ed. of /8 x 66 1/4 in. Doug Hall Neighborhood Watch, 1995 Chromogenic print, digital c-prints, ed. of /2 x 68 1/2 overall Rupert Garcia No More O' This Shit, 1969 Color silkscreen Paper size: 24 x 18 in. Image size: 17 x 13 5/8 in. Rupert Garcia Cesen Deportacion, 1973 Color silkscreen 20 x 26 paper 28 3/4 x 36 1/2 framed Chip Lord Greetings from Amarillo, 2016 HD Video, ed. of 5, 2AP Original music by Hayden Pedigo TRT: 32 Min. Vik Muniz Album: New Car, 2014 Digital c-print, ed. of 6, 4 AP 43 1/2 x 63 in.

3 Tameka Jenean Norris Lexicon Series, 2016 Mixed media 20 x 45 x 2 1/2 in. Tameka Jenean Norris Office Hours, 2016 Digital c-print Print size: 24 x 18 in. Framed size: 30 ¾ x 24 ½ in. Lava Thomas Requiem for Charleston, 2016 Tambourines, lambskin, acrylic 76 x 77 x 2 3/8 in. Hung Liu Dirty Pink, 2015 Oil on canvas 80 x 120 in. John Baldessari Roller Coaster, 1988 Black and white photographs with vinyl paint 48 ½ x 48 in. Dawoud Bey Harlem Redux: Former Renaissance Ballroom Site, 2015 Archival pigment print, ed. of 6 40 x 48 in.

4 Pink Cup, Point Richmond, CA, 2002 Image: 8 x 11 ½ inches Framed: 17 x 21 inches Kitchen, Point Richmond, CA, 1987 Image: 8 x 11 1/2 inches Framed: 17 x 21 inches Muscle Beach, CA, 1989, ed. of 12 Print size: 24 x 20 in. Framed size: 32 x 25 in. John Waters Grim Reaper, 2014 C-print, ed. of 5 Image Size: 8 x 8 inches Framed Size: 14.5 x 14.5 inches Lewis Hine Untitled [Four males] Image size: 4 3/8 x 6 1/4 in. Framed size: 12 1/2 x 14 1/2 in. Night Walk LA #41, 1996, ed. of 12 Print size: 20 x 24 in. Framed size: 25 x 31 in. Lee Friedlander Father Duffy. Times Square, New York City, 1974 Image size: 15 1/2 x 11 1/4 in. Framed size: 16 1/4 x 20 1/4 in.

5 John Waters Separate But Equal, 2014 C-print, ed. of 5 Image size: 6 1/2 x 9 7/8 inches Framed size: 13 x 16 3/8 inches Bernd & Hilla Becher Water Tower, Findlay, Ohio, USA, 1977, 1987, ed. of 5 Print size: 23 5/8 x 19 5/8 in. Framed size: 34 x 28 3/4 in. John Waters Neurotic, 2009 C-prints, ed. of /8 x 26 3/4 in. Peter Bransten Untitled, 1972 Image size: 8 x 9 1/2 in. Framed size: 15 5/8 x 16 3/4 in. Helen Levitt Untitled [Woman with hose], c Vintage silver print Paper size: 6 1/2 x 7 5/8 in. Framed size: 20 3/4 x 16 3/4 in. Helen Levitt New York, c Image size: 9 7/8 x 7 1/8 in. Framed size: 20 3/4 x 16 3/8 in.

6 Aaron Siskind Harlem Document Series: Boys Selling Bags c Image size: 12 x 8 1/4 in. Framed size: 16 1/4 x 20 1/4 in. Leadville, CO 1982 Print size: 16 x 20 in. Framed size: 17 x 21 in. John Gutmann Omen, 1934 Print size: 11 x 14 in. Framed size: 24 3/4 x 20 3/4 in. Tracey Snelling Harvey, San Pablo Avenue, Oakland, 2008 Mixed media, ed. of 5 13 ½ x 31 x 4 in. Danny Lyon Namequepa, Chihuahua, Mexico, 1972 Image size: 12 7/8 x 8 1/2 in. Framed size: 20 x 16 in.