“Kate Petley”, Panoramic view, Delirious
About the Exhibition
After several years of group exhibitions and curatorial endeavors, including the MCA Denver's 2002 ground breaking "Archipelago" installation, Kate Petley returns to Denver with an exhibition of new works that further refine her concepts of abstract beauty and the pleasures of the unknown. "Delirious" expands upon her previous works in resin and plexiglas through a sublime inter-mingling of transparent materials, drawn elements and photographic documentation that captivates the viewer and compounds the individual qualities of each element.
In her attempt to find new ways to capture the ever-shifting reflection, Petley became inspired by commercial photography techniques involving the gobo, a product which utilizes the projection of light through defined patterns to create a visual backdrop at a large scale. Petley's work expands the concept by using natural and environmentally controlled light to create complex and dynamic visual effects. Starting with rich, colorful handmade resin's, Petley creates a variety of her own “gobos,” each with their own distinctive qualities. Rather than the made object being the work of art, it is the reflection of the handmade “gobo” that becomes the foundation for the new works, which the artist documents photographically and reapplies in a richly layered context. After printing the images on transparent material, Petley transforms the layers with drawn elements and resin to create floating, shifting panels that hover in the air, hypnotizing the senses.
In Petley’s own words these works are “more complex, with higher contrast than previous resin panels, the dark and smoky tones offsetting the jewel-like clarity of the colors. Atmospheric foregrounds and backgrounds appear to shift before your eyes as though movement was barely contained. Relying upon the fundamental properties of light, I am making an object that seems to be self-generated from a flat screen. Tiny bits of reflected light are caught and blown up in these works.” The result is a transcendent body of work that provokes the senses and draws the viewer towards a shifting understanding of the material attributes inherent in the works. It is a natural leap for Petley, a truly ground breaking vehicle that her studies over the years have drawn to along with advances in modern technology.
Petley received her B.F.A. from the University of Utah in 1976, and continued forth to establish herself as a talented and sought after artist. Among her noted works is a 1995 collaboration the O: A House Installation, which involved creating a camera obscura chamber inside an abandoned Houston cottage. Working with two other artists, the building was gutted and a round room was created in the center with numerous holes drilled into the structure. The result left a memorable impact on those who had the chance to experience the work, and energized the artist towards experimenting with transformative concepts in her art. In addition to her recent work for the Houston Airport, Petley has completed several other public works, including a collaborative design of a Hike & Bikeway Bridge for the city of Houston as well as concrete enhancements for Vail, Colorado’s Devon Park Terrace. And in the future we can look forward to another site-specific installation at the Art League Houston, where she will be sharing common ground with artist Sheila Klein in “Similar Differences”.
