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Roxy Paine

SITE SANTA FE PRESENTS
ROXY PAINE/SECOND NATURE

April 26 -- July 6, 2003

Santa Fe, NM -- SITE Santa Fe is pleased to present Roxy Paine/Second Nature from April 26, 2003 through July 6, 2003, with a free public opening reception Friday, April 25, from 6 to 7 pm. Showing concurrently will be exhibitions of work by Susan Silton and Karin Davie. There will be a gallery talk with all three artists as part of the Artists On SITE component of Art & Culture on Saturday, April 26 at 5 pm. The event is free with museum admission.

Roxy Paine/Second Nature is a mid-career survey exhibition which focuses on two distinct yet interrelated bodies of Paine's work: monumental artmaking machines and naturalistic, botanical environments. These two types of work illustrate a reversal between the artist, whose repetitive processes are machine-like, and machines, which are programmed to emulate human artmaking. In both bodies of work, Paine subverts the viewer's expectations and raises questions about perceptions of creativity. On the one hand, he builds machines that produce objects that one would expect to be made by hand; on the other, he makes art that appears to have been created by nature.

Paine's computer-driven machines of sleek steel -- programmed by the artist to create sculpture, paintings and ink drawings -- challenge our notion of the role and importance of the artist's hand in the making of a work of art. Ironically, the products of these machines are rich in gesture, nuance and playfulness -- characteristics linked more closely to the human hand than mechanical production. In contrast to the "automated" work, installations made by Paine with his own hands include fields of mushrooms, plots of poison ivy, a weed-laden lawn, and a crop of poppies. Modeled and cast from actual botanical specimens, Paine's tableaux of nature are as metaphorically charged as they are scientifically precise. Through his work, Paine allows us to explore a dynamic place where technology converges with nature and science.

Roxy Paine was born in 1966 in New York. He studied at the Pratt Institute in New York, and the College of Santa Fe in New Mexico. He currently lives and works in Brooklyn, New York. He has had recent solo exhibitions at Galerie Thomas Shulte, Berlin, Germany (2001); James Cohan Gallery, New York (2001); Christopher Grimes Gallery, Los Angeles (2001); Ronald Feldman Fine Arts, New York (1999); Roger Bjorkholmen Gallery, Stockholm, Sweden (1999). His work has been included in group exhibitions such as 2002 Biennial Exhibition, Whitney Museum of American Art (2002); 01.01.01: Art Technological Times, San Francisco Museum of Modern Art (2001); From a Distance: Approaching Landscape, Institute of Contemporary Art, Boston (2000); and Greater New York: New Art in New York Now, P.S.1 Contemporary Art Center, Long Island City (2000). In 1997, he received the Trustees Award for an Emerging Artist from the Aldrich Museum of Contemporary Art, Ridgefield, Connecticut.

PUBLICATION

The exhibition is accompanied by a catalogue that includes an introduction by Joseph D. Ketner, an interview with the artist by Lynn M. Herbert, and an essay on the artist's work by Gregory Volk, New York art critic. Also included are color reproductions of all exhibited work and documentation of the artist's career. The catalogue is distributed by D.A.P. (Distributed Art Publishers, New York).

FUNDING
Roxy Paine/Second Nature is organized by the Contemporary Arts Museum Houston, and The Rose Art Museum, Brandeis University, Waltham, Massachusetts, and curated by Lynn M. Herbert, Senior Curator, Contemporary Arts Museum Houston, and Joseph D. Ketner, Director, Rose Art Museum. Roxy Paine/Second Nature has been made possible by Sandra and Gerald Fineberg, and contributors to the Contemporary Arts Museum's Major Exhibition Fund: Major Patron Fayez Sarofim & Co.; Patrons Eddie and Chinhui Allen, Mr. and Mrs. A.L. Ballard, Mr. and Mrs. I.H. Kempner III, Ms. Louisa Stude Sarofim, The Susan Vaughan Foundation, and Mr. and Mrs. Michael Zilkha; Benefactors Robert J. Card, M.D./Karol Kreymer, George and Mary Josephine Hamman Foundation, Max and Isabell Smith Herzstein, Rob and Louise Jamail, Stephen and Ellen Susman; Donors Eddie and Chinhui Allen, Anderson, Baker & Botts L.L.P., Mr. James A. Elkins, Jr., KPMG LLP, Ransom and Isabel Lummis, Lester Marks, Karen and Eric Pulaski, Mr. and Mrs. David Saperstein, Jeff Shankman, Shell Oil Company Foundation, Leigh and Reggie Smith, and Mr. and Mrs. Wallace S. Wilson.

The exhibition catalogue was supported by The Brown Foundation, Inc., Houston.

EXHIBITION TOUR

The Roxy Paine/Second Nature exhibition tour will culminate at SITE Santa Fe after presentations at The Rose Art Museum, Brandeis University, Waltham Massachusetts (April 25 -- July 14, 2002), and the Contemporary Arts Museum Houston (October 19, 2002 -- January 12, 2003).

SITE Santa Fe is located at 1606 Paseo de Peralta, Santa Fe, New Mexico. Exhibition hours are Wednesday through Sunday, 10:00 a.m. - 5:00 pm; Friday, 10:00 am -7:00 pm. Admission is $5.00 for adults and $2.50 for students and seniors; members are free. Free admission is offered on Fridays, made possible by a grant from The Brown Foundation, Inc., Houston. Free guided tours are offered on Fridays at 6:00 pm and Saturdays and Sundays at 2:00 pm. Tours in Spanish are by appointment. SITE Santa Fe gift certificates are available. Call 505.989.1199 for more information. This announcement is partially funded by the City of Santa Fe Arts Commission and the 1% Lodgers' Tax.

Contact: Press Office
Tel: 505.989.1199
Fax:505.989.1188
email: press@sitesantafe.org


PMU (Painting Manufacture Unit)
,
1999-2000
Aluminum, stainless steel, computer, electronics, motors, pump, valves, acrylic
110 x 157 x 176 inches
Courtesy of the artist and James Cohan Gallery, New York