a rope, pulled

MEREDITH SELLERS + SCOTT LAWRENCE
MARCH 19 - APRIL 23, 2022

Consider tension as a state of being; a state of relentless, durational balance. This ongoing series of errors and recoveries, highs and lows, heavy and light are cumulative forces which travel with us— pulled over a distance, and into the now. Wrought from the mundane and melancholy, this tension is found in both day-to-day crushing socioeconomic pressure and 9-5 humdrum. 

Meredith Sellers’ paintings luxuriate in melancholy. A car crash, a rose, or an iceberg are each exquisitely explored and detailed with the quiet romance of Dutch masters—alongside an implicit critique of capitalist waste and the deeply nihilistic anti-humanist streak that seems so heightened right now. Highly rendered moments of violent intensity juxtaposed with pleasantly pastel negative space deliver both heaviness and levity. These undeniably beautiful paintings of such ubiquitously dark content contend with a reckoning—how long can this last, and can it last forever?

Meanwhile, a steady evaluation of regularity drives Scott Lawrence’s practice. Slightly amiss and mildly impossible, Lawrence’s installations ring as delightfully mundane; a partial derby shoe, askew cardboard boxes, feathers suspended mid-air. There’s a sinister quality in there as well;these symbols of mass production replete with the absence of people. Ultimately, Lawrence’s work is subtle and tenderly crafted and—much like its real world counterparts—erring on unnoticeable.

These works harken to experiences with which we are both familiar and regrettably uncomfortable, but Lawrence’s hand adds an absurdist, dark humor to the whole thing. Of course, yes, there is beauty in the mundane but, at this point, it has to be funny. 

A relatively simple question in physics, “How can a rope exert a force?” is often used to help explain tension and how a conduit can pull at both ends. Car crashes, halved shoes, scattered feathers, and melting ice caps are all the result of some dual-sided force; the rope is pulled. The tension, action, and palpable impressions brought forth in this exhibition—that’s Sellers and Lawrence pulling the rope. 

MEREDITH SELLERS
Meredith Sellers (b. 1988, Baltimore, MD) is an artist and writer living and working in Philadelphia. She received her BFA from the Maryland Institute College of Art and her MFA from the University of Pennsylvania. Conflating the centuries-old concept of the painting as a window with the infinite windows of the digital screen, her works utilize images appropriated from art history, stock photography, advertisements, and the media to examine systems of power and violence.

meredithsellers.com


SCOTT LAWRENCE
Born in Alabama, Scott Lawrence lives in New Haven, Connecticut. He has exhibited his work widely in the US as well as in Paris, Berlin, Seoul and Vancouver, and has had solo shows at GRIN (Providence, RI) and NurtureArt (Brooklyn, NY). His work has been included in the SPRING/ BREAK art show, the BHQFU Brucennial, White Columns' Artist Registry, and has appeared in the New York Times, Art Papers, Creative Loafing and the Atlanta Journal Constitution. Scott Lawrence co-founded the Atlanta art collective Dos Pestaneos in 2003. He received an MFA from New York's School of Visual Arts, a BFA from the Atlanta College of Art and a BArch from Auburn University.

scottlawrencestudio.com