Opening reception for "Passing Time" at Wesleyan Zilkha Gallery On January 31

Ezra and Cecile Zilkha Gallery, Wesleyan University
238 Washington Ter., Middletown, (860) 685-3355
Passing Time
Jan. 27—Mar. 4, 2012.
Opening reception: Tues., Jan. 31, 5—7 p.m.
Gallery talk at 5:30 p.m by guest curator Judith Hoos Fox.

Press release

Passing Time, a new exhibition of recent works by 14 international artists in a range of media, explores the multiple and converging meanings of the phrase “passing time." Organized by guest curators Ginger Gregg Duggan and Judith Hoos Fox of c2 curatorsquared, the exhibition will be on view in Wesleyan University’s Ezra and Cecile Zilkha Gallery, located at 283 Washington Terrace on the Wesleyan campus in Middletown, from Fri., Jan. 27 through Sun., Mar. 4, 2012. Gallery hours are Tuesday through Sunday from noon—4 p.m. Gallery admission is free.

The public is invited to attend the opening reception on Tues., Jan. 31, 2012 from 5—7 p.m., with a gallery talk at 5:30 p.m. by guest curator Judith Hoos Fox. The opening reception is free.

The various meanings of the phrase “passing time”—spending time, time to die—are explored in the evocative imagery of the works in Passing Time—video, photography, sculpture and works on paper. Some artists turn to sport, some to music; some refer to nature and its rhythms to explore concepts of time—short term, long term and terminating. Others partner with time itself in their making of art. Time is a concept that philosophers and physicists ponder. Time provides a framework that orders, measures and defines. We spend time, we waste it, we keep it; time flies, it drags. It is elastic in its perception—long when we are young, gaining momentum as we age. The Passing Time exhibition explores the relationship between the time of our life and the time of the eons.

Following the engagement at Wesleyan University, Passing Time will travel to the Richard E. Peeler Art Center at DePauw University in Greencastle, Indiana and other venues through the fall of 2013. In 2010, c2 curatorsquared organized the exhibition Connectivity Lost, which addressed the ways we are estranged from each other and from the environment in which we live. Connectivity Lost was on view in the Ezra and Cecile Zilkha Gallery from Sept. 11 through Dec. 6, 2010.

"We are really glad to be back at Wesleyan for a second exhibition," said Ms. Fox. "We first identified Passing Time as a subject being explored by a great number of artists across the world and across media about four years ago. The Venice Biennale was particularly rich. That is where we saw the Shaun Gladwell Storm Sequence. Maybe it’s the speed at which we all live these days, on fast forward, that makes artists start to look at time. Maybe we were particularly aware of the subject because of things going on in our own lives—children growing up before our eyes; an older generation dying."

The artists, known and emerging, featured in Passing Time include Matthew Buckingham (United States), Jonathan Callan (United Kingdom), Luis Camnitzer (United States), Rineke Dijkstra (The Netherlands), Ken Fandell (United States), Shaun Gladwell (Australia), Felix Gonzalez-Torres (United States), Leandro Katz (Argentina), Katrin Korfmann (The Netherlands, Germany), Philipp Lachenmann (Germany), Stefana McClure (United States), Su-Mei Tse (Luxembourg, France), Siebren Versteeg (United States), and Bill Viola (United States).

"The North Gallery [of the Ezra and Cecile Zilkha Gallery is a wonderful place for a room-sized installation of video, and we are putting Siebren Versteeg’s dual projection live feed piece there. We really want to take advantage of the elegant glass link to that gallery, and are working on a way to install the Katrin Korfmann light box piece in this link. And Luis Camnitzer's Last Words should read powerfully when placed [on the far back wall]. Each work [in Passing Time] is there because of the particular voice it brings to the conversation," said Fox.