On the evening of August 11th, internationally-exhibiting artist Rachel Owens will speak about her work and process during an evening lecture at UrbanGlass in Brooklyn (UrbanGlass publishes the GLASS Quarterly Hot Sheet). The artist, whose work graced the cover of the Summer 2015 edition of GLASS (#139), explores the corrosive effects of consumer culture driven to unsustainable levels of desire by retail mercandising and marketing. Ownes makes sculptures of molded broken glass and resin, which she employs for its seductive and repulsive push-puil.
In her interview with GLASS, Owens talked about how important it was for her to make her own work as her ideas were worked out through high concept resolved through the process of fabrication. Her recent exhbition at Zieher Smith & Horton, entitled "Smile Always," also tapped into her extensive experience in high-end retail merchandising, which she practiced at some of the most exclusive stores in Manhattan to support her budding art career.
Speaking about the work on display in her Chelsea gallery exhibition, she said: "I wanted all these objects here to share something about consumption and the inherent violence, the repulsion and at traction, that happens at the same time as this constant consuming and consuming and consuming. That’s why I like the glass, because it does that. Broken glass can be so beautiful, and then you get up to it and you’re like, 'Oh, crap!'”
Owens cites the socially aware work of Thomas Hirschhorn as her primary inspiration, though unlike his noncommercial projects, Owens’s work is displayed in a commercial gallery context, where it's critique extends even to the business of art dealing, itself. In Owens's work, nobody is spared from her analysis of consumerism, not even herself.
IF YOU GO:
Rachel Owens
UrbanGlass Artist Lecture Series
Tuesday, August 11, 2015, 7 PM - 8:30 PM
UrbanGlass Third Floor Classroom
647 Fulton Street, entrance on Rockwell Place
Brooklyn, NY 11217
Tel: 718 625 3685
Website