May 17 – June 23, 2012

Opening reception:
Thursday, May 17, 2012
6:00 – 8:00 p.m.

“There is that in me that has to be told fifty times a day: Stop hunting. Step on this net.” —Rumi (1207-1273)

ClampArt is pleased to present “Ensnared”—an exhibition of painted photographs, video, and sculpture by artist, Stan Gaz. In his second solo show at the gallery, Gaz departs from the large-scale landscape photographs of meteorite impact craters from his last series, and turns inward—producing objects that allude to specific events in his own life. “Ensnared” considers themes of loss, transformation, and memory. Throughout these images, ensnarement is allegorized by the actions and effects of the archetypes of the hunter and the hunted. Gaz finds these roles to be oddly interchangeable, caught in a cycle in which each is incarcerated by the other—trapped by longing, manipulation, and other forms of daily violence.

Divided into three suites or chapters, “Ensnared” includes painted photographs of vintage butterfly specimens, images taken during winter hunting expeditions in the Western United States, and haunting prints of an astronaut armed with a butterfly net out to catch fleeting samples of a vanishing world. The exhibition also includes video footage of the astronaut in Central Park, along with a massive, twenty-foot, stainless steel sculpture representing his net.

Stan Gaz is a native of the desert and a graduate of Art Center in California. His work has been extensively exhibited in the United States for over a decade. He resides in Brooklyn, New York.