ALTOGALLERY

Opening Reception: Friday, May 5, 2023, 6 - 10 PM

Satellite Saturday Presented by RedLine Contemporary Art Center + Alto Gallery Featuring Demo/Community Activity with Jodi Stuart: Saturday, May 20 20, 2023, 12 - 3 PM

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ABOUT

 

Jodi Stuart is proud to announce her new exhibition, “Toxic Positivity” running May 5th through 27th at Alto Gallery, 1900 35th Street in Denver at the RiNo ArtPark creative hub. Her collection of colorful, web-like sculptures, relief wall works, and installations showcase her unusual technique that combines digital tools with a hand-made tradition. She explores the aesthetic of the digital technologies which saturate our lives, in relation to tactile and sensory experiences, subverting the materials and tools of high-tech culture through her chosen materials and her laborious and tactile processes.

 

Stuart’s woven sculptural forms are made using the plastic filaments intended for 3D digital printing. By using a ‘3D-pen’ Stuart has replaced the computer with the human hand in a nostalgic gesture towards tactile experience. Her combination of two-dimensional background prints and three-dimensional forms combines to activate an uneasy virtual/optical space between the two formats. A space where craft traditions such as weaving, knitting and basket-making are juxtaposed with abstracted virtual space and biomorphic forms. 

 

The show’s title plays with the thin line between having a positive attitude and displaying “toxic positivity” which, according to Psychology Today, is “…the act of avoiding, suppressing, or rejecting negative emotions or experience.” This can result in dismissing the validity of one’s experience and can, in theory, lead to trauma, isolation, and unhealthy coping mechanisms. Much like the insidious nature of the materials Stuart uses in her work—featuring brightly colored “super-synthetic” plastic to create Frankenstein-esque forms.

 

BIO

 

Stuart was born in New Zealand, where she attained a Bachelor of Visual Arts from Manukau Institute of Technology, Auckland in 1999, and an MFA from Auckland University in 2001. She currently lives, works and teaches in Denver, Colorado. As well as exhibiting in her home country of New Zealand, Jodi has exhibited in California, Colorado, Michigan, Maryland, Texas and Washington. For more information visit jodistuart.com and follow her on Instagram @stuart.jodi.

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