galerie lange + pult is pleased to present you the first solo exhibition in our Zurich gallery space by the American artist Jacob Kassay.
Jacob Kassay’s practice deals with experimental and conceptual manufacturing methods. His work is situated between painting, sculpture, drawing and interactive installation and is at the same time a reaction to the space. The arrangement of an exhibition and the interaction of his pieces with the surrounding architecture – and ultimately their audience – is the key to understanding the essence of his work. Kassay’s pictures combine and form several dialogues: with each other, with the space around them and with the viewer.
It is perhaps safest to say that Jacob Kassay is a contemporary artist, although he has been described as a “neo-minimalist” and “post-conceptual” artist. Its output spans a wide range of media, including films, books, drawings, sculptures and installations. However, he is probably best known as a painter. His early paintings consisted of canvases that were industrially coated with a silver electroplating material and lay unevenly over the rough surface. Imagine a mirror printed on canvas instead of smooth glass, showing a soft, hidden reflection that eludes clear focus or documentation. Many of
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galerie lange + pult is pleased to present you the first solo exhibition in our Zurich gallery space by the American artist Jacob Kassay.
Jacob Kassay’s practice deals with experimental and conceptual manufacturing methods. His work is situated between painting, sculpture, drawing and interactive installation and is at the same time a reaction to the space. The arrangement of an exhibition and the interaction of his pieces with the surrounding architecture – and ultimately their audience – is the key to understanding the essence of his work. Kassay’s pictures combine and form several dialogues: with each other, with the space around them and with the viewer.
It is perhaps safest to say that Jacob Kassay is a contemporary artist, although he has been described as a “neo-minimalist” and “post-conceptual” artist. Its output spans a wide range of media, including films, books, drawings, sculptures and installations. However, he is probably best known as a painter. His early paintings consisted of canvases that were industrially coated with a silver electroplating material and lay unevenly over the rough surface. Imagine a mirror printed on canvas instead of smooth glass, showing a soft, hidden reflection that eludes clear focus or documentation. Many of Kassay’s works, like the works in this exhibition, use similar techniques and use different technologies to create objects that imperfectly or uncannily reflect the biological human senses – but only if they occur in real space. These works deliberately elude precise documentation and presentation, more than many other contemporary works that claim to be experienceable.
The exhibited series of 52 works on paper from 2010 can also be placed in the body of works, that cause blurry reflections, here due to the irregular structure of the silver tape, which interacts with the exhibition space. The viewer is challenged to examine their surface quality and physicality from different perspectives. The choice of paper as the carrier material, which has the perforation for a commercially available spiral binding, emphasises the object character of the work.
The language of the materials is very important for Kassay’s work, who concentrates and puts much emphasize on form, surface and physicality. This is evidenced by the exhibited monochrome shaped-canvases, which achieve a pronounced physicality and spatial presence through geometric as well as irregular shapes. Although there is a lack of traces that could be interpreted as gestural, a closer look at his seemingly empty or monochrome paintings shows traces of their creation – for example, small marginal traces of the painterly style or scratches on the surface. At the same time, the form and physicality of Kassay’s works function as an artistic gesture.
Kassay is influenced by minimalist musicians and conceptual artists such as Rhys Chatham and Tony Conrad, whose drone and flicker works use the senses of sight and hearing to elicit strong physical reactions. However, his works seem more subtle and challenge the viewer’s sense of consciousness when repeated.
Jacob Kassay (* 1984, Lewiston, NY) lives and works in New York.
His works have been shown internationally in numerous solo and group exhibitions, such as the Collezione Maramotti (Reggio Emilia), the MOMA / PS1 (New York), the Villa Arson (Nice), the Wattis Institute (San Francisco), 303 Gallery (New York), Art Concept (Paris), L&M Arts (Los Angeles), De la Cruz Collection Contemporary Art Space (Miami) or Gagosian (Los Angeles).
Jacob Kassay’s works are included in numerous institutional and important private collections, including: Albright Knox Art Gallery (Buffalo, NY), Arab Museum of Modern Art (Qatar), Collezione Maramotti (Reggio Emilia), FRAC Poitou-Charentes (Angoulême), Gemeentemuseum (The Hague), Museo Di Arte Moderna e Contemporanea (Rovereto), Museum of Contemporary Art (Chicago), Museum of Fine Arts (Boston), North Carolina Museum of Art (Raleigh).
