Gesture Towards: Three Visions of Abstraction

Curated by Sophia-Maria Takvorian

Artists: Layton Miles Davis, Austin Clay Willis, Lev Pinkus

October 18 – 25, 2023

The School of Visual Arts is pleased to present Gestures Toward: Three Visions of Abstraction, curated by MA Curatorial Practice student Sophia Maria Takvorian. Gestures Toward invites audience members to enter a portal of abstraction thanks to the art of Brooklyn-based artist Layton Miles Davis and SVA Masters of Fine Arts students Lev Pinkus and Austin Clay Willis. This exhibition will present new work by each artist, with prints by Davis that have incorporated his contemplations on space and memory through photography, drawing, painting, and digital manipulation as well as smaller studies for his work, a sculptural installation by Willis that questions the relationship between the pictorial space and material space, and exploratory paintings in text, systems, and spirituality by Pinkus.

An art-historical reading of abstraction would suggest that it serves as a means to separate us from the real world. Unlike this theory of withdrawal, what if we looked at abstraction as a reaction to our world, a direct response to it, a means of understanding through new gestures of line, movement, text, assemblage, and color. In the over-saturated landscape of the art world, these artists offer refreshing takes on the long history of abstraction and expression. Davis fully displays his process in his work, layering his photography, drawings, and paintings to create entirely new images that underscore his sensory associations with the initial photograph from which he draws inspiration. In his installation, Willis questions the treachery of images and the tension between the physical materials he uses and the representational plane of his creations. Pinkus presents the dichotomy between logic and spirituality in a series of new works, formulating a grid system to address how the body and soul meet through art-making.

This exhibition asks us to question what abstraction means to both the art world and the world at large today through the task of creating a practice, working in tactile ways to reveal insights into our contemporary society. Through these works we can understand that abstraction is not merely ornamental or mystifying, challenging preconceived notions that abstraction is bound up in the art market or of a past untouchable canon. Through their practices, these artists turn inward to interrogate the world instead of turning away from representation to escape reality. This is an active space as its title suggests, a space to reflect on the work of these artists and the concepts that inform their practices. The gestures we make towards one another in the space are an integral part of the experience, discussing the questions presented to us by the artists together, how they relate to their work and the often dizzying world around us.