Russell Crotty | In The Expanse of the Celestial

 

JACKSON HOLE, WYOMING – MAYA FRODEMAN GALLERY (formerly TAYLOE PIGGOTT GALLERY) is pleased to present In the Expanse of the Celestial, a solo exhibition of work by artist Russell Crotty, on view February 8^th through March 24^th, 2024. An artist reception will be held on Thursday, February 8^th, from 5 to 7 pm. All are welcome.

 

In the Expanse of the Celestial presents a selection of drawings and sculpture which capture of the sublime of the night sky against the backdrop of untamed landscapes. This exhibition includes Crotty’s paper-coated suspended globes, as well as large-scale panoramas, a newer endeavor and conceptual twist in Crotty’s continued preoccupation to chronicle an idiosyncratic commentary on astronomy, landscape, and the natural and manmade world. Like Crotty’s past work, this body of work is also a part of Crotty’s longtime project of challenging the preconceptions of drawing as primary medium in exploring and expanding the notion of “works on paper.”

A lifelong recreationalist, and a longtime “serious amateur astronomer,” Russell Crotty immerses himself in the wilderness to glean inspiration, always with a sketchbook, and often with one of his telescopes. Living in Ojai, California, Crotty finds his backyard and playground in the expansive expanse of the Los Padres National Forest, spanning 1.75 million acres of some of California's most rugged and untamed terrain. The works in the exhibition, such as Mars Opposition Over Piedra Blanca, pinpoint both the geological features and astronomical events he has come to know well. The resulting body of work is informed by the scientific research of contemporary astrophysicists, romanticized by his extensive knowledge of 19th century science, and fueled by Crotty’s immense passion for the cosmos.

 

Russell Crotty’s panoramas are a new iteration of his astronomical work which offer viewers a new perspective. He commented, “With the globes, you can look in on the world, and, then, you can look out into the vastness with the panoramas.” In this dichotomy, viewers experience a duality of perspectives: from the infinitesimal to the infinite, from an omniscient observer to a participant in the depicted scenes. Both Crotty’s globes and his two-dimensional drawings on paper incorporate text, bringing humanity back into these landscapes. Crotty’s ruminations on his experiences are expressed through these fields of text, a hybrid of rant and prose. At times, he incorporates found text, as seen in Weirdness in the High Desert, where snippets from old UFO magazines inject a playful and satirical dimension into the artwork, while also highlighting humans’ attempts to rationalize the unfathomable expanses of desert terrain. In other instances, the text serves as a platform for Crotty to share more personal thoughts and encounters within these landscapes. In all cases, the text serves as not only as a formal drawing element denoting strata and volume and adding another textural element, but as a discourse of his fixation on place, turf and bearings, and humans’ role in and conceptualizations of the natural world.

 

Russell Crotty was born in San Rafael, California, and received his BFA from San Francisco Art Institute with honors in 1978. In 1980, he received his MFA from University of California, Irvine. Crotty is a 2015 Guggenheim Fellow. He received a 1999 Visual Arts Fellowship from the Peter Reed Foundation, New York and a 1991 Visual Arts Fellowship from the National Endowment for the Arts. Crotty's past exhibitions include the Museum of Modern Art, New York; Centre Pompidou, Paris; Turner Contemporary, United Kingdom; The Geffen Contemporary at MOCA, Los Angeles; Hammer Museum, Los Angeles; Institut Valencià d'Art Modern, Valencia, Spain; Fine Arts Museums of San Francisco; Museum of Contemporary Art, San Diego; and Vancouver Art Gallery, British Columbia. His work is in the permanent collections of many prominent institutions, including Centre Pompidou, Paris; Museum of Modern Art, New York; Whitney Museum of American Art, New York; New York Public Library, New York, NY; Museum of Contemporary Art, Los Angeles; Los Angeles County Museum of Art; Hammer Museum, Los Angeles; San Francisco Museum of Modern Art; Museum of Contemporary Art San Diego; Santa Barbara Museum of Art; Museum of Fine Arts, Boston; Princeton Art Museum; Harvard Art Museums; High Museum of Art, Atlanta; Dallas Museum of Art; The Kemper Museum of Contemporary Art, Kansas City; NASA Art Program; and the US Department of State’s “ART in Embassies Program” at the Embassy of the United States, Beijing, China. Today, Crotty lives in Ojai and works in Ventura, California.