From November 14 through December 2, 2016, the exhibition mineral ceremony by Julie Grosche will be on view at Mary Baldwin’s Hunt Gallery.
Julie Grosche (b.1986, France) lives and works in Brooklyn, NY, and is a graduate of Ecole Nationale Supérieure d’Art in Dijon, France. Her work has appeared internationally and has recently shown at Galerie Escougnou Cetraro, Paris; Favorite Goods, Los Angeles, CA; Kappa Theta Phi, Richmond, VA; Emerson-Dorsch, Miami, FL; L’Atelier KSR, Berlin, Germany; Era VI VII VI, New York, NY; SPACES, Cleveland, OH. As a curator she has produced exhibitions internationally: based in Berlin, Berlin, Germany; Reference Gallery, Richmond, VA; and Oslo10, Basel, Switzerland. She co-founded PMgalerie in Berlin, Bcc an itinerant curatorial platform and ASMBLY based in NYC. She teaches and is the director the Summer Studio Program at Virginia Commonwealth University.
Julie Grosche’s new video work, mineral ceremony, continues her exploration of the natural world as allegorical fodder, satiating humanity’s appetite for symbol and meaning. mineral ceremony invites the viewer to experience the birth of a new mythology. This new mythology exists between legend and dream built of both human and non-human materials and embraces heterodoxy.
In mineral ceremony a clan of killing rocks is on a baneful mission. One of the killers, Opal, is captured. She will be roughened, washed, and then burned at the stake in a series of rituals attempting to manifest some future of harmonic existence. Ritual becomes a physical manifestation of the intangible story — myth made palpable. Expiation is sought through sacrifice.
Geology is also at the center of some of the artist’s previous works. For her it serves as a signifier. Within a stone, rare physical elements point to an unknowable past. The elements function as a channel connecting the past, present, and future, providing a mysterious and sublime form of time travel. Through myth and its accompanist, ritual, Grosche’s work awakens slumbered secrets.
The video features music by airport.
A reception will be held for the artist from 4:30 to 6 p.m. on November 14 in Hunt Gallery. The public is invited to attend. Hunt Gallery is dedicated to the exhibition of contemporary work in all media by regionally and nationally recognized artists. The gallery is open 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. Monday through Friday during the academic year. Hunt Gallery’s schedule for the 2016–17 academic year can be found online at go.marybaldwin.edu/arts/huntgallery.