Curator

SITE Curated

Contributing Artists

Vidisha Aggarwal, Erin Armstrong, Carol Bedoy, Frida Benitez, Joelle Clapier, Kat Gu, Shama Kipfer-Tessler, Khushmi Mehta, Mikhaila Nodel-Kishner, Holly Peterson

Exhibition Statement as Preserved in the SUGS/SITE Archives:

Soft Spot, a group show curated and featuring works by SITE Gallery Assistants, invokes notions of memory, childhood and introspection. Part of an inaugural program at SITE, this exhibition offers students an opportunity to activate SITE Sharp and draw from their experiences as Gallery Assistants to engage with visitors through the immersive environment of the gallery. What changes occur in us as we grow older and become “adults” ? In Erik Erikson’s theory of developmental psychology, adolescence is characterized by the need to distinguish and discover one’s role in society. Often, this period of self-discovery lasts until early adulthood, the period that the artists of Soft Spot are in. As the artists express themselves to you in this gallery show, they also process their own memories. Using childhood and adolescence as an entry point, the artists explore the multiplicities of their backgrounds and lived experiences. Each artwork draws from a specific spatial or temporal moment and gives the artists an opportunity to look to their past as the source of influence. Taking a collaborative approach to the curating and creation

of the works, they map the converging ties between their practices within the group. For example, the large devils of Benitez’s paintings and Nodel-Kishner’s confined creatures both seem to act as inhuman, self-portrait effigies. Kipfer-Tessler’s “678-999-8212 “, a plush pink Motorola Razor backpack, echoes the hue of Clapier’s wall, “Cicadas and Memories”. Aggarwal and Peterson invite you, the visitor, to interact and make your own work in their spaces, and Gu’s plush archway is a portal to prepare you for the introspection you should achieve in Bedoy and Kipfer-Tessler’s tent. Ultimately, the show reveals to you, the visitor, the artists’ soft spots; their most vulnerable aspects, and invites you to do the same.