Lisa Sigal

Lisa Sigal's fourth solo show at Frederieke Taylor gallery, titled "Tent Paintings," was on view from November 29, 2007 through January 12, 2008.  For a number of years, Lisa Sigal has been conflating building with the act of making art.   Architecture becomes surface and painting can become shelter.  Questioning the way in which space is measured and mediums are defined, Sigal plays with the differences between color, line, signage and wall until all things are seemingly equal.  This exhibition will include tent-like installations using materials such as paint on wallpaper, sheetrock and newspaper. While wallpaper is generally a decorative surface expressing taste, in the case of these pieces, the walls are missing.  The paper replaces the architecture and defines the boundaries. Also on view will be related collage drawings. 

Of the work in this show, the artist writes:  

"Lately I have been using wallpaper to build structures.   I am interested in combining the cultural references that the wallpaper has with unexpected elements such as found notes, photographs, newspaper clippings, etc. which alter its meaning.  The wallpaper pieces come from a group of paintings I call "Tent Paintings."  The "Tent Paintings" are on folded sheetrock panels that are suggestive of makeshift shelters. The wallpaper seems like an extension of these folded architectural forms, unstuck and free form.

Besides the formal qualities of the wallpaper, I am interested in suggesting a mutable delineation between being inside and outside. This shift brings a subtle change in vantage point that has the potential to radically alter one's physical and philosophical perspective. Blurring the distinction between fiction and fact is an act of equality." 

Lisa Sigal currently has an installation at P.S.1 MOMA, on view thru January 7, 2008. This installation directly relates to "Tent Paintings," where she is considering shelter as the threshold between the visual and physical.  It is titled, “LIC 4BR total reno bsmt 2 skylite nr subway historic 1894 school bldg must see Lisa 347 613 0682, " which is a description of the piece as a place in the museum's boiler room.   

Lisa Sigal will be included in the 2008 Whitney Biennal. Works by Lisa Sigal have been included in numerous museum and group exhibitions including The Aldrich Museum, CT, Sculpture Center, NY,  Anderson Gallery in Richmond VA, Brooklyn Museum of Art, NY, White Columns, NY, Weatherspoon Art Gallery, NC, Real Art Ways, CT. Sigal has been the recipient of the Headlands Center for the Arts Residency 2004, NYFA Grant 2002, Ballinglen Arts Foundation Fellowship Ireland 1999, Joan Mitchell Foundation Grant 1998, Elizabeth Foundation for the Arts Grant1998, Yaddo Fellowship 1991 and Provincetown Fine Arts Work Center 1988. 

EDUCATION

1989    MFA in Painting, Yale University School of Art, New Haven, CT

1986    Skowhegan School of Art, ME

1985    BFA, Tyler School of Art, Temple University, PA

SOLO EXHIBITIONS

2007    Tent Painting, Frederieke Taylor Gallery, NY

2005    New  Drawings,  Frederieke Taylor Gallery, NY

            A House of Many Mansions,  Aldrich Museum, CT

2004    house paint, Frederieke Taylor Gallery, NY

2001    Stone To Wind, Frederieke Taylor Gallery, NY

2000    White Room show, White Columns Gallery, NY

1999    Queens Museum of Art at Bulova Corporate Center, NY

1994    Middlebury College Art Museum, Middlebury, VT

1991    Momenta Gallery, Philadelphia, PA

GROUP EXHIBITIONS

2008    Whitney Biennial, NY

2007    Orpheus Selection,  P.S.1/MOMA, Long Island City, NY

2006    Gifts Go In One Direction, Apex Art, NY

            Couples, Palmer Museum,  Penn State College Museum,  PA

2005    Surface Charge, Anderson Gallery, VA; curated by Gregory Volk & Sabine Russ

            Odd Lots, curated by Cabinet Magazine, White Columns and Queens Museum, NY

            Make It Now,  Sculpture Center,  LIC,  NY

2004    Open House, Working in Brooklyn, Brooklyn Museum of Art, NY

            Happy Medium, Clementine Gallery, NY

            Freehand, Marvelli Lab, NY

            Sprawl, (curated by Emily Wei and Haan Y. Chau),Hudson Clearing, NY

2003   Fast Forward, (curated by Lauren Ross) White Columns, NY

            Abstruction, (curated by Eungie Joo) Artists Space, NY

            On And Off the Wall, New York Foundation For The Arts

            Painting Fellows, NY

            Tenth Anniversary Exhibition, Frederieke Taylor Gallery, NY

            Lean to, (curated by Eungie Joo) Real Art Ways, Hartford, CT

            Paper, Weatherspoon Art Gallery, NC

2002   4 NY Painters, Montclair State Gallery, Montclair, NJ

2000    Summertime, Tricia Collins Gallery, NY

            Conversation Exhibition, Art Resources Transfer, NY

1999    Outer Boroughs, White Columns, NY

            Making Change, The Jewish Museum, San Francisco, CA

1998    A Slice of the Apple, Ruth Bachofner Gallery, Santa Monica, CA

            From Here To Eternity, Max Protetch Gallery, NY

            Three Languages of Landscape, Painting Center, NY

1997    The Press Of My Foot To The Earth Springs A Hundred Affections"

            Rotunda Gallery, Brooklyn, NY

            Pulse, No Bias Gallery, VT

1995   10 x 10, New York Studio School, NY

1993   Major Medical, City Without Walls, NJ

            Little Things, Art in General, NY; traveled to Delta Axis Art

            Center, Memphis; Randolph Street Gallery, Chicago;

            Fesek  Gallery, Budapest, Hungary

COMMISSIONS

2003    Federal Reserve Bank, Atlanta

BIBLIOGRAPHY

Johnson, Ken. "Fast Forward: Twenty Years of White Rooms,"  The New York Times , November 2003.

Johnson, Ken. "Sprawl," The New York Times ,  January 23, 2004.

Volk, Gregory. "Big Brash Borough," Art in America , September 2004.

Tsai, Eugenie. "Abstruction," Time Out New York , October 9, 2004.

_____."Fast Foward,"The New Yorker , November 24, 2004.

Sholis, Brian. "Lisa Sigal,"ArtForum online , December 2004.

Goodbody, Bridget. "Lisa Sigal at Frederieke Taylor,"Time Out New York ,9 December 2004.

Israel, Nico. "Lisa Sigal,"ArtForum, March 2005.

Hirsch, Faye. "Lisa Sigal at Frederieke Taylor Gallery,"Art in America , March 2005.

Heur, Megan, Lisa Sigal at Frederieke Taylor ,” Art News, March 2006.

Ryan, Dina, Surface Charge,”  Sculpture, June 2006

Cotter, Holland, “Gifts Go In One Direction,” New York Times, July 28,2006

AWARDS

2004    Headlands Center for the Arts, San Francisco

2002    New York Foundation for the Arts Grant

1999    Ballinglen Arts Foundation Fellowship, Ireland

1998    Joan Mitchell Foundation Grant

            Elizabeth Foundation for the Arts Grant

1991    Yaddo Fellowship

1988    Provincetown Fine Arts Work Center