Eric Wesley

Pio Pico is pleased to announce the opening of an exhibition of new work by Eric Wesley.

Timbuctoo is a multimedia sensory odyssey. The objects, pictures and relics seem to contain, or perhaps retain a spirit. The attitude and approach to stylization of this non-place is both honest and sardonic, revealing an uncomfortable truth regarding the state of the zeitgeist. We find written on one drawing “Goodbye cult life hello adult contemporary” while the two main sculptures of the show “Sticks” and “stones” concern themselves chiefly with the formal qualities of conceptual art and the tenants of the all but forgotten discipline of literalism.

Rocks naturally fill space along a horizontal trajectory, here the artist presents an alternative in the form of the hippy tradition of stone balancing, Trees, of course, grow vertically, in this new space they form a horizontal plane. The ubiquitous hard wood floor, the literal foundation of “adult contemporary” is an unappreciated marvel of nature and science working together.

“Sticks” seems to attack the yuppie sensibility by presenting the mundane as high art as if to beg “worship the ground you walk on”

The alternative title “Sticks and stones may break my bones but words fucking kill me” demonstrates the linguistic workings of the project and overall theme of Timbuctoo. Everyone knows what the word means yet the equation for proving it is unobtainable and asymptotic. It is not a question of reaching the place but a matter of getting out.

Eric Wesley (born 1973, Los Angeles) has had solo exhibitions in galleries internationally as well as at the MOCA, Los Angeles and Foundation Morra Greco, Naples, Italy. Among others, Wesley’s work has been included in exhibitions at the Hammer Museum, Los Angeles; Musée d’Art Contemporain, Bordeaux; Fundación/Colección, Jumex, Mexico; Museo d’Arte, Benevento, Italy; the 2004 Whitney Biennial; The Prague Biennial; Institute of Contemporary Art, London; MoMA P.S.1, New York; and the Studio Museum in Harlem.

He is one of the founders of Los Angeles Mountain School of Arts.