“They Became What They Beheld”, is organized by Daniel Ingroff, Paul Pescador and Katherine Metz and includes the work of Jamie Chan, Mariah Csepanyi, Daniel Ingroff, Renee Martin, Peggy Pabustan, Paul Pescador, Carlos Reyes, Lyla Rose and Katie Ryan. The work of these artists, while operating in radically different aesthetics, all seek to capture fantastic moments in subjects that occupy our everyday lives and experiences. The show’s title is a quote from a William Blake poem, as interpreted by Marshall McLuhan. McLuhan writes about how media and technology become integrated into our lives, and how people tend to imitate the things they create. As a group of artists working in Los Angeles in 2009, spaces such as the studio, the street, and the home are creations to be imitated.

About the work:

In Jamie Chan’s and Daniel Ingroff’s work there is a restructuring of space and landscape that abstracts imitation. In Renee Martin’s photographs of objects losing function, Martin depicts the result of the process in which pieces of the landscape senesce. In Peggy Pabustan’s performances, imitation of the cultural landscape is key to social commentary, while imitating nature is a strategy in Mariah Csepanyi’s process. In Katie Ryan and Carlos Reyes’s sculptures, and in Lyla Rose’s collages, a new vocabulary emerges around juxtaposing unlikely common materials and objects. In Paul Pescador’s photographs imitation of normal, everyday interactions allows for the insertion of fiction into the environment.

The convergence of work by these nine artists, values the consideration and re-contextualization of seemingly banal experiences and locales. The result is a fantastic map of the utilitarian landscape.