Shona
Macdonald:
SHIFT, Main Space
Heimir Björgúlfsson:
Allure Gone Buffalo,
Project Space
Oct
27 - Dec 1
opening reception
Saturday, October 27, from 5 -8 pm
d.e.n. contemporary art is pleased
to present two solo exhibitions: Shift, the Los Angeles
debut of new paintings and drawings by Massachusetts-based Shona
Macdonald; and, allure gone buffalo, with
paintings, sculpture, photo-collage/drawing, and installation by Heimir
Björgúlfsson, based in Amsterdam and Los Angeles.
Macdonald 
In “Shift,” Macdonald examines the constant motions and
cyclical routines of our domestic life, and the
human tendency to establish daily rituals of shifting and ordering our
possessions to create a state of comfort and security. In her work,
Macdonald depicts everyday objects, some passing through our lives,
some held and cherished.
Macdonald’s subtle palette of gouache, graphite or silverpoint,
echoes the comfort and familiarity of the
belongings they represent. Papers are read and then recycled; clothes
are soiled, laundered, and folded. Images of snow-capped landscapes
also appear in her work, an element of the larger environment MacDonald
inhabits, whether it be her native Scotland or her present home in the
east coast.
Paper, clothes, and snow – all routinely put into piles to neatly
move them out and make room for the time being, until the need to repeat
the routine arises again. It’s our instinctual drive to make life
more manageable and keep at bay discomfort and chaos, an attempt at
once mundane yet, like in the myth of Sisyphus pushing a rock up the
mountain, never-ending and slightly humorous.
Born in Aberdeen, Macdonald moved to the U.S. to attend the University
of Illinois in Chicago, where she
received her M.F.A. in 1996. In 2006, she moved east after accepting
a teaching position at the University of Massachusetts. Her work has
been exhibited in several solo shows in California and Illinois, and
in group exhibitions throughout the Midwest states as well as in the
United Kingdom.
Björgúlfsson
[click for images]
The gallery will also present “allure gone buffalo,” featuring
Heimir Björgúlfsson in the Project Room. Born in
Reykjavík, Iceland, the artist presently lives and works in Amsterdam
as well as Los Angeles. Björgúlfsson integrates a vision
from both his native and adopted countries in his work as he examines
the challenges and threats experienced while adapting to conflicting
natural situations.
Influencing Björgúlfsson’s artistic development is
his upbringing in Iceland’s raw expanse of mountains,
glaciers, and volcanoes, the flora and fauna existing therein, and the
native birds that are a recurring element in the artist’s work.
Also influential is his emigration to the antithetical surroundings
of southern California’s densely populated, ethnically-diverse
metropolis. This is represented in the work by the presence of palm
trees and graffiti, omnipresent in Los Angeles, deliberate insertions
by man into the city environment.
The exhibition will consist of a variety of media including painting,
sculpture, photo-collage/drawing, and
installation, where both illustrated and taxidermic animals and insects
serve as opposing life forms situated to co-exist in a peculiar environment.
Each creature is confronted with physical or behavioral adaptation or
maybe extinction as a result of a “higher” creature or human
settlement disturbing the ecosystem. In one sculpture, a bird is the
dominant force to a more delicate species of butterflies. In another
piece, a bird seems vulnerable in size next to the bold, physically
intimidating presence of a large buffalo head, yet the bird appears
to be whispering a message into the buffalo’s ear, perhaps one
of warning.
As with animal evolution and with mankind’s quest to find a balance
between conquering an environment
and adapting to it, so too, is an artist’s quest to assimilate
into another culture - each requiring psychological or behavioral adjustment
or reaction to situational forces, each quest having successes and failures
along the way.
Björgúlfsson’s work has been exhibited throughout
Europe, in Iceland, Belgium, The Netherlands, Germany,
Italy, and United Kingdom, as well as in Los Angeles, Houston, Texas,
and Japan. (This exhibition is in part made possible with the support
of The Netherlands Foundation of Art, Design and Architecture, Amsterdam).
The exhibitions will be on view through December 1. Gallery
hours: Tue-Sat, 11-5:30. For additional
information or to request visual material, contact the gallery at (310)
559-3023 or info@dencontemporaryart.com