Derek Stroup | Making Space: Quint Contemporary Art: 7739 Drury Lane

Quint Contemporary Art is pleased to exhibit new works by artists Lee Materazzi and Derek Stroup. The exhibitions open on February 20th, 2009 with a public reception from 6-8 p.m. and continue through March 28th.  The two solo exhibitions will occur simultaneously. 

Miami based photographer, Lee Materazzi, graduated with honors from Central Saint Martins College in London. Ms. Materazzi has built a solid reputation as a talented and prolific photographer. Her work belongs in such prominent collections as The Margulies Collection at the Warehouse, World Class Boxing, The Collection of Debra & Denis Scholl, and The Collection at the Sagamore. Materazzi stages elaborate theatrical scenes in which people seem to be fleeing their immediate surroundings or picking at the scab of estrangement by burying their heads in various surfaces. They appear vulnerable — victims of life's banal intrusions, against which they fold without a fight. They have an Alice-down-the-rabbit-hole sensibility that renders spectators out of their shoes with a nifty head fake. In an age that embraces the use of Photoshop and other such programs to present highly stylized images that are meant to trick the eye, Materazzi's work accomplishes this with a very playful organic artistic touch.  This specific body of work examines everyday occurrences that are visually altered to present the more complex and emotional relationships that lie beneath the surface. 

New York based artist, Derek Stroup is an artist presently consumed with investigating the experience of language, the communication of information, the visual perception of the common conduit of intelligible data, and consumer packaging and branding. It's a true sign of successful marketing if a product can be recognized just by a hint of color or shape of a wrapper. The works presented in this exhibition do just that. With no visual cues other than the presentation of color 

and texture, Stroup plays with the viewers subconscious reference to branding and its effect on the image at hand. The works presented transform the seemingly ordinary object into something quite beautiful. As Stroup notes ‘with labels, we instantly assign these objects to their proper category in our mind. With labels removed, there is a moment of when our categorical impulse is suspended.’ The works presented in this exhibition present photographs of unbranded products that seemingly transform into sculptures – perfect objects that don’t exist anywhere in the world. 

Mr. Stroup is the author of Field Guide (2002), Rope Swing, Manifesto (2004), and Candy (2006).