Peer & Peer More Closely

Peer is a site-specific installation created by Meridith McNeal for Small House Gallery in London in two side-by-side vintage wooden dollhouses known as Gallery One and Gallery Two. The exhibition plays with layers of verisimilitude, as viewers gaze into a world that is both familiar and strange.

At the ground level of Gallery One, miniature versions of full-sized reflective window pieces are painted to appear as to be hanging in storefront windows flanking the front entry door. The second- and third-floor galleries present tiny versions of paintings of Meridith’s Inside Outside Windowphilia series, with views of Italy, and an installation of Magical Things, originally shown at the Sugar Hill Museum in Manhattan. The garret of Gallery One is a miniature of Meridith’s studio, with views of her Brooklyn neighborhood, the ubiquitous New York City clanky radiator, stacks of paintings and works in progress, and, of course, cats.

The exhibition continues in Gallery Two with tiny versions of paintings of Venice, London, Brooklyn, and Rome. Lilliputian-scaled brochures are available on the second floor, and invitations in the office, along with a model of the Small House Gallery. In the private upper floor storage room packing materials, installation supplies, and tools are stored.