(from left to right) Current artists-in-residence: Natasha Rosling, Becky Sik, Ari Tabei, Nicholas des Cognets, Marin Abell. Installation by Natasha Rosling.

May 15, 2011 — Area residents and visitors are invited to attend a free Works-in-Progress Program and Reception on Monday, May 24 from 5:00 to 7:00 p.m., at the Sculpture Space studio, 12 Gates Street, Utica, located nearby the Historic Brewery District. The reception is sponsored by Empire Recycling Corporation. The restaurant sponsor is Nola’s Restaurant, Clinton.

The community will have the opportunity to view exciting sculptural contemporary work in a wide range of media created by emerging and mid-career professional visiting artists, Marin Abell (Newport News, VA), Nicholas des Cognets (Richmond, VA), Becky Sik (Glasgow, Scotland), Natasha Rosling (London, England), Ari Tabei (Tokyo, Japan and Brooklyn, NY). These artists have spent up to two months at Sculpture Space making new art.

“The art is original, experimental and cutting edge and always totally intriguing,” said Sydney L. Waller, Sculpture Space executive director. “The artists are articulate, inventive and delightful. They are each so different from one another, demonstrating a broad spectrum of approaches to contemporary art making. We hope the public will enjoy this glimpse into the creative process.”

About the Artists:

The newest arrival to the 34-year-old international artist residency program- that has been attracting professional artists to the Mohawk Valley since 1976- is Nicholas des Cognets received his BFA in Sculpture from the University of Massachusetts. After nearly eight years living and working in Brooklyn, New York, he currently lives in Richmond Virginia were he recently received his MFA in Sculpture from the Virginia Commonwealth University. He has shown his work extensively in both a solo and group shows, including recent shows in New York, Washington DC, and Los Angeles. Des Cognets’ work is heavily influenced by the natural world, biology and chemistry. His work focuses on slowing a viewer’s perception and fostering a kind of seeing that is rare in our mediated society. While at Sculpture Space, Nicholas will continue his investigation into the contemporary role of the natural world in relation to human perception. This includes the making of images, objects, video and audio works, with emphasis on art that needs to be experienced firsthand.

Marin Abell approaches art as an opportunity to fold levels of reality together that are traditionally kept apart. His sculptural events are explorations in futility, and involve the creation of rarified objects that can be integrated into the public sphere. He incorporates his physical body into his work to interrogate its pliability in the face of conditioning and constraints imposed by society, and to discover limits of his own self-control. Marin received his BFA in Sculpture from James Madison University, and his MFA in Sculpture & Expanded Practice from Ohio University, where he was also an instructor. In addition to his Sculpture Space award, he has received full fellowships at Anderson Ranch Arts Center, Vermont Studio Center, and Spiro Arts. Marin is currently the Director of Outreach at Spiro Arts in Park City, Utah. While at Sculpture Space, Abell will be engaged in a constant process of covering a piano’s keys with sets of soft polymer clay keys, playing the piano until these keys get mushed together, peeling them off and then baking them. These “recordings” will provide an awareness of the piano-playing activity from the perspective of the keys.

Natasha Rosling is a European based sculptor/installation artist, born in London, England. Her work explores the interrelationship of the human body with the physical and psychological layering of the structured environment – where cultural attitudes towards heritage, architecture, craft and decoration come into play. She studied Sculpture at Chelsea College of Art and Design, London, where she earned her BA and was awarded her MFA at the Sandberg Institute, Amsterdam. She has completed many international projects and residencies, having exhibited in China, Canada, Mali, The Netherlands, Austria and London. She is part of the international artist organization and platform, Vision Forum, and is represented by the Hidde van Seggelen Gallery in London. During her time at Sculpture Space, Natasha Rosling took the opportunity to experiment with a range of different craft techniques and structures, many of which were inspired by the rich variety of different architectural facades and verandas around Utica – culminating into a playful installation. Slightly absurd references are drawn to domestic and bodily adornment.

Becky Sik lives and works in Glasgow, Scotland. Her work centers on ideas of human endeavor, exploration and perception, sculptural installations looking at the minute detail of momentous events and the singular objects that make up the memories and feelings of unnamed eras. Sik received her BA from Glasgow School of Art and has exhibited her work throughout the United Kingdom, Sweden and Australia. During her residency, she has been looking at the objects we surround ourselves with, that are subject to altering authorship. Borrowing ideas previously invented by pioneers and craftspeople she wants to memorialize, she questions, “If we both recognize it, does it make us connected?”

Ari Tabei was born and raised in Tokyo, receiving her BA at Sophia University, Japan. Traveling back and forth between Tokyo and the United States, Ari attended the Post-Baccalaureate Program in Studio Art at Brandeis University and received her MFA from University of Connecticut in Sculpture and Video Performance Art. She has participated in several residency programs including LMCC Swing Space, Vermont Studio Center, and Smack Mellon Studio Program. She has exhibited her work extensively in New York, Massachusetts and Japan. During her stay at Sculpture Space, Ari has made a new series of garments, complete with gasmasks out of vinyl for her and her husband to perform for video. She will be carried around in her "Runaway Cart" that they made together using parts from a found wheel chair, wishing to confront nature that she most fears and respects.

For further information, please call 315-724-8381 or visit www.sculpturespace.org.

Sculpture Space is an international artist in residence program, the only one of its kind in North America. Work created at Sculpture Space is subsequently shown in museums, sculpture parks and galleries around the globe. Sculpture Space was awarded Business of the Year in its non-profit category by the Mohawk Valley Chamber of Commerce.

A unique cultural resource within the City of Utica, the Mohawk Valley and Upstate New York, Sculpture Space promotes interaction between international visiting artists and the local community by placing works in the public domain, hosting studio tours, and collaborating with other organizations to exhibit artists' projects. Several hundred artists apply annually. Twenty national and international artists are accepted each year to enjoy two-month residencies. They receive stipends, subsidized housing, 24-hour access to the studio and technical assistance. The program is in part made possible with support from the NYS Council on the Arts, the National Endowment for the Arts (which believes that a great nation deserves great art), the Milton and Sally Avery Foundation, area foundations and corporations and generous friends.