“Untitled #20,” by Mark Dorf.
Many of us live, these days, with one foot in physical space and the other in digital space. So why shouldn’t our art do the same? “Inverted Normals,” an exhibition at the Rowan University Art Gallery through Dec. 20, showcases art that attempts to bridge that gap by using new digital techniques as well as more traditional means.
Shown above is Mark Dorf’s “Untitled #20,” from his series “//_PATH.” In it, a complex green-and-blue digital image is juxtaposed withe the raw beauty of a forest. Dorf has written of the “//_PATH” series: “The natural landscape can be seen as the most ancient of symbolic languages: it is the original set of symbols that birthed all of modern language; it is the original text. Focusing on the landscape and our modern digital language, I seek to understand our aggressive capture and digitization of our surroundings through very basic use of pure color and the native tools of contemporary digital imaging that we use to create meaning and manipulation in mass media.”
Other artists in the “Inverted Normals” exhibition are: José Carlos Casado, Channel Two, Chris Manzione, Alex Myers and Daniel Rourke, Benjamin Phelan, Michael Rees, and Jeff Thompson.
The gallery is located on the lower level of Westby Hall on the university’s Glassboro campus. Admission is free, and the hours are Mondays through Fridays, 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. (Wednesdays to 7 p.m.), and Saturday, noon to 5 p.m. Visit rowan.edu/artgallery.
Art of the Day is a series of posts, each focusing on one work of art on display at a museum, gallery or other exhibition space in New Jersey. These will appear daily, though not on weekends and holidays. To suggest works of art to feature, please email njartsdaily@gmail.com.
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