To Cast a Shadow

Date and Time for this Past Event

• Thursday, Sep 2, 2021  2-8pm

Location

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Details

To Cast A Shadow

August 5th - Oct 7th, 2021

Rachel Reichert
Letha Wilson

Presented by VACANCY
At SCORIA in Downtown Boise

VACANCY is pleased to present a two-person exhibition of works by Rachel Reichert and Letha Wilson at SCORIA's space in Downtown Boise. With this show, VACANCY sets off on a wandering series of exhibitions throughout Idaho with one solitary guidepost: to bring artists working locally into conversation with artists from farther afield.

You spiral up behind a hill, teeter, and then brake down into the pit. Hard-seared mountains slip behind cliff walls. It smells like crushed dirt down here, fifty feet beneath the farm. You left this morning looking for something - a broken saloon or hot spring, maybe - but now you've fallen backwards into a volcano. Elsewhere, a shattered window skips light up at a rocky plateau circled by falcons. Here in the pit, you accept earth as a cosmic sundial, and from its hands time casts its perfect shadow.

The two artists in this exhibition present new citations of Idaho landscapes, both natural and constructed. Some of the works are literally made from the land. The pieces include:

A small grouping of brass sculptures, hanging on walls from metal loops. They appear as structures: windows, doorways, infinity ladders, go on.

Three framed works on rough black paper, embossed with hand-cut brass shapes and displayed debossed, withdrawn away from the viewer.

Seven plaster replicas of a stone extracted from a volcanic vent in Caldwell, coated in light-absorbing black paint. These flow throughout the space at various heights and locations: some on walls, some on tables.

Seven plaster replicas of a charred wooden cube from a burnt forest in Idaho, coated in light-absorbing black paint. Mounted in silver, they hang in a straight line down the left wall.

A plaster mold in the shape of a grid. A string tied around its base, as if around a finger.

Three pieces of thin, silver, chain and cross-bar jewelry. Hung from pins on the wall, they are spaced sporadically and are nearly invisible.

A photograph taken at Craters of The Moon, UV printed onto steel, welded to a steel frame and set beneath a steel cross bar.

Three artist books with three sets of white gloves. Please wear them when handling the books. You will want to touch them.

These bodies of work cast new visions of sculpture and photography. The works come together in slant

rhymes: materially, indexically, subjectively.

we trust these loved things to weak defenses in the heart of the heart of the country time's shadow cast in stone

Rachel Reichert (b. 1984 in Boise, ID) and raised in Bellevue, ID. She currently lives and works in Boise, ID. Reichert is co-founder of The Atlanta School and is the organizing force behind the building, developing, and programming of the James Castle House, a museum and residency program in Boise. Reichert's work blurs the lines between art, preservation, and community engagement. Hailing from over a decade and a half of experience connecting people to community, Reichert is a builder of beloved places, programs, experiences, and objects. Often working in the format of installation, performance, small sculpture, and social practice, Reichert's work pulls from identity, memory, and place to establish shared moments, visual artworks, and interventions in the built environment. Trained as a metalsmith, Reichert manages Studio R, where she develops one-of-a-kind art objects, teaches, writes, and consults for individuals and organizations.

Letha Wilson (b. 1976 in Honolulu, HI) and raised in Greeley, CO. She currently lives and works in Brooklyn, NY and Hudson, NY. Wilson’s practice is rooted in material experimentation. She is known for her synthesis of mediums, expanding the visual and physical dimensions of photography and sculpture. By combining industrial materials such as Corten steel, aluminum, and vinyl with photography, Wilson has developed unique fabrication processes. She prints images depicting the beauty of natural landscapes onto her sculptures, embeds them in the surface of her works, and manipulates them in various unexpected compositions. She earned her BFA from Syracuse University, NY in 1998, and an MFA from Hunter College, NY in 2003. Wilson's recent solo exhibitions include GRIMM, Amsterdam and New York, NY; the Center for Contemporary Art and Culture, Portland, OR; the DeCordova Sculpture Park and Museum, Lincoln, MA, and Galerie Christophe Gaillard, Paris.