The Blogazine

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J. Parker Valentine at Peep Hole

PEEP HOLE, one of the most interesting and active art spaces in Milan, until January 29, is displaying Cut-Outs-Inter-Sections, the solo show by J. Parker Valentine, a young American artist (b. 1980) currently based in New York and Austin, Texas.

For her first time in Italy, the artist presents a site-specific work realised directly on the wall and an installation of drawings on MDF boards – coming from a previous show – and used here as a table to support other works on paper.
Even if the artist usually uses different media, which also include photography, collage, painting and sculpture, the exhibition focuses on the semiotic ‘sign’ that is the core of her work.

In the big drawing on the wall of the first room, J. Parker Valentine combines remaining graphite marks and erasures with stained shreds of canvas creating complete and incomplete fragments of an abstract narration, which covers the entire space. As in the table-object room, abstraction becomes the subject and the viewer can glimpse concrete forms through it. The gestural, abstract drawings, the sketches and the dirty marks cross the traditional two-dimensionality of the works on paper to turn into physical objects that reveal their precarious balance. With basic material and lines, J. Parker Valentine creates an interaction between abstraction and figuration, providing a personal path to grasp her own experience and cultural background among the texture of signs in the works.

J. Parker Valentine’s recent solo shows have taken place at Supportico Lopez in Berlin (ongoing), Taka Ishii Gallery in Kyoto (2010) and Lisa Cooley Gallery in New York (2010, 2008). Among group shows: Organic Relationships, The Center for Cosmic Wonder, Tokyo (2010); Substance Abuse, Leo Koenig Inc., New York (2010); Christopher Orr & J. Parker Valentine & Rezi van Lankveld, Front Room, Contemporary Arts Museum, St. Louis, Missouri (2009); If the Dogs are Barking, Artists Space, New York (2009); Creswell Crags, Lisa Cooley Gallery, New York (2008).