Traywick Contemporary is pleased to announce Emanate, an exhibition of recent works on paper by Bay Area artist Dharma Strasser MacColl. This will be her first show with Traywick Contemporary. Showing concurrently will be Nancy Mintz: Mother May I.
In this recent body of work, Strasser MacColl uses porcelain, silk thread, paper and watercolor in delicate combinations to create quietly powerful works that defy their materials. Strasser MacColl starts with Iokta paper -- a handmade rice paper chosen for its unexpected tonal variations and saturated natural colors. The paper is torn down and then sewn together in blocks of subtly contrasting color values. Her hand appears throughout the work: from the careful stitching (which appears as drawn lines) to the small porcelain discs and objects that she hand forms and delicately inserts among the thread and watercolor surface marks. Upon closer viewing, the surfaces are further activated by a clever illusion of depth.
Throughout Strasser MacColl's work there emerges a fascinating interplay between the multiplying, overlapping groups of smaller parts, and the open spaces inside and around them. Her process of building and combining, while slowly executed, is about corralling the energy of moving parts as they move and shift, finding their natural order in space. Her work succeeds in capturing the small, intimate moments that are often lost in our frenetic world.
Dharma Strasser MacColl received her MFA in 1997 from the Cranbrook Academy of Art in Michigan. She has previously exhibited her work at Augen Gallery, Portland, OR; Walker Contemporary, Boston, MA; Marin Arts Council, Novato, CA; Nancy Margolis Gallery, New York; and Dorothy Weiss Gallery, San Francisco.