LIQUID, new work by Dornith Doherty

LIQUID

new work by Dornith Doherty

1 june d 7 july 2001

LIQUID, new work by Dornith Doherty, featuring color photographs and video=
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work, opens June 1 from 6-8:30 P.M. at James Gallery. ?The exhibition is=20
accompanied by a color brochure with an essay by Susie Kalil. ?James Galler=
y=20
is located in Houston?s Museum District between West Alabama and Richmond=
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Avenue, east of Montrose Boulevard. ?Gallery hours are Wednesday-Saturday 1=
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A.M. to 5:30 P.M.

". . . The tableaux Doherty creates for the camera can evoke the odd=20
curiosities assembled by 19th century scientific explorers. ?But Doherty?s=
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reconfigurations, her re-filling of the skins of things, are nothing less=
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than acts of reincarnation. ?As master of her fabricated world, Doherty=20
breathes new existence into the most ordinary materials and detritus. ?By=
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focusing on the tension between chaos and order, perception and illusion,=
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Doherty folds systems of understanding back on themselves to confound=20
seemingly distinct categories. ?Her photographs investigate the world rathe=
r=20
than represent it, reminding us of seasonal change and the transience of=20
existence. ?They engender something akin to sensory whiplash. ?We come up=
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close and peer at the large-scale images - searching, scrutinizing, scannin=
g=20
- much the way she must have done while setting her sights through the view=
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camera?s ground glass. ?They bring the viewer?s eye up short with shadowy=
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projections that belie illusion. ?It?s not a violent phenomenon, but a=20
captivating one, a persistent reckoning of the friction between form and=20
void, solid and phantasm.

In photography, however, paradox is paramount, the lie is taken for truth,=
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and the real is understood only in terms of its simulation. ?Accordingly,=
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Doherty?s images attend to the lonely but pleasurable activity of looking.=
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They concentrate on the duration of vision - time, the memory of time, the=
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specific lunar radiance of dreams. She reminds us that those things touch o=
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in us a deeper desire; it?s as if she peels off layers of the apparent=20
richness of ourselves, arguing us back to the realm of great, raw, objectle=
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longing . . ."

=01.from Liquid
an essay by Susie Kalil

Dornith Doherty (a native Houstonian) studied Spanish and French language a=
nd=20
literature at Rice University (BA, 1980), and photography at Yale Universit=
y=20
(MFA, 1988). ?She received a William J. Fulbright-Garc?a Robles=20
Lecture/Research Fellowship (Mexico, 1995), and a Society for Contemporary=
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Photography Fellowship (1993). ?Her many solo exhibitions include Dornith=
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Doherty, McDonough Museum of Art, Youngstown State University, (2000);=20
Dornith Doherty, University Gallery, Texas A&M University (2001); Dornith=
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Doherty: Fragmentary Evolutions (FotoFest '98), James Gallery (1998), and=
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Dornith Doherty, Traces, University of Notre Dame Photography Gallery (1997=
).=20
?Group exhibitions include FotoFest 2000: 10 x 2 + 2: 22 Texas Artists,=20
DiverseWorks (2000); The Shelf-Life of Objects: Contemporary Still Life=20
Photography, University of Texas at Dallas (2000); Dornith Doherty & Sybil=
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Miller, Rhode Island College (1999); Flora and Fauna, Museum of Fine Arts,=
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Houston (1999), and Material World, James Gallery (1999). ?Upcoming=20
exhibitions include a solo at the University of Notre Dame's Isis Gallery=
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(January 2002) and Aspects of Human Agency in the Landscape (with Sally=20
Packard and Gary Retherford) at the Arlington Museum of Art, TX (April 2002=
).=20
?Doherty's work can be found in the permanent collections of the Museum of=
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Fine Arts, Houston; the Minneapolis Institute of Arts; the Museum of Fine=
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Arts, Milwaukee; the Art Museum of Southeast Texas, Beaumont, and the Sheld=
on=20
Swope Art Museum, Terre Haute, among numerous other public and private=20
collections nationally. ?Doherty is currently an Associate Professor of Art=
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at the University of North Texas.

james gallery

307 sul ross | houston 77006 | 713.942.7035

http://www.jamesgalleryhouston.com

- Liquid @ James Gallery