Idylls at the World Bank

The Idylls show at the World Bank ended last week. Here are a few photos in case you didn't get to see it in person. The building itself is a work of art, so it was inspiring to see the work of familiar friends and DC artists in this unique space.

Idylls

Idylls

In partnership with the World Bank Art Program
juried by Andrea Pollan, Director of Curator's Office

The World Bank
Main Complex Front Lobby Gallery
1818 H Street, NW
Washington, DC 20433

Opening reception on Friday, May 29 from 6-8pm. The works can also be viewed around the clock from the glass exterior of the building on H Street between 18th and 19th Streets, NW.

Washington Project for the Arts and the World Bank Art Program are pleased to present a collaborative exhibition, Idylls. The goal of this exhibition is to see how artists of this greater metropolitan area interpret the idea of an idyll or a utopian environment. The show features works selected by juror Andrea Pollan from submissions by WPA member artists. Andrea Pollan is an independent curator and director and founder of Curator's Office, a contemporary art gallery in DC. In this unique collaboration with Washington Project for the Arts, the World Bank Art Program will, for the first time, be working with a DC-based curator to show works by area professional artists.

Selected artists include:

Christene Carr
Sara Clark
Benjamin Edwards
Amy Glengary Yang
Pat Goslee
Tom Greaves
Bridget Sue Lambert
Barbara Liotta
Isabel Manalo
Mark Parascandola
Diane Szczenpaniak

The idyll is a special variant of utopia, an imagined paradise-like, timeless little piece of earth, but actually not of this world. Formally, the idyll is a literary category, a mode of narrating and writing. This literary mode was joined by a musical one, and later by a visual artistic one, a mode of the drawn picture and of painting. This mode is fully furnished...The premise of this exhibition, which was selected from a juried process across the greater Washington, DC metropolitan area, is to define how diverse that vision of an idyll can be. After all, most of the artists in this exhibition have urban lives... -Andrea Pollan

The World Bank Art Program began shortly after the opening in 1997 of the Bank's new Washington DC Main Complex - a spacious building of steel and glass that permits ample natural light into an atrium. This new space was the catalyst for developing a collection policy and creating a program that showcases the visual arts of member countries. The Art Program's activities reflect an implicit understanding of art and culture as integral forces of human development in the broadest sense. Its mission is to promote and draw awareness to contemporary art from member nations with particular emphasis on emerging artists from developing countries.

Idylls

_{May 29 - July 3, 2009
Organized by the Washington Project for the Arts and the World Bank Art Program
Juried by Andrea Pollan, Director of Curator's Office}
Opening Reception: Friday, May 29 6-8pm

The World Bank
Main Complex, Front Lobby Gallery
1818 H Street, NW
Washington, DC

Four photographs of mine from abandoned sites in Spain, including the Carabanchel prison, will be included in this exhibition. The theme of the exhibition is focused on artists interpretations of or responses to the idea of an idyll or utopian environment. More details about the show and its theme are available on the WPA site at: http://www.wpadc.org/events/upcoming.html

Here's an excerpt from my artist statement about these images:

"To me, an idyll represents not a fixed condition, but an acceptance of change and a capacity to envision a better future. My intention in the photographs included here was to depict buildings that were constructed with utopian ideals (albeit sometimes misguided) but that have undergone dramatic alterations over time. While these buildings are seemingly abandoned and decaying, they show evidence of alternative uses by more recent visitors, as well as the potential for transformation."