'Nothing Happens'
Organized by Julia Kansas
Jacob Dutton
Haley Gunn
Kelsie Hjorleifson
Stephen Harper
Quinn O'Connor
Bronson Smillie
Nov 2nd - Nov 22nd
2019
Crescent Heights Pop up Space
Five AM is proud to present ‘Nothing Happens’, a group exhibition that is inspired by boredom and the everyday. These concepts are explored by six artists through painting, drawing, collage and photo. Tools to deal with boredom, what arises from boredom, familiar objects, unfamiliar objects presented in a familiar way, facial expressions, and daily deeds mingle to address the numerous unanswered questions surrounding the mundane and the unremarkable. Located in a gallery that has been carved out of a hundred-year-old unoccupied apartment, where an idle fire place has sat patiently and waited to be given a new function; at last, it now exists as a space where art is hung above for many people to see!
Bronson Smillie presents us with a common, if not too common, moment of eradication. This broom. This red, plastic, familiar broom that lives in countless homes and businesses. When looking at this picture I can’t help but wonder when this broom took over our lives and homes? I can’t remember ever not owning it. The two paintings, one before the spiderweb’s demise, and one after, take on a moody moment of destruction.
Kelsie Hjorleifson’s collage portrays an encyclopedic image of a rock on top of a picturesque background, the didactic material has the opportunity to excite one reader and bore another. It makes me consider how different we all are and how one person’s boredom is another person’s pleasure. Her delicate drawing of a socket softens a hard object and exposes the insides of this things we use every day, making it seem vulnerable and beautiful.
In both of Haley Gunn’s paintings the rooms seem both eerie and inviting. The use of private space and emptiness as a way to invite the onlooker to impart their own history and views on, is both clever and manipulative. But we want to be manipulated, we NEED to be manipulated. Gunn’s use of abstracted photo transfer disorients the onlooker, but she has been kind enough to give us a well rendered couch to lay down in as we recover from our mental mindfucks.
Quinn O’connor’s dense and protruding paintings tell two very different stories about two very different misfits. However, loneliness, or perceived loneliness, is the thread that ties them together. The pierrot (pee-uh-row) stands in front of a remote background with a facial expression that alludes to leisure time gone wrong. The other painting, a man who pleasures himself while talking on the phone. Why is it I immediately assume he’s paying for the voice on the other side? He somehow seems so alone even though he’s in company. I wish these two misfits could meet and spend their lives together.
Stephen Harper’s photos, elaborately framed and outrageously slick, give objects their time to shine. Little Caesar’s and Easy Cheese are the stars of these pieces, and junk food never looked so good. We’ve all fell victim to boredom eating, and if you say you haven’t, you’re lying. Brb, pizza guy’s here.
What do measuring spoons, a fast food cup and a wooden door with a panic bar have in common? I have no idea, but Jacob Dutton might. Dutton’s skilfully rendered pencil crayon drawings capture things that might otherwise be overlooked in a day. These menial objects exist around us but we’re too busy being bored to notice.