Representing the Unrepresentable: Exhibitions by Tim Roby and Shelby A. Baron at Hallwalls Contemporary Arts Center

By Amanda McLaughlin:

Representing the unrepresentable through presentation itself: the (delightfully frustrating) main tenet of postmodernism.  Hallwalls' exciting new exhibitions by Tim Roby and Shelby A. Baron seek to do just that: challenge our perspective and illuminate our understanding of art by utilizing a tantalizing mixture of the abstract and the personal, the familiar and the unexpected.

Described by John Massier, the Visual Arts Curator at Hallwalls Contemporary Arts Center, Roby's work "inclines toward a form of minimal concise expression that suggests a sense of the personal even to the point of whimsical fantasy, while still remaining grounded in the reality that generated the materials and objects of his work;"  Roby is able to achieve this, Massier continues, through a "hybridization of the familiar source and the somewhat ambiguous object."   For the exhibition at Hallwalls, Objects of Venerable Decay, Roby will use sources from a previously-constructed installation room as the material for his new works, producing a new sculptural installation specifically for Hallwalls, an installation, Massier writes, that "may appear to describe destruction," but suggests "something far more effusive and full of promise."

Likewise, Shelby A. Baron's work is a conflation of familiar shapes and "images piled atop each other to a degree that they disrupt recognition." (John Massier.)  Growing up in both Buffalo, NY and San Antonio, TX, Baron credits her dependence on "hyper-observation" and obsessive drawing to an upbringing in radically different cities.  Ink is the primary medium of Baron's work; Hallwalls asserts that her pieces range from illustrating characters to drawings that "depict mysterious machines or rampant organic growth."  Her installation at Hallwalls, Shelby Baron's Big Fat Baby, will include site-specific wall drawings based loosely on "A Shutter of Snow," by Emily Holmes Coleman, and Erika Eiffel, a woman who married the Eiffel Tower in a commitment ceremony in 2007.  Baron describes the exhibition as so pampered that it "could be considered a mild case of Objectophilia or Parental Obsession."

Both exhibitions open Friday, January 14, from 8 to 11 PM, with artists' talks at 8 PM.  Hallwalls Contemporary Arts Center is located at 341 Delaware Avenue, Buffalo, NY, 14202, and can be reached at 716.854.1694. More information on the exhibitions can be found at www.hallwalls.org, and information on the artists can be found at their websites www.timroby.com and www.shelbybaron.com.