Opening Saturday, March 5, 2011 6-8pm
Featuring a sound performance by Seth Cluett

Are their faces really different from our own? There are those who refused to believe this. And there are those of us who sincerely look upon the ruins today … Those who pretend to take hope again as the image fades… Those of us who pretend to believe that all this happened only once, at a certain time and in a certain place, and those who refuse to see, who do not hear the cry to the end of time.

- From Night and Fog, a 1955 French documentary short film about the Holocaust

Swarm Gallery is pleased to present, aboveground, an exhibition of new work by Mayumi Hamanaka on view from March 5 – April 10, 2011. The artist’s first solo show with Swarm Gallery features large-scale photo-based cut-out images and photography.

Growing up in the climate of rapid economical growth and globalization, Mayumi Hamanaka’s art practice has followed concepts of individualism, mass-circulated trends, personal histories/memories buried within historical events, and power struggles of individuals within group dynamics.

aboveground explores the connection between historical events overseas and the present day where we stand. As written in Night and Fog, there are reverberating effects of past incidents over time and place, affecting more people than realized. Using recognizable source images collected from 20th Century wars such as WWI, WWII and the Vietnam War, Mayumi hand cuts and slightly abstracts them. By this action, she examines her own distorted perspective and experience in the context of how history is written, and invites the viewer to do the same. Re-imagining the past, we come up with a more accurate picture of the present.

You can also preview and order our project catalog here.

Swarm Gallery is pleased to announce “THINGS ARE EXPANDING,” an experimental group show on the theme of “collaboration.” Paired with a sound installation in the project space by SF artist, Tamara Albaitis, we sought inspiration from musical collaborators Brian Eno and David Byrne. Both legendary musicians in their own right, they’ve said a lot about the process of collaboration:

“…Another reason to risk [collaboration] is that others often have ideas outside and beyond what one would come up with oneself. To have one’s work responded to by another mind, or to have to stretch one’s own creative muscles to accommodate someone else’s muse, is a satisfying exercise. It gets us outside of our self-created boxes.”

Successful collaboration can be likened to a color wheel. Complimentary colors are in striking contrast to each other; when juxtaposed, each appears brighter and more intense. The opposition between the two gives the combination more power than each element could achieve on its own.

The process: Swarm invited fourteen of its gallery artists to invite another artist of their choosing (from outside the gallery) to collaborate on a piece. We encouraged the artists to invite someone whose work they admire, but who works differently – either in medium, creative style, concept, or all of the above – to “stretch their creative muscles”.

COME SEE WHAT THEY’VE DONE, opening with live music, performance and festivities:
Second Friday, December 10, 6PM