Distorting (a messiah project, 14C) by R. Justin Stewart

266 W 37th Street (between 7th and 8th Ave) New York, NY

March 26 – 30, 2012

Viewable from the street Mon-Fri, 10AM-5:30PM

Distorting (a messiah project, 14C) is a sculptural installation inspired by R. Justin Stewart’s research into the Jewish concept of the messiah.

After two years of research into the Jewish concept of the messiah, Stewart, a professed agnostic, installs Distorting (a messiah project, 14C), an intricate environment constructed of fleece, rope and plastic that serves as a 3-D representation of the concept of the messiah in the 14h Century. Distorting (a messiah project, 14C) is a visual delight of color and shape that invades the storefront of 266 W 37th Street. Those viewers wanting to understand the connection between the sculptural elements and the information that inspired them can scan QR codes, discreetly embedded throughout the sculpture, with their phone or other mobile devices to download the information.

In conjunction with Distorting (a messiah project, 14C) a separate installation in the Distorting series, Distorting (a messiah project, 13C) is on view at the Invisible Dog Art Center in Brooklyn located at 51 Bergen Street, through May 5, 2012.

According to the curator, Risa Shoup: “Justin’s work blends intellectual rigor with visual splendor. His work makes cogent those systems of information that are otherwise too vast, too esoteric to understand through casual inquiry. The QR codes embedded in Distorting create a technological barrier that obfuscates the religious implications of the work mirroring the barriers that one comes across in investigating any new, particularly complex, set of ideas.”

Artist Bio: R Justin Stewart was born in Waukesha, Wisconsin in 1980. He attended the Kansas City Art Institute where he earned his BFA in 2003 followed by the University of Minnesota where he earned an MFA in 2008. He currently lives and works in New York City.

www.rjustin.com