RELIQUARIES - New Works by Madeline von Foerster

About

Curated by Yasha Young. Opening November 12th from 7pm. This new series of artworks grows out of the artist's fascination with reliquaries: the jewel-covered statues and treasure chests where remains of sainted persons - from bones, to scraps of clothing, to vials of blood - are enshrined. Old, beautiful, and mysterious, reliquaries often become objects of worship themselves. The impulse to preserve and make precious seems to represent a common human urge, spanning across many cultures, and not only confined to religion: we create reliquaries for vanquished cultures in our Natural History Museums, and living reliquaries, in the form of zoos, for animals all but extinct in the wild. In the Vault: TO SLEEP LIKE GHOSTS by Brad Kunkle Sleep is a beautiful, uninhibited state of being. Waking from a dream only to realize that it was JUST a dream is a powerful feeling and It's amazing what we can experience and learn without the laws of physics or our known reality arranging things for us. The paintings of TO SLEEP LIKE GHOSTS are about heading towards something beautiful and unknown, and allowing the natural world to take us there, not the dogmas and learned behaviors. Brad Reuben Kunkle's world premiere one-man exhibition, Against Nature, was sold out opening night in April of 2010 in New York City. He has been featured in Fine Art Connoisseur magazine, Poets and Artists, and on the covers of American Art Collector and International Artists magazine. Born in 1978 in a small town in Pennsylvania, he studied painting at Kutztown University. He now lives and works in New York City.