Lateral Passage
Tom Ryan & Jenny Scheu
November 21 - January 11
Opening Reception: Thurs., November 21, 5 - 7pm
About the Show
Featured Artist
Lateral Passage features recent work by Jenny Scheu and her son, Tom Ryan. The show was created over a multi-year period in which the two artists lived in opposite corners of the country, after having spent the preceding decade living only a couple blocks away from each other in Portland. During this time, each artist engaged in their own separate studio practice, but they frequently exchanged communication, via written and digital media, about art, family, and life. They also share a common visual lineage dating back to their early aesthetic experiences alongside one another as mother and son.
The show’s title references this shared experience as well as the intervening years in which the artists’ paths converged and diverged in myriad ways, with the word “passage” serving to describe avenues of both connection and departure. In addition, the title alludes to the movement of time and accompanying processes of diffusion and entropy. These transformations imply lateral expansion more than linear progression, and they correspond to the tendency of kinship to evolve into increasingly complex entanglements. While the works in this show make no overt gestures of collaboration, they are linked by bonds as tight as family and as tenuous as a text message, marked both by individual pursuits and common context. Lateral Passage forms a brief moment of stasis and reflection between two individuals navigating an ever-shifting familial network.
Preview the Exhibition
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