Superposition

Kevin Frances

Jewett Art Gallery

Jan. 28 - March 1, 2019

install view of a white walled gallery with wood floor, color photographs of interior spaces on the wall, white pedestal with tiny sculptures on it; at right, table made of white board and raw wood sawhorses with roughly shoebox-size model of the basement level of a building, complete with furnishings and stairs

Superposition is an exhibition about a relationship. One character is a sculptor - a ceramicist. She works in a basement studio in a small, one-bedroom duplex. Directly above the studio, in a living room turned home office, her husband works - he is a writer. Their spaces are distinct, but there is a push/pull, a bleed-over, a dialogue. This is a narrative about collaboration, living with art, living with an artist, craft, and egos.

The first stage of the project is a 1:12 scale model of the two rooms - the studio and the office. Over the course of the exhibition, the model will break apart and recombine in as-yet undetermined ways. Kevin Frances will be returning repeatedly to alter the arrangement of the model and document the changes. The resulting photographs will hang on the gallery wall as a kind of working open studio. As the model shifts, as photos are added and moved around, the story of these characters will emerge.

miniature model of midcentury slatted bench with gray cushion, plant pot with snake plant, small pile of books

color photograph of room with glowing paper light and large gray sculpture in the middle of a living room; the miniature midcentury bench from the previous image on this page is visible in the photo, revealing that the entire scene is a miniature

view of an approximately shoebox-size model of a living room with miniature bookshelf and eames chair visible; three small pots with fake plants are placed outside the model's window

long horizontal photo of basement sculpture studio space

Superposition was on view in the Jewett Art Gallery from January 28 - March 1, 2019.

To see how this project continued to evolve after leaving Wellesley, including the prints that ultimately resulted from it, please see the Superposition page on Kevin Frances' artist website.

gallery installation with variously sized color photographs of interior spaces on the white wall; two white pedestals with tiny sculptures on them in front

black ink sketches of various small household and studio items

black ink handwritten notes and a sketch of a lumpy sculpture of a meteorite

photo of a sculpture studio interior with kilns and shelving; the scene is a miniature and everything in it is handmade

interior scene of a living room with bookshelves, potted plant, Eames lounge chair, some yellow post-its on the wall; the scene is a miniature and everything in it is handmade

several miniature items on a white pedestal: an orange Home Depot bucket with blue tape and a Fage yogurt container holding paint brushes, a spray bottle, a gray abstract sculpture, a metal studio stool, and a box fan

miniature objects on a white pedestal: a small black printer on table with hairpin legs, a lumpy gray sculpture with cup-like form held on one protruberance

3 miniature objects on a white pedestal: amorphous gray sculpture, orange cone sculpture, and a boxy tan space heater

roughly shoebox-sized model of an interior space, on a white table; in the background another model on table is blurrily visible

moodily-lit photograph of a basement sculpture studio space - shadows are tinged blue, highlights tinged pink

Kevin Frances

Kevin Frances lives and works in New York City. He received his MFA from the Rhode Island School of Design in 2013, and his BA from the University of California, Davis in 2010. In 2012 he was a participant at the Skowhegan School of Painting and Sculpture. His work has been shown at the International Print Center New York, the Knockdown Center in New York, Vox Populi in Philadelphia, the Kala Gallery in Berkeley, How's Howard in Boston, and Galleri CC in Malmö, Sweden.

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