Joy Feasley and Paul Swenbeck Worms are the Words March 2010 Worms are the Words is a collaborative installation by Joy Feasley and Paul Swenbeck. The twisted narrative of this exhibition revolves around Shakerism, Wicca and a Salem legend-trip. To convey a sense of this story, Swenbeck and Feasley will transform the gallery into a Shaker interior. Two fundamental opposing forces are at work here. The first motif is a Shaker austerity rooted in the idea that Heaven is right here on earth. The second is the passionate abandon offered up in Shaker religious expression. At first glance, the simple reproductions seem to be a reverent but rough take on the original. On closer inspection, the room is filled with phantasmagorical details that belie a secret Pagan belief. Feasley will be making psychedelic spirit drawings hanging from peg rails, while […]

Daniel Davidson and Josh Rickards Bad Dreams Starring Good Friends December 2009 Bad Dreams Starring Good Friends brings together two amazing artists for one great show. Daniel Davidson is out of New York City and Josh Rickards works out of Philadelphia. Daniel Davidson’s work is a fusion of hybrid characters, spaces and styles. Focusing on the urges and consequences of actions on a personal and social level, his work for the past few years has been about over-consumption. Often employing the comic or the grotesque, it is a reflection of societal overload, of the complexities of modern life, and the excesses and addictions that surround us. Josh Rickards grew up on an Island in SW Florida where his Dad was the local preacher and where people believed there was a yeti that lived in the everglades. He makes some work […]

Jason Polan Please Trust Me November 2009 Please Trust Me is an exhibition of all different things. The source material ranges from comic book panels, to pages from LIFE Magazine, to notes found on the street. There are particular shapes, lines, letters and texts that I like and want to show to you.~~ Jason Polan This is Jason’s second exhibition at Lump and a new book will accompany the exhibition. Jason Polan is an artist living in New York City. He has exhibited widely in the United States, Europe, and Asia. His drawings and projects have appeared in ARTnews, The New York Times, Esquire Magazine, McSweeney’s, and The New Yorker. He has made over 64 books. Polan is the founding member of Taco Bell Drawing Club and is currently trying to draw every person in New York. Polan is from […]

Molly Schafer Dawn Horse October 2009 Molly Schafer’s long-standing interest in natural history and Paleobiology provides a context for the romanticized, quasi-prehistorical world she creates. Unable to relate to the popular viewpoint of man the hunter, Schafer searches for a new character, one that considers her relationship to nature’s other inhabitants, be they friend, prey, predator, or all three. In Dawn Horse Schafer embodies the character she has been searching for. Like a protagonist from the novels that influence her work, Schafer removes herself from society and places herself alone in nature. Dawn Horse includes the video relic of her stay on Assateague, a barrier island off the coast of Maryland. Schafer camped on the island, where feral horses roam free, accompanied only by her arctic-looking house cat who plays the literary role of the animal familiar. In the drawings […]

Jerstin Crosby If You Build It We Will Burn It September 2009 If You Build It We will Burn It is an exhibition of two interrelated installations by Jerstin Crosby. In these works, Crosby lists among his references conceptual starting points such as vegetarianism, environmental extremism, 80’s sitcoms, TV commercials, local news shows, community bulletin boards, subversive counter cultures, and medieval Flemish tapestries. More overt artistic references occur in the smaller of the two installations, titled, Visual Representation of Invisible Processes. Here, Crosby cross-references last century art history influences like Land Art and Calder’s mobile sculptures by adhering meticulously-modeled ceramic trail-mix to a black and white poster of Robert Smithson’s “Spiral Jetty”, and by creating a kinetic sculpture from collaged vegetarian food packages and poorly-braided hemp. In the main room of the gallery, a more subtle installation allows one to […]

The Middle Of Nowhere curated by Jerstin Crosby June 2009 Where is the Middle of Nowhere? Who lives there? What happens? This common verbal expression is often used to describe places far away from urban drama, although the over-development and overcrowding of urban areas in many ways creates more isolation; not to mention social networks which bring us together by design, but instead expand our remoteness. We use the idiom, ‘it came out of nowhere’ to describe incidents, acts of spontaneity, natural disasters, surprises, the unexpected or the unexplainable. The Middle of Nowhere will approach this figure of speech from a variety of media and will map out the visual geography and hypothetical demographics for a “No Place”. This exhibition will include work by artists based in North Carolina, Chicago, San Francisco, Charlottesville, and Berlin working in a range of […]

Cammi Climaco Yesterday was yesterday. Tomorrow is ours. May 2009 Showing sculpture and video, this show will feature pieces that are a mix of object, installation and text. Climaco’s work is inspired by the accidental and usually unintentional stumbling across of intimate moments, through her own experiences and the empathic experience of others. Within the dichotomy between the delicate balance of hope and despair, her work is representative of both the staving off of loneliness and the potential for joy and merriment. Obsessed with the pursuit of happiness, she gives a funny/sad glimpse into the obvious and the subversive, the feminine and masculine and youthful exuberance. Climaco uses humor and surface charm to look at the human condition and human behavior, the good and the bad, and explores simple pleasures and concerns of everyday life. Largely using luxurious porcelain, the […]

Chris Coleman The State of Separation April 2009 Chris Coleman explores the tenuous balance between chaos and control as it concerns politics, progress, fear, and identity. The State of Separation will include animations and digital prints of journeys between locations in various states of withdrawal and aggression where borders have become weaponized and damage is always dealt from afar. The individual is caught in the midst, unable to separate themselves, unable to define identity without place. Chris Coleman received his BFA in his native state from West Virginia University and his MFA from New York State University at Buffalo. His work includes sculptures, performances and videos as well as interactive installations. Chris Coleman was twice a participant in the VIPER Basel Festival in Switzerland and has had his work in exhibitions in Singapore, Finland, Sweden, Italy, Germany, France, China, the […]

Penned curated by Cynthia Connolly and Bill Thelen, Andrew Jeffery Wright & Wendy Yao March 2009 Penned is an exhibition of pen and/or marker drawings including photographs of the pens used to make them. The over one hundred drawings in this exhibition cover a broad range of pens from the generic ball point to the traditional rapid-o-graph and feather quill to the modern array of jell and artists’ pens. This exhibition will travel to Ellipse Arts Center, Arlington, VA and was shown at Artscape in Baltimore, MD, July 2008. Selection Committee, Cynthia Connolly, artist, photographer, Director, Ellipse Arts Center, Arlington, VA; Bill Thelen, artist, Director, Lump Gallery/Projects, Raleigh, NC; Andrew Jeffrey Wright, artist, co-founder, Space 1026, Philadelphia, PA; Wendy Yao, Owner/Director, Ooga Booga, Los Angeles, CA; Staff Members, Baltimore Office of Promotion & The Arts, Baltimore, MD In the project […]

Tory Wright Pleasure Seekers February 2009 Tory Wright uses a reductive language to flirt with the viewer’s gaze thru an altered surface of advertising. Wright cuts away imagery pulled from luxury item advertising to reveal a new conversation with broad references to the female form. Gucci links, William Morris, art nouveau, tears and textiles intertwine as they overtake the seduction of advertisements used within a consumer culture. Pleasure Seekersincludes cut posters, manipulated magazine pages and a lone light box to tell the story of American lust for material gratification. Wright resides in Raleigh, is a member of Team Lump and recently completed her MFA at Maryland Institute College of Art. This is her second solo exhibition at Lump. Lump is located at 505 S. Blount St, Raleigh, NC. More information about our mission and exhibition programs can be found at […]

Cannonball Press Drink Up and Be Somebody December 2008 World Kings of scruffy pirate black and white, hillbilly printmaking, New York’s legendary Cannonball Press return to Raleigh (their third show at Lump) with an irrefutable deluge of relief prints. The show will feature a huge new pile of limited-edition 20 dollar prints, new 4×8 foot woodcuts on canvas, and supersized collaborative woodcut Franken-banners, depicting familiar scenes of American-style debauchery. For nine years, Martin Mazorra and Mike Houston have been publishing high-quality limited-edition black and white relief cuts, silk-screens and lithographs, and are proud to represent the following masters of grumpy, soulful, scabby, charged printmaking: David Ellis (Barnstormers), Jenny Schmid (Bikini Press Int’l), Joe Stauber, Swoon, David Watne, Maya Hayuk, Bill Fick (Cockeyed Press), Mike Ming, Dennis Mcnett (Howling Print), the Amazing Hancock Brothers, and many more! Lump is located at […]

Jason de Haan Life After Doomsday November 2008 Life After Doomsday by Jason de Haan My practice concerns itself with the refrain of overcoming problems. As a line of investigation this takes many forms: sculpture, installation, drawing and book works among them. It is also a practice that draws freely from popular culture, the potentials of material and space, site specificity, and art historical context. It functions within and between the poetic, conceptual and absurd. As such my work proposes a series of attempts to right wrongs, to suggest alternatives, and as an acknowledgement of falling flat on your ass-ness and the potential redemption from said state. Also, there is hope, critical optimism and a desire to achieve the positive. Jason de Haan is a multidisciplinary artist living and working in Calgary, Alberta, Canada. Lump is located at 505 S. […]