5:30pm members preview

6:30–10pm free public reception

Be among the first to see Viviane Le Courtois: Edible? and Jason Rogenes: SP4C3CR4FT at the opening reception. Meet the artists and enjoy cocktails, appetizers, and music as you view the exhibitions.

2012 SPRING
February 23–June 17

VIVIANE LE COURTOIS: EDIBLE?
Twenty-two Years of Working With Food
Featuring the new interactive installation The Garden of Earthy Delights

West Gallery and East Gallery

Although Viviane Le Courtois has been working with food as a medium or source of inspiration since 1990, Edible? presents the first opportunity to experience a large selection from this body of work in context. In addition to the newly commissioned interactive installation The Garden of Earthy Delights, the exhibition comprises a mid-career retrospective of food-related work of the past twenty-two years by this Denver-based artist. Through sculptures, performances, videos, photos, prints, and interactive installations, Le Courtois explores the processes of consumption, focusing on the repetitive aspects of food preparation, ceremonial food offerings, and the social implications of eating.

The earliest works in the exhibition, executed in France in the 1990s before her move to the US, include an installation of chewed licorice sticks as well as photos and video documentations of performances and sculptural work made from foraged foods, fruit peelings, and nut shells. A series of etchings employing the naturally occurring acids of the kombucha mushroom continues to fascinate Le Courtois, who has created over forty different plates since first developing the process in 1995. A number of these prints, as well as the mushrooms used to create them, will be on view alongside large-scale sculptures from a series of works created from junk food such as chips, candy, and marshmallows.

Since 2010, Le Courtois has become more interested in aspects of interaction and participation and has organized a number of events for which she prepared and served meals for a large number of guests, including How to Eat An Artichoke, held at RedLine Denver in 2010, and a curry dinner for the exhibition Do It! at Rocky Mountain College of Art + Design in 2011.

The Garden of Earthy Delights, a living interactive installation created for BMoCA, is envisioned as a space for people to relax, think, and interact. Herbs such as mint, verbena, thyme, sage, and rosemary will be arranged throughout the gallery in vertical gardens for consumption in tea, in reference to the ancient process of growing, collecting, and consuming plants. During weekly performances, the artist will tend to the plants, serve tea, and offer food samples.

JASON ROGENES: SP4C3CR4FT

Union Works Gallery

Styrofoam and cardboard, the quintessential symbols of our consumer culture, are the materials of choice for Brooklyn-based artist Jason Rogenes. Making use of commonly disregarded aesthetic attributes, including their inherent surface qualities, color, and varying degrees of translucency, he creates large-scale installations, suspended sculptures, and reliefs. Illuminated from the inside, the works acquire a monumental and spiritual presence usually associated with totems or space stations, and are equally representative of human aspirations and accomplishments.

Rogenes affords as much care and attention in the treatment of his abundantly available material as a sculptor working in marble or alabaster would. Piece by individually carved piece is assembled into a complex structure, thoughtfully fit together according to the rules of his artistic vision. What he offers is not only a creative way of looking at everything in our environment beyond assigned functions and limitations but also an opportunity to reimagine ourselves with open eyes for endless possibilities.

Conceptually connected to the sculptural work are his drawings, which are sometimes created as preparatory studies for his sculptures, sometimes as documentation following the installation. A number of these drawings, executed in ink and watercolor on paper, will be on view as part of the exhibition at BMoCA, adding a two-dimensional component to the experience.

Click here for more information about the Spring 2012 exhibitions.

Exhibiting artist Jason Rogenes in conversation with his wife, Sarah Rogenes

BMoCA’s Expert Talks series presents casual conversations with the leading authorities on exhibiting artists. Join artist Jason Rogenes and his wife, Sarah Rogenes, and learn insights into his artistic development.

Jason Rogenes: SP4C3CR4FT is on view through June 17.

Experience highlights on the international contemporary art calendar by joining Boulder Museum of Contemporary Art (BMoCA) for an exclusive, full-immersion art tour in NYC. The tour will visit the Whitney Biennial, the New Museum Triennial, and the Armory Show 2012.

Only once every six years do these three important events in contemporary art come together at the same time. Take advantage of this excellently-priced opportunity to immerse yourself in what’s going on in the world of art right now.

Limited to 12 participants.

Package Includes:
- Private tour of the Whitney Biennial
- Private tour of the New Museum Triennial
- Private tour of emerging Lower East Side galleries with a local independent curator
- Private lecture from the architects at So-Il (formerly of SANAA), recently awarded the Frieze NY 2012 commission; architects for Pole Dance MoMA PS1 2010, fashion designer Derek Lam
- VIP tickets to the Armory Show including the opening event
- Visits to two artists’ studios
- 3 nights accommodation at the Ace Hotel Chelsea
- 2 lunches
- 1 cocktail hour at the Ace Hotel on the first night

Price: $1600
**Pricing includes items listed above and excludes airfare or airport/hotel transfers of any kind.

Total Art Immersion NYC is organized and led by Kecia Benvenuto, Board of Directors, Boulder Museum of Contemporary Art; former head of art buying, Wieden + Kennedy Amsterdam (1999 – 2007); independent curator.

For more information and to make reservations: please contact David Dadone at david@bmoca.org or 303.443.2122 or Kecia Benvenuto at dearkecia@gmail.com or 718.909.3669.

This tour is sure to fill up fast, book soon to reserve your space.

Study anatomy, structure, and expression as you learn the art of figure drawing. Each week will touch on one element from art history. Students will draw from both female and male models.

Bring your own materials and an easel. Gayle recommends: large sheets of paper, pencils (soft-hard), charcoal, erasers, brushes, odorless mineral spirits, a tin can, and a drawing board with clips. Space is limited and fills up fast. Pre-registration required by Friday, March 2nd.

$60 For Members
$90 Includes an Individual Membership to BMoCA

To register, call 303.443.2122.

VIVIANE LE COURTOIS: EDIBLE?
Twenty-two Years of Working With Food
Featuring the new interactive installation The Garden of Earthy Delights

West Gallery and East Gallery

Although Viviane Le Courtois has been working with food as a medium or source of inspiration since 1990, Edible? at Boulder Museum of Contemporary Art presents the first opportunity to experience a large selection from this body of work in context. In addition to the newly commissioned interactive installation The Garden of Earthy Delights, the exhibition comprises a mid-career retrospective of food-related work of the past twenty-two years by this Denver-based artist. Through sculptures, performances, videos, photos, prints, and interactive installations, Le Courtois explores the processes of consumption, focusing on the repetitive aspects of food preparation, ceremonial food offerings, and the social implications of eating.

The earliest works in the exhibition, executed in France in the 1990s before her move to the US, include an installation of chewed licorice sticks as well as photos and video documentations of performances and sculptural work made from foraged foods, fruit peelings, and nut shells. For a series of Pickles from the early 2000s, Le Courtois filled over 200 jars with liquid and all kinds of objects in memory of her then recently-deceased mother, who had a tendency to keep pickle jars long after the contents had been consumed.

A series of etchings employing the naturally occurring acids of the kombucha mushroom continues to fascinate Le Courtois, who has created over forty different plates since first developing the process in 1995. A number of these prints, as well as the mushrooms used to create them, will be on view alongside large-scale sculptures from a series of works created from junk food such as chips, candy, and marshmallows. These include the Cheetovore, Shane The Obese Marshmallow Teenager, a group of Little Fat Kids – small figurines made from melted and cast candy, and the Venus of Consumption, a crocheted sculpture of an obese, reclining woman.

Since 2010, Le Courtois has become more interested in aspects of interaction and participation and has organized a number of events for which she prepared and served meals for a large number of guests, including How to Eat An Artichoke, held at RedLine Denver in 2010, and a curry dinner for the exhibition Do It! at Rocky Mountain College of Art + Design in 2011.

The Garden of Earthy Delights, a living interactive installation created for BMoCA, is envisioned as a space for people to relax, think, and interact. Herbs such as mint, verbena, thyme, sage, and rosemary will be arranged throughout the gallery in vertical gardens for consumption in tea, in reference to the ancient process of growing, collecting, and consuming plants. During weekly performances, the artist will tend to the plants, serve tea, and offer food samples.

Viviane Le Courtois was born in France in 1969. She moved to the US in 1994 and currently lives in Denver, Colorado. She received her Diplôme National Supérieur d’Expression Plastique (MFA) in Sculpture/Installations from the International School of Art and Research in Nice, France in 1992 and an MA in Art History from the University of Denver in 2000. In 2009 Westword presented Le Courtois with the Mastermind Award in Visual Arts. She was a resident artist at RedLine Denver from 2008 to 2011. She regularly exhibits in the US and Europe and has shown her work at the Passerelle Art Center in France, Mobius in Boston, and at many venues in Colorado, including Rocky Mountain School of Art + Design, Regis University, and the Museum of Contemporary Art Denver during the 2010 Biennial of the Americas.

VIVIANE LE COURTOIS: EDIBLE?
Twenty-two Years of Working With Food
Featuring the new interactive installation The Garden of Earthy Delights

West Gallery and East Gallery

Although Viviane Le Courtois has been working with food as a medium or source of inspiration since 1990, Edible? at Boulder Museum of Contemporary Art presents the first opportunity to experience a large selection from this body of work in context. In addition to the newly commissioned interactive installation The Garden of Earthy Delights, the exhibition comprises a mid-career retrospective of food-related work of the past twenty-two years by this Denver-based artist. Through sculptures, performances, videos, photos, prints, and interactive installations, Le Courtois explores the processes of consumption, focusing on the repetitive aspects of food preparation, ceremonial food offerings, and the social implications of eating.

The earliest works in the exhibition, executed in France in the 1990s before her move to the US, include an installation of chewed licorice sticks as well as photos and video documentations of performances and sculptural work made from foraged foods, fruit peelings, and nut shells. For a series of Pickles from the early 2000s, Le Courtois filled over 200 jars with liquid and all kinds of objects in memory of her then recently-deceased mother, who had a tendency to keep pickle jars long after the contents had been consumed.

A series of etchings employing the naturally occurring acids of the kombucha mushroom continues to fascinate Le Courtois, who has created over forty different plates since first developing the process in 1995. A number of these prints, as well as the mushrooms used to create them, will be on view alongside large-scale sculptures from a series of works created from junk food such as chips, candy, and marshmallows. These include the Cheetovore, Shane The Obese Marshmallow Teenager, a group of Little Fat Kids – small figurines made from melted and cast candy, and the Venus of Consumption, a crocheted sculpture of an obese, reclining woman.

Since 2010, Le Courtois has become more interested in aspects of interaction and participation and has organized a number of events for which she prepared and served meals for a large number of guests, including How to Eat An Artichoke, held at RedLine Denver in 2010, and a curry dinner for the exhibition Do It! at Rocky Mountain College of Art + Design in 2011.

The Garden of Earthy Delights, a living interactive installation created for BMoCA, is envisioned as a space for people to relax, think, and interact. Herbs such as mint, verbena, thyme, sage, and rosemary will be arranged throughout the gallery in vertical gardens for consumption in tea, in reference to the ancient process of growing, collecting, and consuming plants. During weekly performances, the artist will tend to the plants, serve tea, and offer food samples.

Viviane Le Courtois was born in France in 1969. She moved to the US in 1994 and currently lives in Denver, Colorado. She received her Diplôme National Supérieur d’Expression Plastique (MFA) in Sculpture/Installations from the International School of Art and Research in Nice, France in 1992 and an MA in Art History from the University of Denver in 2000. In 2009 Westword presented Le Courtois with the Mastermind Award in Visual Arts. She was a resident artist at RedLine Denver from 2008 to 2011. She regularly exhibits in the US and Europe and has shown her work at the Passerelle Art Center in France, Mobius in Boston, and at many venues in Colorado, including Rocky Mountain School of Art + Design, Regis University, and the Museum of Contemporary Art Denver during the 2010 Biennial of the Americas.

Drawing FUNdamentals
9am–12pm
Large, small, wide, and tall. Learn to draw like never before as artist Sara Sanderson helps you explore a variety of materials.

Airbrush Painting
1–4pm
Learn to use an airbrush to create paintings on canvas, paper, and t-shirts with artist Joseph Martinez.

Members: June 11-15 for ages 9-12

Drawing FUNdamentals: 9am-12pm $120.00 USD Airbrush Painting: 1-4pm $120.00 USD Full Day: June 11-15 $240.00 USD

Non-Members: June 11-15 for ages 9-12

Drawing FUNdamentals: 9am-12pm $140.00 USD Airbrush Painting: 1-4pm $140.00 USD Full Day: June 11-15 $280.00 USD

June 25–29
For 9–12-year-olds

Modern Masters & Me
9am–12pm
Travel through Modernism with artist Jennifer Lees as your guide. Create your own versions of works by Kandinsky, Picasso, and artists you may not know!

From Sumi to Sharpie
1–4pm
Inspired by contemporary and traditional Japanese art, make Kanjii characters, anime self-portraits, and more with artist Angela Beloian.

Members: June 25-29 for ages 9-12

Modern Masters and Me: 9am-12pm $120.00 USD From Sumi to Sharpie: 1-4pm $120.00 USD Full Day: June 25-29 $240.00 USD

Non-Members: June 25-29 for ages 9-12

Modern Masters and Me: 9am-12pm $140.00 USD From Sumi to Sharpie: 1-4pm $140.00 USD Full Day: June 25-29 $280.00 USD

July 16–20
For 9–12-year-olds

Members: July 16-20 for ages 9-12

Viewfinders: 9am-12pm $120.00 USD

Non-Members: July 16-20 for ages 9-12

Viewfinders: 9am-12pm $140.00 USD

Wax Works
9am–12pm
Work in wax and learn encaustic painting, sandpaper prints, wax resists, and wet media techniques with artist Sarah Hanson.

Painters’ Palette
1–4pm
Colors, shapes, portraits, and more–like you’ve never seen before! Create a variety of innovative paintings with artist Mónica Pesántez.

Members: July 23-27 for ages 9-12

Wax Works: 9am-12pm $120.00 USD Painters Palette: 1-4pm $120.00 USD Full Day: July 23-27 $240.00 USD

Non-Members: July 23-27 for ages 9-12

Wax Works: 9am-12pm $140.00 USD Painters Palette: 1-4pm $140.00 USD Full Day: July 23-27 $280.00 USD

Cost & Registration for each workshop:
$140 per workshop / $120 Members

To register, use the PayPal options above, call 303.443.2122, or stop by the museum.

Participants must also complete the Young Artists at Work registration form. Click here to download the form. To submit your completed form: email shannon@bmoca.org, fax 303.447.1633, or bring it to the museum.

SCHOLARSHIPS AVAILABLE: A limited number of scholarships are available for Latino youth with financial need. Sponsored by Marco’s Ready Foods. To download the scholarship application, click here. For more information, contact shannon@bmoca.org or call 303-443-2122 x11.

Join the Lunch Bunch: Pack a lunch and stay for a fun-filled break with more art-making, storytelling, and games! 12–1pm. Cost per week for Lunch Bunch: $25

Receive a 5% discount when you enroll more than one child in the same family in camp together.

Join BMoCA today and receive discounts all year long. A Family Membership is $55. Click here to learn more about BMoCA memberships.

Cancellation & Refund Policy:
To cancel and request a refund for a program or workshop, including Young Artists at Work, please contact BMoCA’s Education Department at 303.443.2122 x11.
A 10% administrative fee will be charged on all refunds.
A 90% refund will be given to cancellations made 5 business days before the program or workshop.
A cancellation made within the week prior to a program or workshop will result in a 50% refund.
We apologize, but no refunds can be given on the day of the program or workshop.

June 4–8
For 5–8-year-olds

Art Adventurer
9am–12pm
Join artist Julia Lunk and create a storybook world full of fairies, boats, castles, and moats.

Paper Passion
1–4pm
Discover your passion for paper. Make animals and clothing and design a miniature tree house with artist Heather Cherry.

Members: June 4-8 for ages 5-8

Art Adventurer: 9am-12pm $120.00 USD Paper Passion: 1-4pm $120.00 USD Full Day: June 4-8 $240.00 USD

Non-Members: June 4-8 for ages 5-8

Art Adventurer: 9am-12pm $140.00 USD Paper Passion: 1-4pm $140.00 USD Full Day: June 4-8 $280.00 USD

July 9–13
For 5–8-year-olds

Free Art
9am–12pm
Like Free Draw, only better. Be free to paint, draw, sculpt, photograph, print, and silkscreen your ideas with the guidance of artist Jay Tomlinson.

Myths and Legends
1–4pm
Hear wonderful stories from around the world and let them stir your imagination for a week of art-making in paint, clay, and mosaic with artist Tyrell Osborn.

July 30–August 3
For 5–8-year-olds

Wearable, Shareable
9am–noon
Join artist Sarah Kinn for a week of making upcycled, wearable art for you and your friends! You will make hats, capes, bracelets, and bags–all with re-purposed materials.

Red Fish, Blue Fish
1–4pm
Learn the art of printmaking without a press with artist Mary Powell. You will even make a suminigashi fish print with a REAL fish!

Cost & Registration for each workshop:
$140 per workshop / $120 Members

To register, use the PayPal options above, call 303.443.2122, or stop by the museum.

Participants must also complete the Young Artists at Work registration form. Click here to download the form. To submit your completed form: email shannon@bmoca.org, fax 303.447.1633, or bring it to the museum.

SCHOLARSHIPS AVAILABLE: A limited number of scholarships are available for Latino youth with financial need. Sponsored by Marco’s Ready Foods. To download the scholarship application, click here. For more information, contact shannon@bmoca.org or call 303-443-2122 x11.

Join the Lunch Bunch: Pack a lunch and stay for a fun-filled break with more art-making, storytelling, and games! 12–1pm. Cost per week for Lunch Bunch: $25

Receive a 5% discount when you enroll more than one child in the same family in camp together.

Join BMoCA today and receive discounts all year long. A Family Membership is $55. Click here to learn more about BMoCA memberships.

Cancellation & Refund Policy:
To cancel and request a refund for a program or workshop, including Young Artists at Work, please contact BMoCA’s Education Department at 303.443.2122 x11.
A 10% administrative fee will be charged on all refunds.
A 90% refund will be given to cancellations made 5 business days before the program or workshop.
A cancellation made within the week prior to a program or workshop will result in a 50% refund.
We apologize, but no refunds can be given on the day of the program or workshop.

$10/$5 Members

Acclaimed perfumer Dawn Spencer Hurwitz interprets the fall exhibitions through custom blended scents.

The BMoCA Scavenger Hunt is a fun, educational, and exhibition-themed game that can be played at the museum and throughout downtown Boulder. Museum visitors can use SCVNGR, a web-based application that can be downloaded onto any smartphone, to participate in the scavenger hunt. Players can download the free app, choose their location, and begin the scavenger hunt. If a museum patron does not have access to a smartphone, printed copies of the questions and challenges are available at the front desk, including a “Just for Kids!” scavenger hunt.

Participants who answer the questions about our current exhibitions will win prizes from local businesses.

Local participating businesses include: Boulder Dushanbe Teahouse, hip consignment, Momentum, Pangea Organics, Saxy’s Cafe, and our own Museum Store!

The BMoCA Scavenger Hunt is a community-building activity that is designed to educate players about the museum’s exhibitions while encouraging interaction with and support for local businesses.

The Scavenger Hunt is made possible by a grant through the Boulder Arts Commission.  Through this grant, the Boulder Arts Commission has encouraged all of us at BMoCA to recognize the capacity for arts organizations to contribute to the vitality of the Boulder economy. The grant has allowed us to consider the arts not just as a cultural asset to our community, but as an economic asset as well. By creatively integrating art, technology, and business, the BMoCA Scavenger Hunt will have a viable, sustainable impact on the City of Boulder.

Come by BMoCA and join the fun!  It’s a great way to get to know our current artists, exhibitions and receive coupons/gift certificates from local businesses.  Happy Hunting!

Directions for participating via SCVNGR:

1. With your smart phone, download the free scavenger hunt app:  SCVNGR.

2. Once you’ve downloaded the app click on “places” and scroll down until you find BMoCA. Click on BMoCA and begin the hunt!

3. There are 5 questions. Each question is worth a certain number of points. When you receive your score, show it to the staff member at the front desk who will reward you with a treasure from a local business!

4. If you do not have access to a smartphone, just pick up a hard copy at the front desk and turn it in when you’ve completed the hunt.  If you receive enough points for correct answers you will be rewarded with a gift certificate or goody from a local business!

5. Our “Just for Kids!” scavenger hunt is available here at the front desk.

Amanda Marie Ploegsma: Purity and Credence

BMoCA presents new paintings by Amanda Marie Ploegsma in the artist’s first museum exhibition, Purity & Credence. Working with spray paint and stencils, Ploegsma develops her paintings layer by layer, choosing placement and relations between different elements to build cohesive scenarios, playing with foreground and background, mirroring and repeating images, and adding bursts of color or drips of paint to imply movement. Her signature characters – a little boy and girl – appear frequently and in various situations. Executed in a simplified illustrative style reminiscent of the 1950s, they seem to have been lifted from the pages of a mid-twentieth century children’s book and have traded the protective home of childhood nostalgia for a slightly more adventurous and unsettling world, somewhere between dream and reality. A sense of tension is introduced by presenting scenes of uncorrupted innocence and translating the stylized graphic appeal for a contemporary sensibility through the use of stencil and spray paint, referencing the global language of street art with its associations of rawness and transgression.

In her new paintings, Ploegsma refers to the historical roots of stenciling and other street art inspired modes of expression, such as wheatpasting and graffiti, not only in technique but also in subject matter by showing freight train monikers and dumpster tagging. Also on view are a number of the stencils the artist employed to create the paintings. Ploegsma often uses the backsides of Barack Obama posters from his 2008 presidential campaign, featuring a stylized stencil portrait of Obama. The randomly overlaid cut-outs make for a striking effect that changes dramatically when viewed from the front or back. Due to the ease of duplication, stencil art has long been tied to the distribution of political opinion. In the world of Amanda Marie Ploegsma, it is also connected to the supernatural realm of childhood with a sense of mystery and wonder.

Amanda Marie Ploegsma was born in 1981. She moved to Colorado in 2001 and currently lives in Greeley with her husband and two children—Purity (2) and Credence (5). She attended Rocky Mountain College of Art + Design and exhibits regularly in Denver, the US, and Europe. Her most recent exhibition was See You Through It at Andenken Gallery, Amsterdam, NL (September 2011), just after completing a mural for the new Atzlan Northside Skate Park in Fort Collins, Colorado (summer 2011).

Obvious Invisible presents a selection of paintings from Thomas Scharfenberg’s extensive body of work, created over the past few years. Executed on stretched canvas or paper in colored pencil, charcoal, pastel, ink, watercolor, acrylic and spray paint, with melted glass, and even beet juice, they describe the multi-layered, interconnected nature of life in all its complexities. With an enthusiasm that is reflected in the abundance of color and generosity of shapes, patterns, and textures, Scharfenberg arranges his compositions over several strata, each symbolizing a different facet of our perceived reality with its own set of rules and behaviors.

Here, as in real life, order and chaos live side by side – not as opposites, but as parallel aspects of a joint reality, expressed as hard-edged, geometric layers and structured patterns on the one side, emerging within liberally applied paint drips and splatters on the other. Attentively observing, photographing, and recording our surroundings, from which he then makes his drawings freehand, Scharfenberg reveals structures and patterns in everything from flower fields to floorboards to light reflected on a TV screen. Some patterns are obvious and easily recognized, while others may require that we open our minds to the possibility of their existence – right before our eyes. In addition to the paintings on view, visitors will be able to observe the artist and follow his progress as he creates a mural on one of the museum walls.

Thomas Scharfenberg was born in 1984; he lives in Denver, Colorado. He holds a BFA from Rocky Mountain College of Art + Design (2007) and is currently a resident creative at Wazee Union, where he regularly shows his work. Recent exhibitions include America Runs on Double Ds at Madison Museum of Post Contemporary Art, Madison, Wisconsin (2010) and Love to Hate/Hate to Love at Redline, Denver, Colorado (2009).

Suburban Lawns features works from several series of Zach Reini’s distinct body of work, but in spite of its title the color green is markedly absent from the exhibition. Monochromatic black on black paintings of American icons and popular brands such as Mickey Mouse and Coca-Cola comment on the incessant dissemination of these images through advertising and the Internet until they blend into any given surrounding and become part of a universal, collective image library, devoid of their symbolic potency. Reini’s series of Braille paintings—white dots arranged on black backgrounds to spell random phrases in the alphabet used by the visually impaired—bring attention to the exclusive nature of art. Their tactile relief could be felt if one would run a finger over them, and the phrases could be understood by a blind person competent in Braille. But with neither situation likely to occur in an art museum, the paintings are left to stand as stark, yet incomprehensive messages. Reini’s Observed Sculptures recreate arrangements of randomly encountered everyday items. Assembled to heighten awareness of their visual presence within the context of the exhibition, they merge a minimalist aesthetic with a straightforward sense of humor, revealing the absurdities of both art and life.

The term Suburban Lawns invokes images of uniformity and compliance with established norms. In a cultural landscape where all edges and differences have been smoothed out and replaced with sameness, it becomes increasingly difficult to distinguish individual identities and meanings. By taking the flattening effect to its consequential extreme, Reini creates an opportunity to rediscover the seemingly familiar and reacquaint ourselves with our own cultural identity.

Zach Reini was born in 1990. He lives in Denver, Colorado, where he is currently pursuing a BFA with an emphasis in painting from Rocky Mountain College of Art + Design. He has been studio assistant to John McEnroe and Clark Richert. His work has been shown at Illiterate Gallery, Rule Gallery, and RedLine, Denver.

EXHIBITION DETAILS
Open continuously (all night) from Thursday, July 21 at 6:30pm until Saturday, July 23 at 4pm.
Open on Sunday, July 24 from 11am until 4pm.
Free and open to the public.

Boulder Museum of Contemporary Art and Adam Milner invite you to join the artist for the latest iteration of his bedroom installation—at BMoCA. By setting up his own bed and personal items inside the museum, Milner creates a place that firmly blends private and public spheres, melding behavioral patterns usually reserved for one or the other. For the duration of the exhibition – from Thursday until Sunday evening – Another Room at BMoCA will become Milner’s home base. From here he will leave to go about his day, rest between appointments, or meet with visitors. He will also sleep at the museum at night.

The exhibition is free and open around the clock from Thursday until Saturday evening and during regular museum hours on Sunday. Visitors are invited to sit and talk with the artist, enjoy a cup of tea, or relax and listen to music. The experience is shaped by participants’ interactions within the artist-created environment. Milner lists the ingredients for his installation as “me, you, personal objects, and hand-cut vinyl,” embracing open-endedness and chance as compelling means to broaden our awareness regarding social conduct and close personal relationships.

I explore the tension and politics of intimacy and relationships and the boundaries and containers—both self-imposed and pre-existing—that mediate our interaction, including memory, distance, communication, and technology. – Adam Milner

Another Room is part of an ongoing series. Previous venues include a hallway at CU Boulder’s School of Art and the artist’s actual bedroom. Plans for future installations are also underway. Although Milner takes a light-hearted, playful approach, he addresses the key influences that shape our actions and decision-making. Recognizing the desire for emotional and physical closeness as a major factor in human behavior, unabashed sexual overtones in his work are neither accidental nor insignificant.

Milner’s work employs video, photography, performance, and experimental drawing techniques, often to document otherwise ephemeral interactions and routines. One of his ongoing series, titled Petition Against Forgetting, includes daily photo-documentation of the bed he slept in and every bathroom he used. Another series, Bed Drawings, consists of drawings created by the movement of the artist’s body as he falls asleep.

Adam Milner lives in Boulder, Colorado. He recently graduated summa cum laude from the University of Colorado, Boulder with a BFA in Drawing and Painting and a BS in Journalism as well as a minor in Technology, Arts and Media.

Seth Wulsin, Orbus Tertius, 2007 (detail). Photograph by Fede Juarez

Artist Talk with Seth Wulsin: TBD

Seth Wulsin: Wishing Well

“What we call birth is the beginning of a difference.”
- from Ovid’s Metamorphoses, The Teachings of Pythagoras

Seth Wulsin’s installation Wishing Well, consisting of two spheres made from twenty equal-sided triangles, extends an invitation to consider individual differences rather than statistically measurable aspects as a key ingredient for diversity. Two icosahedra – twenty-sided spheres – made from mirror, glass, and silicone stand in sleek angularity that merges their inherent fragility with structural strength. Installed with the mirrored side facing inward, their gleaming interiors are revealed through glass-faced panes and small gaps as viewers move around the freestanding sculptures. Light and reflections enter and pass through the spheres at the speed of light and continue into infinity due to their geometric attributes, yet remain contained within their outer boundaries.

Viewers will be able to catch a glimpse of numerous fragmented and constantly changing images of themselves, as their reflections pass through, multiply, and leave traces that accumulate in these intangible spaces like memories. In this way, the sculptures become vessels that hold the essence of everyone that happens upon them.

Wulsin’s installation is steeped in philosophy, mythology, geometric symbolism, and folklore. According to the ancient Greek philosopher Plato, the icosahedron was the symbol for the element of water. Water as a source of life, has traditionally been assigned transformational and healing powers. This inspired the belief that wells hold the power to grant wishes. Wishing Well at BMoCA is a place where we can come and speak our wishes, leaving with renewed hope that they will be granted.

About the artist:

Seth Wulsin was born in 1981 in Spring Valley, New York. He studied Drawing and Painting at Parsons The New School for Design in New York City. He also briefly studied Literature and Philosophy at Yale University, New Haven, Connecticut, and Religion and Politics at Brown University, Providence, Rhode Island. Between 2005 and 2009, he lived and worked in Buenos Aires, Argentina. Since 2009, Wulsin divides his time between Bogotá, Colombia and Brooklyn, New York. He is a member of the art collectives Artistas en Latinoamerica, and Wubacawi, and he is currently a studio fellow at Smack Mellon, New York. Wulsin’s work has been exhibited in group and solo exhibitions at DUMBO Arts Festival 2010, Brooklyn, NY; ArteBA 2010, Buenos Aires, Argentina; and at Casa Tres Patios, Medellín, Colombia (2008).

Gustavo Artigas: Relay (Endless)

Let’s run together.
Not from each other.
-Gustavo Artigas

Relay (Endless), an inclusive sporting event created by Gustavo Artigas, brings together people from all walks of life. As an ongoing pro-diversity relay race that will continue throughout BIODOME, this project becomes a metaphor for collective effort. Participants of any athletic ability will pass the baton as often as possible and for as long as possible, representing a vibrant exchange of ideas. The extent and boundaries of the relay depend on the routes determined by individual participants.

You may choose to complete the circuit track installed inside the museum. Please see our visitor services representatives at the front desk to check out the baton. Take as many loops as you like. When you are finished, you may pass the baton to the next person waiting to continue the race, or return it to the front desk. We also invite participants to take the baton throughout the Boulder area and even beyond. After you check out the baton, you can take it for a spin anywhere you like, just let us know when you will return it and maybe take some photos to share with us. If you are the last one to check out the baton for the day, you may keep it over night but please return it by 11am the next day.

All participants will be asked to complete a questionnaire about their ideas and experiences of diversity prior to taking the baton. These responses will create an archive of thoughts about diversity in the Boulder area. Those who successfully complete the race by passing the baton to the next participant receive a commemorative medal.

About the artist:

Gustavo Artigas was born in 1970 in Mexico City, where he lives and works. He studied at the Universidad Nacional Autonoma de México (UNAM) in Mexico City. Artigas won the II Installation Competition organized by the Ex-Teresa Arte Actual gallery in 1996, and was offered a residency at Project at Johannesburg, South Africa in 2001. His work has been shown at Kunstmuseum Liechtenstein, Vaduz Liechtenstein; the Akademie der Kunst, Berlin, Germany (2005-6); international 04, Liverpool Biennial, Liverpool, United Kingdom (2004); and at OUTLOOK 2003 Arena, Society for the Advancement of Contemporary Art, Athens, Greece, among other institutions.

Click here to learn more about registering for Relay (Endless).

Image by Laleh Mehran & Chris Coleman

Artist Talk with Laleh Mehran & Chris Coleman: Thursday, July 14, 7pm at BMoCA

Laleh Mehran & Chris Coleman: W3fi

Laleh Mehran and Chris Coleman focus on the effects of technology on the sense of self. In particular, they examine a second self, referred to as the digital self or “S3lf,” that emerges as we find ourselves increasingly enveloped by worlds of information. This S3lf is made up of many fragments, often dispersed into numerous Internet databases, which make up the way we are perceived even when we are not physically present. This project offers a possible path toward becoming a better S3lf, and thus a positive part of the network, the “W3fi” (pronounced wee-fy). The W3fi is the sum of all the digital S3lfs and depends on the concept that every action has consequences far beyond S3lf-to-S3lf interactions. As part of the W3fi, we are interconnected and we must give as much, if not more, care and consideration to each action as we do every day in the physical realm.

Mehran and Coleman pose questions concerning the nature of our use of technology and information. As the Internet grows, cycling through phases of promise and decay, it retains its core idea of connecting people and ideas despite geography. The artists suggest that the value of the information disseminated through the Internet has been diluted by its increased use for the broadcasting of the mundane and the irresponsible. They challenge visitors to consider the following questions: Is it possible to change our attitudes and begin to perceive the bandwidth and storage of the virtual space as valuable, rather than as a forum for our cultural waste? Can we find validation by contributing positively to the W3fi, the network of collaboration and support?

About the artists:

Laleh Mehran was born in Tehran, the daughter of Iranian scientists. She received her MFA in Electronic Time-Based Media from Carnegie Mellon University, Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. Her work has been shown at the Next 5 Minutes 4 Tactical Media Festival in Amsterdam, Holland; the European Media Arts Festival in Osnabrück, Germany; and at the Andy Warhol Museum, Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. Mehran is Associate Professor and Graduate Director of the Electronic Media Arts & Design program at the University of Denver.

Chris Coleman received his BFA in his native state from West Virginia University in 2001 and his MFA from New York State University at Buffalo in 2003. He has exhibited at the Albright-Knox Art Gallery, Buffalo, NY; FILE Sao Paulo, Brazil, and other institutions throughout Europe, Asia, and the US. In 2009 he was the winner of the Babelgum Metropolis Art Prize in New York City. He is Assistant Professor in the department of Media, Film & Journalism Studies at the University of Denver.