Vogt Gallery is pleased to present “Even in the quietest moments” featuring work of Patricia Dauder, Cristóbal Lehyt and Dushko Petrovich. The show is curated by Manuela Moscoso.

— CURATOR’S STATEMENT

Scientists, common belief tells us, describe the world through theories and models. They assess phenomena in terms of correspondence and tell us how the world really is. Yet, this reality is a structure that would exist even if our cognitive activity did not. “Even In The Quietest Moments” asks us how we comprehend the world. Are objects perhaps complex events that cannot be reduced to their calculable presence? How do things affect each other, in light of their relations to other things?

For instance: eight standstill mobiles challenge gravitational forces. Eighty black and white images of flying windsurfers highlight an impossible moment. A series of flower paintings depict the particularities of universal forms. We look at frozen events that resemble the power of crystals or stones. We look at board and surfer together defying the law of gravity. We look at objects drained of color, only visible when we move in space. It seems that things, especially these levitating ones, are often more than what the eye can see or the mind can measure.

Inspired by scientific illustrations, Cristóbal Lehyt´s “Sculptures” (2010) depict entities existing beyond the human eye. In distinction from the scientific strict attention for scale, frequency and breadth, Lehyt collapses macro and micro models of representation. Marking an uncertain range—from mid-size mobiles to atoms or even universes—he problematizes what might constitute or delimit a thing. He brings to our attention that we are, after all, both atoms and universes.

Patricia Dauder´s “Forward (slides)” (2009) equally impedes the possibility of correspondence between theory and nature, representation and object. Alluding to repetition within her slideshow she imbues an exceptional quasi non-rational moment with force and potentiality. Not insignificantly, windsurfers often

emphasize the feeling of being part of a world of united forces over and above the ability to master complicated maneuvers. Human skills, mental concentration, sail, waves and wind weave together to produce an extraordinary moment of becoming one—of being one object in action.

In “No title (heat)” (2011) Dauder further explores maritime enclaves and arrives at a completely non-representational image. Repeated sessions of slow bleaching bring her to whiten the canvas textile. The process comes to an end when the object attains a significance in relation to the culture of surfing and navigation, and when it directly relates to the mental image in her own inner perception.

Dushko Petrovich´s “Dark Flower” (2008-2011) paintings investigate the relation between mental forms and matter. Over the last years, Petrovich has painted a very limited number of unusual, almost inappropriate objects: a flower, a sphinx, a jaw, and a view. Every painting creates a two-fold operation and so alludes to the fact that objects expand beyond perception. Though they evoke representation, these flowers tell us more about how objects escape it. In each painting, the depicted object constitutes a thing in-itself, though reflecting only one aspect thereof. For Petrovich, painting relates to our relation with things in the world that exist beyond our empirical knowledge of them.

Manuela Moscoso

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Vogt Gallery focuses on drawing attention to the complex artistic and cultural ties that bind New York to both Europe and Latin America. Vogt Gallery seeks to challenge mid-career as well as up-and-coming artists of diverse backgrounds to create new visual and conceptual vocabularies to reinvigorate these bonds.

This is the third exhibition in Vogt Gallery’s initial series of shows aiming to put an emphasis on curatorial practice to further artistic discussion. The gallery also serves as a venue for performance art.