IMMATERIAL: Cathy Cunningham-Little & Amy M. Ho
DECEMBER 7, 2012 - JANUARY 24, 2013
Amy M. Ho Blue Grass, 2012 Duratrans print 24 x 30 x 4 inches
Immaterial features the work of two artists who use light as a primary medium. Amy M. Ho and Cathy Cunningham-Little are fundamentally interested in perception, challenging us to simultaneously decipher and question what we see.
Amy M. Ho explores imaginary spaces using projections or backlit images of architectural models she creates. Her site-specific light-filled environments challenge the viewer's comprehension of space, recalling the works of James Turrell, Doug Wheeler and other Light and Space artists of the 1960's. Up/Down II (2012) is a two channel video projection of stairs that seem to extend from the actual gallery floor, inviting viewers to imagine the virtual stairwell space and beyond. In smaller light boxes, planes of color are given architectural shape by light and shadow, which suggest three-dimensional spaces one might inhabit. Whether physically encompassing or presented as windows to imaginary spaces, Ho challenges the viewer’s sense of spatial reality.
While Ho creates virtual spaces perceived as potentially “real,”Cathy Cunningham-Little’s newest work presents colored light as though it is as tangible as paint on canvas. Works like Buzzzand Metamorphosis (both 2012) incorporate minimal material—shards of dichroic glass—to create large-scale luminous “murals.” In a darkened space, small glass fragments adhered to the wall reflect and transmit large beams of vividly colored light that spread across the wall’s surface in dramatic shapes. In a more sculptural work titled Six Degrees of Separation (2010), Cunningham-Little uses reflections on mirrored glass bulbs as a metaphor for the interconnectedness among people. When standing under the suspended drops, the viewer sees his/her own as well as nearby viewers’ reflections transmitted repeatedly among the surfaces. This experiential and immaterial aspect of the work is essential to its substance.
About the Artists
Cathy Cunningham-Little lives in San Antonio, TX. Her work has received numerous awards and has widely been exhibited at national and international venues, including the San Antonio Museum of Art; Santa Reparata Int’l School of Art in Florence, Italy; Museum of Neon Art, Los Angeles; HsinChu Municipal Cultural Center, Taiwan; Mexic-arte Museum, Austin; Seto Shinyou Kinko Gallery, Seto, Japan; and the Austin Museum of Art. She studied at the University of Texas in San Antonio and the Pilchuck Glass School in Washington State. Cunningham-Little received the ArtPace travel grant for research in Germany, as well as being awarded artist residencies in Texas and Wyoming. This is her second exhibition at Chandra Cerrito Contemporary.
Amy M. Ho lives in the Bay Area and received her BA from UC Berkeley in 2005 and her MFA from Mills College in 2011. Her work has been shown in numerous galleries and alternative spaces throughout San Francisco and the East Bay including solo exhibitions at the San Francisco Art Institute and ProArts Gallery. She has also shown at the Astoria Moving Picture Festival in New York; the Jersey City Museum, New Jersey; Conrad Wilde Gallery, Arizona; Preston Contemporary Art Center, New Mexico. Ho has had artist residencies in Vermont and the Czech Republic. This is her second exhibition at Chandra Cerrito Contemporary.
-Chandra Cerrito, Curator
