A Walk Through "Doppler Shift"

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Doppler Shift, curated by Mary Birmingham for the Visual Art Center of New Jersey, explores shifting perceptions of color and space. The work is largely geometric in form, the geometry allowing for what Birmingham calls "spatial ambiguities" based on angle of viewing, distance, and light. 

Visitors Molly Heron and Cora Jane Glasser standing before Similar Motions by Gilbert Hsaio

JM photo

With two enormous windows in its large main gallery, the museum offers plenty of opportunity for these kinds of shifts.  And in its smaller seven-sided Eisenberg Gallery, the lowered ceiling and angle of the walls offer yet more opportunities for shifts in perception.

The term Doppler Shift is, says Birmingham, "the apparent change in the frequency of emitted waves relative to an observer." You've probably heard it with regard to weather forecasting, where radar bounceback from rain, snow and hail allows meteorologists to determine the placement and intensity of approaching precipitation. I like to think of this exhibition, then, as a kind of visual weather report for a particular kind of painting and sculpture. ( Disclaimer: I have one piece in the show, but I'm one of 26 artists in an exhibition with a total of 46 artworks.)

Two wall drawings: Rob de Oude, left, and Iemke van Dijk

Guido Winkler photo

The exhibition, which had its opening the last Sunday in September, is up through January 18, 2015. Many of the artists were in attendance--some from the West Coast and as faraway as Germany and the Netherlands--and the images you see in this post were shot by a number of them: Steven Baris, Brent Hallard, Rob de Oude, Debra Ramsay, Guido Winkler and myself, all credited, and I've pulled a few images from the VACNJ website as well.

The group photographic effort mirrors the gestation of this exhibition, as Thomas Micchelli describes in his essay. In brief,  painter Mel Prest created a suitcase exhibition, which she brought to Amsterdam and traveled throughout Europe in 2013. The following year, artists Rob de Oude and Enrico Gomez showed an iteration of the exhibition at their Brooklyn gallery, Parallel Art Space. Debra Ramsay brought Birmingham to see the show. With Prest's blessing, Birmingham reinvented and expanded the concept as Doppler Shift. (This is when you realize that it really does take a village.)

I'm keeping my comments brief in favor of the visual walk-through, but you can read two splendid essays in the catalog, viewable online, by curator Birmingham and the artist/writer Thomas Micchelli. The catalog will also provide more information about the artworks that I can include here.

Installation views

Above: looking into the gallery from the main entrance

Below:  From the opposite end of the long space

Guido Winkler photos

Mary Birmingham, left, addressing the visitors at the opening

We're going to begin our tour of the exhibition with work out of the range of this photo

Edgar Diehl, Weisbaden, Germany; Jupiter Landung IV, 2014

Closer view below

JM photos

Diehl's painting is to the left of the window you see here. Now we'll proceed clockwise around the gallery. On the wall behind Mary Birmingham: Karen Schifano, Enrico Gomez, Don Voisine, Steven Baris, Brent Hallard

Brent Hallard photo

Karen Schifano, New York City;  Pent Up House, 2014

Guido Winkler photo

Enrico Gomez, Don Voisine

Guido Winkler photo

Enrico Gomez, Jersey City, New Jersey; Hope Break Beat II, 2014

VACNJ photo

Baris, Hallard

Brent Hallard photo

Steven Baris, Philadelphia; Stations of the Cube #4, 2014

Steven Baris photo

Brent Hallard, San Francisco; Rim, 2014

VACNJ photo

Three by Kevin Finklea; Joanne Mattera

Brent Hallard photo

Kevin Finklea, Philadelphia; Parakeet for Palermo, group 2, 2010, Dolores Street, 1963, 2011

Guido Winkler photo

Another view of Finklea and Mattera, with Jose Heerkens and Rob de Oude

Brent Hallard photo

Joanne Mattera, New York City, Chromatic Geometry 21, 2014

VACNJ photo

Jose Heerkens, Zeeland, Netherlands; Travelin' Light, 2013-P21, 2013

Guido Winkler photo

Rob de Oude, New York City; Proximities and Parameters, 2014

VACNJ photo

This image, which opens the post, is a painted installation on the back wall of the gallery

Gilbert Hsaio, New York City; Similar Motions

JM photo

One cube with two views to orient it within the gallery

Gay Outlaw, San Francisco; Camo Cube

JM photos

We're back at the entrance to the gallery, this time working counterclockise

Foreground: Patricia Zarate, New York City; Sliding Up, 2014

Brent Hallard photo

Gilbert Hsaio, Lucky Strike, 2013

Brent Hallard photo

Continuing down the wall counterclockwise: Henriette van 't Hoog, Nancy White, Gabrielle Evertz, Richard Bottwin, Don Voisine

Brent Hallard photo

Shifting the perspective: White, van 't Hoog

JM photo

Nancy White, Redwood City, California; #48, 2012

VACNJ photo

Henriette van 't Hoog, Amsterdam, Netherlands; Triangle 1, 2012

JM photo

Stepping back to look at Zarate, Hsaio, Van 't Hoog, White, and view Gabrielle Evertz and Richard Bottwin

Guido Winkler photo

Gabrielle Evertz, New York City; Messenger Spectrum, Door to the East Series, 2013

JM photo

Richard Bottwin, New York City; two views of Yellow Facade, 2013

JM photos

Don Voisine, New York City; Wrench, 2014

VACNJ  photo

Orienting you down the wall from Voisine (and giving you a full view of the gallery's long wall): Guido Winkler, Ruth van Veenan, Gracia Khouw

Guido Winkler photo

Upper left corner: Gracia Khouw, Amsterdam; Closed Circuit Series/ CC3 (yellow/black), 2013

JM photo

Ruth van Veenan, Haarlem, Netherlands; Untitled, 2012

VACNJ photo

Guide Winkler, Leiden, Netherlands; One of the endless possibilities of seeing a particular rectangle a little different XII, 2011

JM photo

. . . . . . . . . .

Now we exit the large gallery and enter with Birmingham calls "the strolling galleries."  

Lemke van Dijk,  Leiden, Netherlands; Uutitled Wall Drawing, 2014

Guido Winkler photo

Turning the corner to Rob de Oude wall drawing, Double Take #9, on the left . . .

JM photo

. . .  and Lone Star video stills below by Sarah Klein and David Kwan, San Francisco

with detail following

Detail of Lone Star

JM photos

Shifting perspective, we walk back through the strolling gallery to view de Oude's framed drawings. above and below

JM photo above

Rob de Oude photo

. . . . .

We now find ourselves back at the glass door of the large gallery we exited moments ago. We're not going back in. Instead, to our right we're going to enter the Eisenberg where the exhibition continues.

On the outer wall of the Eisenberg Gallery: Albert Roksam, Leiden, Netherlands, Four vanishing points in a square #3, 2014

Here, about a 240-degree view of the Eisenberg Gallery. Click to enlarge

JM photo

Another panorama with, from left: Stephen Maine, Patricia Zarate, Gay Outlaw, two Brent Hallards bracketing two Debra Ramsays; right wall: Steven Baris, Debra Ramsay, Mel Prest

Guido Winkler photo

Stephen Maine, New York City; HP13-0909, 2013

Detail below

Patricia Zarate, Sweet Spot; Gay Outlaw, Untitled (Cube Study after Donald Judd), 2005; Brent Hallard, Green Candy, 2011

JM photo

Another view of Zarate, Outlaw, Hallard

Brent Hallard photo

Hallard; Debra Ramsay, New York City; Two Equal Lovers with Yellow Green and Two Equal Lovers with Yellow Green 2, both 2013

Brent Hallard photo

Ramsay,van 't Hoog, Hallard

Brent Hallard photo

Van 't Hoog, Core IV, 2012; Hallard, Baris

JM photo

Brent Hallard, Orange Candy,  2011

Brent Hallard photo

Steven Baris, Debra Ramsay, Mel Prest

Debra Ramsay photo

Steven Baris, Somewhere Beyond or Behind D4, 2011

VACNJ photo

Debra Ramsay, The Effects of a fold on a Pink line, 2013

VACNJ photo

Mel Prest, Vielen Danke Schoen, 2013

VACNJ photo

Detail below

JM photo

Prest, Finklea, White

Brent Hallard photo

Kevin Finklea, Pelikan for Palermo #8, 2014

VACNJ photo

Nancy White, #61, 2013

JM photo

Albert Roskam, Two vanishing points on 2 opposing diagonal lines #1, 2014

VACNJ photo

Also in the Eisenberg Gallery: A video program of time-based art running simultaneously with Doppler Shift, curated by Sarah Klein and produced by David Kwan

Guido Winkler photo

. . . . . . . .

Wait, there's more! In the upstrair Studio X, Gary Petersen created what is essentially a walk-in painting on the gallery's five walls. With shifting planes and ambiguous space, Tilting Points effectively counterpoints the premise of Doppler Shift and vice versa.

Outside the gallery . . .

and just inside the door

Corner view . . .

. . . and a panorama that shows you 360 degrees of the installation. Cllick to enlarge

JM photos

Additional events will take place during the riun of the show. Click here to find out