Jennie Ottinger

Ibid

8/7/2009 - 9/18/2009 at Johansson Projects

Opening Reception Saturday, August 7th, 5 - 8 pm
Showing August 7th - September 18th

A solo exploration by Jennie Ottinger, in a delicate and haunting display of the familiar suspects stripped of their familiarity. From her ballerina lineups to her team of surgeons, Ottinger's characters contain all the parts in place, yet a lurking trace of disorientation lingers in the way of recognition or comfort. The subjects are more skeletons of flesh than human beings. A crafted impossibility echoes throughout Ottinger's presentation of her pieces in a new kind of narrative network: a dissonant collective instead of a rigid unfurling of cause-and-effect. Ottinger confronts viewers with storybook pages tossed into the wind, forming links between strangers in strange places that transcend conventional story logic. Her cast of fictional characters is conjured from a medley of nonfictional materials-- newspapers, textbooks, and photo archives—and then freed from any storyline to frolic in a storyweb. Every moment of Ottinger's dripping portraits summons a bitter longing to find a home in the imaginary ideals of the happily ever after. While stories often take great liberties to fill in the blanks, Ottinger's mythical portraits employ the ruse of familiarity as a vehicle and a trap, exposing the blank spaces between body parts and storybook pages.

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Johansson Projects

2300 Telegraph Avenue
Oakland, CA 94612
(510) 444-9140

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