Lehmann Maupin would like to announce an exhibition of new work by artist Jennifer Steinkamp. This will be Steinkamp's second exhibition at Lehmann Maupin.
Jennifer Steinkamp is known for her projected installations utilizing 3-Dimensional computer animation. The Los Angeles-based artist employs this new media to explore ideas about perception and space. Her works interact between the actual space and illusionistic space resulting in environments where the lines between viewer and object blur. Steinkamp's recent, hyper-animated representations of trees and flowers fill the gallery's walls, dissolving the architecture and creating an imaginary space.
Steinkamp was inspired by the Grimm fairy tale of Rapunzel whose mother became addicted to the rampion flower. Rapunzel's mother longed for the beautiful flower that grew in the garden of a witch. After being caught trying to steal the flower, she was forced to give up her daughter to the witch. The installation at Lehmann Maupin consists of gently swaying vines projected on the walls of the gallery with flowers dancing at the floor. The playful movement of the vines and flowers in the gallery is seemingly natural, yet tension is created between the physical space of the gallery and the invented landscape. Here, Jennifer Steinkamp has created an enchanted garden within the gallery that evokes the witch's garden.
Jennifer Steinkamp studied at CalArts and ArtCenter in Los Angeles, and has had solo exhibitions at The Museum of Contemporary Art, North Miami, and Henry Art Gallery, Seattle, Washington, among others. Her group shows include the 8th Annual Istanbul Biennial and participation in shows at the San Jose Museum of Art and the Seoul Museum of Art. In 2004, she collaborated with director Bill Friedken, creating sets for the opera Tannhäuser at the Dorothy Chandler Pavilion, Los Angeles and Lincoln Center, New York. Her work will also be included in the upcoming show Visual Music at the Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden, Washington D.C., the Museum of Contemporary Art, Los Angeles, the Kemper Museum of Art and a traveling retrospective of her work opens at the San Jose Museum of Contemporary Art in 2006.