THE PEOPLE CONCERNED
Anna Mayer
May 8 - 30, 2010

Opening Reception: Saturday, May 8, 7-10 pm

Bad Pants III, 2010, performance with glazed ceramic for photograph

For her solo exhibition, The People Concerned, Anna Mayer will present numerous works made for the gallery space as well as performance documents from events and moments occurring in the weeks leading up to the show. All works emanate from Mayer’s attempt to establish an “outcantatory” practice that uses language, fire, and intention to propose relationships encouraging embodiment and the rejection of discreet, linear modes of reception. Wavering between collectivity and introspection, the exhibition offers different access points for experiential discovery. The works included articulate a functional, insistently generative process taking place between people, elements, and hands touching objects.

In the month prior to the exhibition, Mayer hosts Self-Soothery, a series of pit-fires at different sites in Los Angeles. The project developed out of her interest in both the history of ceramics and occult traditions that use fire in a generative way. Self-Soothery mines the social space created by fire, as well as fire’s ability to produce shifts in time and knowledge. Artifacts from the firings will be on display in the gallery, as well as pre- and post-relic documents revealing how the potential of fire predates our desires but also emerges from them. Mayer’s interest in alternative firing techniques for ceramics brought her to architect Nadir Khalili’s work and its impact on contemporary disaster relief and utopian building traditions. Notes from her research inform a full-scale architectural model incorporating live bodies. This and all works in the exhibition use malleable materials—fabric, unfired clay, sand, and words—in order to speculate about what an individual can do for others and by herself.

The exhibition’s closing event will be held at (Yoni) Tree and Space from 4-7 pm on Sunday, May ­­­30. Bring your gendered offerings to the Yoni Tree and enjoy the ins-and-outs of prophecy through pleasure.

Anna Mayer lives and works in Los Angeles, where she received her MFA from CalArts in 2007. She holds Bachelor degrees from Washington University and The School of the Art Institute of Chicago. Mayer has been included in group exhibitions at Klaus Von Nichtssagend (NY) and Karen Lovegrove, 533 Los Angeles, and Chime & Co in Los Angeles. Recently she’s performed as part of the Eternal Telethon, and continues her durational Fireful of Fear project, begun in 2008. In addition to her solo practice, Anna works with Jemima Wyman as part of the collaborative duo CamLab, which recently had an exhibition at the gallery, “Dan Graham,” which, for the duration of their show there, was called "Leslie Dick." CamLab completed a threewalls residency in Chicago during the summer of 2009.

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