Blue Sky September 2021 Exhibitions
Gary Burnley: The Known World
AL J Thompson: Remnants of an Exodus
Sept 2 - Oct 2, 2021
image © Gary Burnley, Hudson, 2018
Blue Sky is pleased to announce the 2020 Critical Mass Solo Exhibition, The Known World by Gary Burnley.
In his series of unique photo-collages, Gary Burnley constructs images that layer our memory with revered representations of beauty, power, influence, identity and social status into unlikely, chance encounters with other images. Burnley's intention is to craft alternative parables that invade and challenge the immortality and purity of long-held Western cultural profiles, ideals, and attitudes.
Gary Burnley (American, b.1950) received a BFA from Washington University in St. Louis and an MFA from Yale University. A Photolucida Critical Mass 2020 Top 50 Selection, Burnley was the 2020 Blue Sky Solo Show Winner. His work is part of museum and private collections including the Virginia Museum of Fine Arts, Richmond, VA, and Hunter Museum of American Art, Chattanooga, TN. Solo and group exhibitions include Aperture Gallery, NYC, Elizabeth Houston Gallery, NYC, SALON, Florence, Italy, among others. Burnley has been the recipient of artist fellowships and commissions from the National Endowment for the Arts, the State of Connecticut, New York State Council on the Arts, Creative Artist Public Service Program, NYC, The MTA, NYC and Bi-State Development, Saint Louis, Missouri.
image © Al J Thompson, Smoke Break, 2019
Blue Sky is pleased to announce Remnants of an Exodus, an exhibition by Al J Thompson featuring photographs from his first monograph of the same name.
Remnants of an Exodus is a love letter to Thompson's second home — Spring Valley, NY, a Caribbean immigrant community, 40 minutes from New York City. Thompson observes and experiences change firsthand, as the community undergoes a dramatic shift in both demographic and political landscapes. In turn, he finds Spring Valley fraught with insecurity and uncertainty but bound by love.
Al J Thompson (Jamaican-born, b.1980) settled in the immigrant community of Spring Valley, New York in 1996. His time spent in college studying Graphic Arts helped shape his core values in visual communication and community. Seeing the apparent decline in his old neighborhood eventually led him to his first monograph, Remnants of an Exodus.
Thompson has been involved with a number of group exhibits and commissioned for companies such as Weill Cornell University, Under Armour, Moët Hennessy, NYC GO, Kaiser Health News, The New Yorker, New York Times Magazine, and New York Times. His work made several appearances in PDN, BOOOOOOOM, Lenscratch, British Journal of Photography, The Guardian, National Geographic, Italian Vogue, NPR, Buzzfeed, Lensculture, Rocket Science, Float Magazine, GUP, C-41, among others.
The case bound, 104 page book with a red PVC insert, is comprised of 55 black and white photographs made over several years. Copies of the book will be available for purchase at Blue Sky and online at Gnomic Book.