For our third installment of AR et al. we are partnering with re.riddle, an itinerant contemporary art gallery curating socially engaging and multidisciplinary exhibitions. The upcoming installment, Pour the Line, is a site-store-happening-anything, and will run for three weeks between September and October.
Linda Lui, Creative Director for Pour the Line, writes:
$3899 is a high sum to charge for a donut. A natural response may be “Is this the correct price?”
The answer depends: Is it the real thing, or a thing of art?
This line of questioning is the key concern of re.riddle’s Pour the Line, a site-store-happening-anything, that takes place at Abacus Row as part of AR et al.
A ‘revisit' to The Store (1960) by Claes Oldenburg, where the artist occupied an abandoned shop in New York with “products” for sale, is what inspired this “thing” we’re creating. The provocation then was that its offerings—an inventory of banal, everyday objects such as a dress, ice cream sundae, iron, pistol, slice of cake—were all made of papier mâché. Hence, their referential presentations in the context of conventional commercial consumption echoed the contemporary debates about an existing, tenuous relationship between art and life, reality and non-reality.
Indeed, this postmodern theme has been thoroughly unpacked by art historians. It’s not our intention to re-analyze it. Rather, Pour the Line is hinged on the persistence and relevance of its ideas as they relate to us today. Ambiguity. Spontaneity. Irony. What role do the paradoxical and dialectical play in our current human experience?
A concerted effort made by creators, artists and thinkers from multidisciplinary backgrounds has been led by re.riddle to explore these concepts and questions. Pour the Line’s program will entail design and art objects for sale, artists talks, performances, manifestations and anything else it feels compelled to do. In addition to operating during regular business hours, experimental programs that comment on the theme of art and life will take place on random days and at “off” times such as after midnight or before dawn. Details will likewise be shared by alternative means and methods.
At stake is the risk that modern commercialism and over-consciousness might eclipse the spotlight directed at the sliver of space between art and life. This is where various freedoms—and monsters—may be born. Such a liminal experience is not always paradisiacal, however; eventually one must land somewhere. Perhaps, and we hope, it is occasionally on the line.
Please join us for the opening reception of Pour the Line on Friday, September 13, from 6:30-8:30 at Abacus Row, 1256 Mason St. San Francisco, CA 94108.
RSVP kindly requested. Please reserve your ticket
here on Eventbrite.
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re.riddle is an itinerant gallery featuring site-specific exhibitions and pop-up events worldwide. Recent exhibitions include The Body Electric in collaboration with CCCSF and 41 Ross, Marqueyssac, Dordogne, France, re:home, For Freedoms exhibition in collaboration with AKArt, San Francisco, Alma Yoray: The Stillness, The Dancing, Chicago, After Tomorrow, French Consulate of San Francisco, San Francisco, Poursuite, Musée de Montmartre, Paris and forthcoming exhibitions in San Francisco, London and Hong Kong. Our mission is to contribute to the discourse on contemporary art in thought provoking and playfully subversive ways. Via new modes of production, reception and consumption, re.riddle places an emphasis on the whimsical in hopes that art continues to arouse curiosity and promotes an awareness of its profound impact on our daily surroundings and lives. www.reriddle.com
AR et al. is a series of pop-ups produced by Abacus Row in collaboration with others – independent designers, artists and small business owners. This is an on-going project for our company to explore various creative synergies, to showcase the work of fellow creatives, and to build community.
