Christy Lee Rogers Releases "Muses" at Art Labor in Shanghai, China
We are excited to announce that this past Saturday, June 23, our very own artist Christy Lee Rogers released her new photographic collection “Muses” at Art Labor gallery in Shanghai, China. Again, she brings her intense love for water and interest in our human interaction with earthly surroundings to a successful series of photos. Check out her press release and images from the opening below! (Click image for more).
Christy Lee Rogers: Muses
23 June – 8 August, 2018
Opening reception this Saturday, 23 June 4-7pm
ART LABOR is thrilled to present new photographic works, new media and textile installation by Hawaiian born artist Christy Lee Rogers (b. 1972), for a solo exhibition opening 23 June, 2018. A pioneer in underwater photographic style and technique, earning her international acclaim, her work embraces the unique quality of light refraction between the surface and layers of water, and her personal approach is to honor and explore the frailty of our existence within the elements around us.
Obsessed with the transformative qualities of water, Rogers uses it once again as her muse, pushing toward a new boundary for herself both artistically and emotionally. This collection of entirely new work, thus titled Muses, is derived from the sources of that inspiration itself, and the depths to which an individual will go to find and hold on to that inspiration, until a new spark of insight is needed, once its predecessor has vanished. It's this mechanism that Rogers delves deep into and what she reveres, as it is common to all of us and never ending. She finds in the creation of a body of work all this trapped passion, which is then finally unleashed in all its glory, but then so it fades and to be desired again yet again. Out of this desire to connect with the universe and a certain knowledge of what is beyond our current reality is then intensified, after having had some glimpse of the possibilities deep down into our own ship of treasures, filled with immaterial and material wealth.
The narrative in Rogers’ new waterscapes continues to follow the thread of her most celebrated collections, with a process that allows her and her subjects to experience first hand the vulnerabilities and beauty of the human body in an underwater setting. The colors and cascading bodies take on late Renaissance and Baroque tones, with chiaroscuro contrasts of light and darkness creating movement and purpose within each scene.
As “The Independent" (newspaper) in London has described of her earlier works, "The ethereal payoff is indeed redolent of a mix of Masters – the vivid hues of Titian, the straining bodies of Rubens, the sun-dappling chiaroscuro of Caravaggio, but also the loose brushstrokes and fluid movement of Delacroix; hints, too, of the Tiepolo-esque heavenly ascents adorning many an 18th-century Venetian chapel. Yet, for all these highfalutin qualities, Rogers' subjects were no gods, kings or mythical beasts, but rather her friends, whom she coaxed to writhe around in a local swimming pool – a simplicity that reflects both her method (the pictures are entirely unretouched) and the purity of Rogers' lifelong love of the water.”
For over fifteen years, Rogers has experimented with water in her artistic endeavors; refracting light in it, moving bodies through its layers, combining textiles underneath its surface and finding insight in it’s beauty and chaos. She was born and raised in the Hawaiian Islands, learning a deep respect for the water as a young surfer and boogie border, and continues to find hope and inspiration beneath it’s surface. And the social and environmental importance of protecting water on our planet drives her continuing fascination with it. As she states: “Water is the giver of life”.
About the Artist
Christy Lee Rogers is an International visual artist from Kailua, Hawaii, living in Nashville, Tennessee. Her obsession with water as a medium for breaking the conventions of contemporary photography has led to her work being compared to Baroque painting masters like Caravaggio. Rogers’ works have been exhibited internationally from Paris, London, Italy, Mexico City, South Africa to Shanghai, Sao Paulo, Los Angeles and more, and are held in private and public collections throughout the world. She has been featured in International Magazines, including Vogue, Harper’s Bazaar Art China, Elle Decoration, Global Times, The Independent, Casa Vogue, Photo Technique, Photo Korea and others. Rogers’ "Reckless Unbound" is currently housed at Longleat House in the UK; the stately home, which is the seat of the Marquesses of Bath and also home to Renaissance gems of the Italian masters, like Titan’s "Rest on the Flight into Egypt.” Her art has been featured on several music album covers, and in 2013, her images were selected for the 2013–2014 performance season of the Angers-Nantes Opera in France.
克里斯蒂·李·罗杰斯：缪斯
展期：2018年6月23日至8月8日
开幕酒会：2018年6月23日周六下午四至七点
ART LABOR画廊荣幸呈现艺术家克里斯蒂·李·罗杰斯（Christy Lee Rogers）的全新摄影、新媒体及织物装置作品展，展览将于2018年6月23日开幕。作为享誉国际的水下摄影先驱，罗杰斯的作品展现水中光线折射的特质，以极具她个人风格的创作手法探索生命的柔弱性，以及向“水”——这一我们赖以存在的元素致敬。
“水”的特质与可塑性令罗杰斯痴迷，在艺术性上和情感表达上，把罗杰斯的作品推向新的境界。“水”是罗杰斯创作的灵感缪斯，她将灵感进行更为深度和广度的转化，直至新的感悟的火花闪现。因此，这组全新作品即以“缪斯（Muses）”命名，“缪斯”旨在向灵感本源致敬，她发现在创作中，所有被束缚的激情，终将在创作过程中被释放，随后逐渐消逝，循环往复。这种创作的欲望缘于她对人类宝藏中的物质及非物质文化财富的惊鸿一瞥，以及对宇宙万物相联、以及超出我们当前现实认知的某种知识的渴望，变得更加强烈。
罗杰斯的叙事在新的水景中延续其最知名系列作品的线索展开，让她和她的模特们在创作过程中，亲身体验人体在水下环境中的柔性与美感。互相交错层叠的人物和色彩延用文艺复兴时期和巴洛克式色调，光影的明暗对比使画面更加灵动。
伦敦独立报（The Independent）评论罗杰斯早期的摄影作品—— “是大师的融合体——提香（Titian）的绚丽的色调，鲁本斯（Rubens）人物肢体的力量感，卡拉瓦乔（Caravaggio）的明暗对照法，同时不乏德拉克洛瓦（Delacroix）松散的笔触和流动感，也具有十八世纪的威尼斯教堂穹顶提埃坡罗式（Tiepolo-esque ）装饰的神韵。然而，相较于所有这些艺术杰作，罗杰斯作品的主体不是神、国王或神兽，而是她的朋友们，在当地的泳池中来回游弋——用朴素简单的方式表达罗杰斯终生对水的挚爱。”
十五年来，罗杰斯从未停止在水中进行创作和探索；不同角度的光线折射，人物、织物的结合，在相穿梭游弋中，展现水面之下的的浑沌之美。 她在夏威夷群岛出生并长大，作为一个冲浪爱好者和boogie border，学习到了对水的深深敬意，并在水面下找到了希望和灵感，正如她所说：“水是生命的赐予者”。
1972年出生的克里斯蒂·李·罗杰斯（Christy Lee Rogers）是一位来自夏威夷凯鲁瓦的国际视觉艺术家，生活在田纳西州的纳什维尔。她将水作为打破当代摄影习俗的媒介，使她的作品与卡拉瓦乔等巴洛克绘画大师相比。罗杰斯的作品从巴黎，伦敦，意大利，墨西哥城，南非到上海，圣保罗，洛杉矶等国际展出，并在世界各地的私人和公共收藏馆举办。罗杰斯的作品被众多国际著名媒体刊登，包括芭莎艺术中国、ELLE家居廊、环球时报、英国独立报、Casa Vogue杂志、Photo Technique杂志等。她的作品“Reckless Unbound”与诸如卡拉瓦乔的《逃亡埃及途中的歇息》（"Rest on the Flight into Egypt"）等众多文艺复兴时期意大利艺术大师的杰作，一起被陈列在英国朗利特庄园（Longleat House）。这座庄严的庄园是巴斯侯爵的故居，以其丰富的文艺复兴时期意大利大师的藏品闻名。此外，她的摄影作品已在多张音乐专辑封面上亮相；2013年，她的影像被选为2013-14法国昂热-南特歌剧（Angers-Nantes Opera）演出季展出。
ART LABOR Gallery 画廊
101 Haifang Lu, Shanghai
上海静安区海防路101号
86 - 21 - 6245 6963
info@artlaborgallery.com
www.artlaborgallery.com