Lydian Stater is pleased to present The Fall The Show, a three-person exhibition featuring new NFT works by Corinne Jones, Anika Todd, and Catalina Tuca exploring themes of judgement, vulnerability, confession, and paradox through the lens of the philosophical novel, The Fall, by Albert Camus.

The internet has ushered in an era of radical transparency. With so much data available, sometimes the only way to control the narrative is by “putting it all out there” unabashed. One prime example of this ethos is the blockchain technology this exhibition is built upon. Every transaction, action, and address is recorded in full public viewing. But even with this extreme level of candor, the blockchain is far from perfect. Scams flourish and deception happens every day.

Jean-Baptiste Clamence, our failed protagonist and judge-penitent from the exhibition’s namesake, seems to understand this strategy, his tell-all confession absolving him from judgement, while spending his existence trying to convince strangers they are guilty of the sins which he is not. Like him, the works in this show use transparency, or its many derivatives, to their own ends.

In GoneDaddyGone/Stimulus, Anika Todd points her camera toward the cubicles of finance, albeit empty due to the 2020 pandemic. Those places on high which disproportionately affect the lives of millions down below sit ironically barren while the income gap widens. Through a clever economical surveillance device, Todd provides a judging eye into these gated spaces while window reflections allow us to simultaneously see the one who judges. 

And like Clamence’s dual occupation as judge-penitent, Corinne Jones’s Montage for the Analog Sunset (A+B) lives in a space where opposites coexist. A picture of a picture of a place, we are treated to the recording of a camera obscura built by Jones projecting a sidewalk scene and a participatory sundial. Passersby are unknowingly flipped and transformed across an interior space while a digital video camera records their movements. Jones shows us a non-reality in a dreamlike sequence while obscuring the reality from whence it came.

While The Fall’s protagonist does not offer much in the way of his own vulnerability, as his diatribe is meant to strip him of this burden, his confession is meant to evoke that feeling in us all. The Sensitive Project by Catalina Tuca investigates this feeling of vulnerability through visual interpretations of emotions. Using oral descriptions given by strangers and friends, Tuca commissions 3D renderings of the feelings of her participants. Personal experiences often hidden are made visible and their connected vulnerability turns to strength.

Towards the end of our story, Jean-Baptiste Clamence states: “the confession of my crimes allows me to begin again lighter in heart and to taste a double enjoyment, first of my nature and secondly of a charming repentance.” The artworks in this show are also confessions of sorts, glimpses into the nature of their creators, and like Clamence’s disclosures, are meant to provoke reflection in those that listen. But while Clamence’s goal is absolution, Jones, Todd, and Tuca thrive in the spaces between; seeking, observing, and critiquing while acknowledging their own role in our complicated existence.

The Fall The Show will be viewable online at www.lydianstater.co from November 15 to December 17.

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Installation Images

Works

Corinne Jones lives and works in New York City. She earned her MFA from Columbia University in 2007 and a BFA from The School of Visual Arts in 1996. Jones has realized public art projects at the Elizabeth Street Garden, New York; at Madison Park, Memphis, TN; and on Huling Street, Memphis, TN. She has exhibited solo and two-person shows at Situations Gallery, New York City, NY; Jackie Klempay, Brooklyn, NY; Museum of America books, Brooklyn, NY; Tops Gallery, Memphis, TN, and has participated in various group shows including galleries and museums in Miami, FL; London, UK; and Warsaw, Poland. Her work is held in many private and public institutions including the New York Presbyterian Hospital. She currently teaches Color Theory and Advanced Painting at The Cooper Union. Jones has published several editions, "Liam Gillick & Corinne Jones," (Brigade Commerz/Liam Gillick, 2010, "Plain English," 2014, and "Trends in Repurposed Abstraction" which debuted at the MoMA PS1 Art Book Fair in 2015. Her artwork has received critical praise from The New Yorker, Art News, Art Slant, and Artcore journal. 

Anika Todd (b.1992, Boston, MA) received her BFA from Massachusetts College of Art and Design, and her MFA from The University of Texas at Austin. Todd is a sculptor/media artist investigating landscape and ownership; Todd’s work functions through acts of trespass — simultaneously enacting and challenging systems that oppress, compartmentalize, and own in order to control. Todd’s work has been presented in solo exhibitions at VisArts Center, Richmond, VA and Co-Lab Gallery, Austin, TX featured in the Washington Post (2018) and Glasstire (2019) respectively. She has been selected to participate in numerous residencies including Salem Art Works (2017), Haystack School of Craft and Design (2018), and Skowhegan School of Painting and Sculpture (2019).

Catalina Tuca is a multidisciplinary Visual Artist, educator and independent curator, born and raised in Santiago, Chile. After earning a BFA and a degree in Art Education, she developed her career in Santiago, showing her work in solo and group exhibitions since 2004. She worked in several education projects, co-founded and co-directed Oficina Barroca Gallery and CANCHA_Santiago Residency Program. She participated in several art residencies abroad, in Japan, Colombia, and The United States. In 2016 she moves to the US to pursue an MFA at Rutgers University from where she recently graduated. She is currently a member of NEW INC. The New Museum Incubator Program. Lives and works in Brooklyn, NY.