Generation Hex May 2014 You’re in the middle of a forest. Your phone is dead now. At least you are living you think. Really living. The difference is just formatting. A way to categorize. You know how 1997 felt yellow and 1993 seemed dark green. You are lying on the earth pushing a dead phone into the mud. A large magnolia leaf is sticking up out of the hole where the headphones normally fit, like a little vase. “Is there something that I can help with? “, a muffled monotone speaks through the mud. A low purple glow from the display. 1996, is that you? A surge of interest brought you to the forest that afternoon. What you were to become could not yet be gleaned by looking through the backlogs or by simply studying the expression behind your dark […]

Chris Bogia April 2014 Primarily composed of plywood, and relying on balance and tension alone to maintain structural integrity, these new works by Chris Bogia signal a shift into abstraction and a departure from his previous installation works while maintaining his signature surface treatment of appliquéd yarn. The exhibition is anchored by a series of wall compositions that rest in rectangular frames, embodying a style of geometric abstraction illustrative of mid-century modernist painting and it’s decorative domestic iterations. Eschewing paint, and relying on building materials and textiles, these works suggest sculptures of paintings (the frames and the shapes within are all cut from the same birch plywood sheet). Though designed and executed with precision, their handcrafted surface complicates this – suggesting the personal devotion of a maker: repetitive and calculated, careful and doting. The aspect ratio and curvature of the […]

Range Life February 2014 Range Life can get lonely, out on the plains with the wind gusting up. The cornfields stretch out forever and the strip malls are pale under the blazing sun. Ubiquitous yet alien, in this vastness details go unnoticed, like the bushes outside of Target or the soil beneath the endless rows of corn. On the range, edges are invisible, blurring into the horizon, itself a distant blur of changing colors. Where are we? Rather than melt into the landscape the work in Range Life aspires to both connect and contrast with the enigmatic plains. Delineated by hard angles, bold colors and patterns, paintings become their own non-landscape landscapes. An alien life form demands to be acknowledged. David Bowie receives an answer to a long-awaited question. And a drummer forms a new relationship to the corn grown […]

Lee Delegard / Carolyn Janssen A Tooth for an Eye December 2013 Lee Delegard’s sculptures and installations playfully combine domestic materials culled from her everyday life, (Coconut Water boxes, Keds, mugs, found metal pipes, hair extensions), with abstracted papier-mâché and ceramic forms. Her works utilize elements inherent to the medium of sculpture, i.e. mass, volume, scale and balance, to create a sense of instability and unease. In this way, Delegard explores precarious relationships between juxtaposed materials, viewing them as analogous to the unsustainable connections between identity, consumer goods, and the limitations of art as a language itself. In Carolyn Janssen’s large-scale tableaus, photographs of everyday objects are layered and repeated to create disorienting, sublime landscapes. Blurring the line between painting and photography, Janssen immerses her viewer in psychedelic digital worlds, where roaming packs of the artist perform unrecognizable rituals and […]

Tim Harrington Kiss Without End November 2013 “Nothing in the world is more seductive then the reverie of unchained curiosity. Rocks flipped over, machines disassembled, zits poked. Spelunking infinitely forking rabbit holes is where I discover new creative routes developing a dense and personal map that connects sensual stimulation, scientific inquiry, and narrative thought. The material output from this exploration isn’t about reporting/recording discovered/created meaning but on the process itself. In multiple contexts and with multiple expressions my work aims to illuminate the surprising moments of synthesis that await investigation all around us.” – Tim Harrington Kiss Without End is a reference to Culte de Baiser Sans Fin (The cult of the Endless Kiss) is the name of a fictional game/cult in Infinite Jest where teenagers lock in a kiss, each holding the other’s head in place and nose closed. […]

Rich McIsaac This Is Not Your Land October 2013 “As long as our civilization is essentially one of property, of fences, of exclusiveness, it will be mocked by delusions.” – Ralph Waldo Emerson “Communism doesn’t work because people like to own stuff.” – Frank Zappa This Land Is Not Your Land is the first solo exhibition by multidisciplinary artist Rich McIsaac. This Land playfully challenges our widely held beliefs of property ownership through an investigative series of collages, crayon drawings, photographs, sculpture and video that reveal a youthful drive to defy boundaries. The title derives without contempt for the famous Woody Guthrie song “This Land Is Your Land.” Instead, the artist imagines what exists beyond the “nothing” Guthrie sings of being found “on the other side of a No Trespassing sign.” While the environmental imagery of This Land is staged […]

Harrison Haynes No Concert September 2013 No Concert is a site-specific installation of new work by the Durham-based artist Harrison Haynes consisting of sound, video projection and photography. It is the artist’s first solo show at Lump and his first solo exhibition since completing the Bard MFA program in 2012. Using Francis Picabia’s 1924 collaborative, interdisciplinary event Relâche as a jumping off point, Haynes brings together aspects of his own multifarious practice under one roof. For the installation, Haynes has taken cues from the space itself, both historically and architecturally, in determining the layout. A large projected video screen bisects the gallery and cycles through a series of scenes depicting assemblages of objects in Haynes’ studio as they are subjected to certain conditions of light. Large, unframed photographs hang from the ceiling, showing tiers of metal work-lamps, another reference to […]

Mark Jackson/Tony Lewis/John Neff May 2013 Organized by participating artist John Neff, Mark Jackson / Tony Lewis / John Neff will present two bodies of drawings and a sound recording. A publication featuring an essay by artist Gillian Riley will accompany the exhibition. Mark Jackson’s charcoal portraits of lone men – primarily African-American and Latino youths – are based on images from the artist’s photographic scrapbooks. His sensitively rendered, carefully individualized portraits contrast with the anonymity and “lowness” of his sources, often vintage pornographic and pulp magazines. This contrast opens onto a series of questions about, for example: the relationship between artistic production and erotic desire, where “individuality” is located within a portrait image, and the play of generality and specificity that operates in both serial image-making and sexual attraction. Tony Lewis’s drawings of fragmentary texts, geometric patterns and enveloping […]

Megan Sullivan & Tyler Wolf Modern Mythos April 2013 Modern Mythos is a modern look at ancient myths. Tyler Wolf’s energetic painting method conveys his response to the Universe, past, present and future; and the myths civilizations create to explain everything from basic human emotions to natural phenomena. Megan Sullivan utilizes the method of weaving, which has been represented in images and myths from the earliest of times. Her modern view of the ancient loom’s artifact incorporates t-shirts, thread and animal bones. Tyler Wolf received a BFA from East Carolina University; his art is influenced by everyday interactions with the universe, past present and future. He writes “I am interested how humanity tries to understand the cosmos, the myths and stories that civilizations create to explain everything from basic human emotions to intergalactic events.” Wolf is also a founding member […]

Secret Boyfriend/Russian Tsarlag Guests of Horror: Your Worst Nightmare, In It’s Own Hell February 2013 Guests of Horror: Your Worst Nightmare, In It’s Own Hell presents the visual work by two outstanding musicians Carlos Gonzales (Russian Tsarlag) and Ryan Martin (Secret Boyfriend). Both artists are unified by a low culture, degenerated, amateur, and garbage aesthetic. Carlos Gonzales will be presenting black and white horror collages, medium-sized full color drawings, and a few pieces of dried up, spray-painted costumes. He will also be screening a new home video, Heaven’s Rope. Ryan Martin will be exhibiting xerox-rendered collages, drawings, and with fliers from local, sub-underground shows. After the opening reception, Lump will close for an hour and re-open at 11pm for two amazing performances by Russian Tsarlag and Secret Boyfriend to celebrate the release of their brand new split lp on Martin’s […]

Jason Osborne Fast and Frugal December 2012 The term ‘fast and frugal’ is used in heuristics and cognitive psychology to describe a process of decision-making and learning. This method of problem solving is characterized by a ‘seat of the pants’ mentality, ‘rule of thumb’ thinking or an intuitive judgment. These judgments are not made by exhaustive research and logical charting over years of study, but by the immediate, limited information at hand, in conjunction with passed experience gained. Could it be we are smarter than we think when we are not over thinking? Jason Osborne’s recent paintings reveal a camaraderie with this philosophy, evident in the process and the materials with which they were composed. Often, the marks contain a speed reminiscent of a snap judgment and often reek of frugality in their sparseness; the pieces, though wobbly and awkward, […]