After the Pedestal, the 12th exhibition of small sculpture from the region

Sculptures by Lauren Baker, Carol Boram-Hays, Casey Bradley, Peggy Breidenbach, Rebecca Cross, Michelle Droll, Ana England & Steven Finke, Benjamin Johnson, Jennifer L. Jones, Jacquie Wynn Kennedy, Sharon Koelblinger, Mona Kolesar, Kristine Mifsud, Joyce Morrow-Jones, Donald Stuart, and E. D. Taylor

Main and Euclid Galleries
June 14 – August 2, 2019.
Opening reception on Friday, June 14 from 5:30 p.m. – 8:00 p.m.
The Artists Talk in both galleries begin at 6:30
Free and open to the public.

Annually through an open call for artists, The Sculpture Center invites all sculptors, including students, currently living and working in our greater region of Ohio, its contiguous states, W. PA and W. NY, and Ontario, Canada, to submit recent work for After the Pedestal, the summer juried exhibition of small sculpture. This always critically well received exhibition is juried by an artist or curator of national and international reputation.

Juror’s Statement
A vast mycorrhizal network deep beneath the ground connects trees and other plant life to one another. This fungal web?—comprised of innumerable white tendril-like threads?—serves as channeling through which plants share and redistribute a whole host of supplies? necessary for plant life to thrive: water, carbon, nitrogen, and other nutrients and minerals. This entanglement between species—fungi and its plant host—first springs in the plant’s rhizosphere, or root system, and quickly multiplies, growing into fungal strands that can span miles. Recent studies have noted striking similarities between the signals sent across mycorrhizal networks and the flares dispatched across human and animal neural networks. Through these signals, plants warn one another of infectious bacteria in the area or of invading insects drawing near. When connected through these networks, plants survive at exponentially higher rates than when in isolation.

Studies of plants and their environment reveal complex ecologies and astonishing relationships between species that allow for life to persist. Through careful examination of these forms, evocative metaphors about dependency, violence, power, care, and collectivity emerge. Many of the works in this exhibition invoke organic matter, suggesting larger questions about the relationships between beings, and the social and environmental structures creatures inhabit. Ultimately, these works point to a dizzying array of models, providing analogies for how we might understand our own.

Juror 2019
Sara O’Keeffe is an Associate Curator at the New Museum. She was part of the curatorial teams that organized “Trigger: Gender as a Tool and a Weapon” (with Johanna Burton, 2017-2018), and the “2015 Triennial: Surround Audience” (with Lauren Cornell and Ryan Trecartin, 2015). She curated “RAGGA NYC: All the threated and delicious things joining one another” (2015) and “Screens Series: Dynasty Handbag” (2018-2019), and co-curated “Jeffrey Gibson: The Anthropophagic Effect” (2019); “MOTHA and Chris E. Vargas: Consciousness Razing—The Stonewall Re-Memorialization Project”(2018-2019); “A.K. Burns: Shabby but Thriving” (2017); “My Barbarian: The Audience is Always Right” (2016); “Beatriz Santiago Muñoz: Song, Strategy, Sign” (2016); “Cheryl Donegan: Scenes and Commercials” (2015-2016); and “Wynne Greenwood: Kelly” (2015), all with Johanna Burton.

The call for artists is now closed and final selections have been made. Check back next spring for After the Pedestal 13.

Past Jurors
Second Generation Ab Ex sculptor Richard Hunt (2005), designer and artist Viktor Schrekengost (2006), sculptor and urban activist Don Harvey (2007), painter and Chair of the Visual Arts Division, Columbia University, New York, Gregory Amenoff (2008), the Cleveland Museum of Art’s Curator of Contemporary Art Paola Morsiani (2009), Executive Director of Carnegie Mellon University’s Miller Gallery Astria Suparak (2010), Judd Foundation (New York and Texas) Executive Director Barbara Hunt McClanahan (2011), sound and installation artist and Oberlin College’s Professor of Art and African American Studies Johnny Coleman (2015), the Toledo Museum of Art’s Associate Director and Curator of Modern and Contemporary Art Amy Gilman (2016), artist and Professor of Arts Education at Massachusetts College of Art and Design Steve Locke (2017),  and chief curator at the Albright-Knox Art Gallery in Buffalo, NY, Cathleen Chaffee (2018).