Gregg Blasdel • Tory Fair
Whirly Nerd • Joe Zane
June 3 – August 27, 2023
opening reception: Saturday, June 3 • 3-5pm
hours: Thursdays 12-4pm and by appointment: email or call 617.835.8255
Drive-by Projects is please to present PLAY, an exhibition including objects by Gregg Blasdel, game drawings by Tory Fair, drone photographs by Whirly Nerd (Drew Katz), and sculpture by Joe Zane. Please join us for the opening of this wryly playful show.
Gregg Blasdel is a Burlington, Vermont based artist, curator, and educator. His seminal Art in America article “The Grass Roots Artist” introduced a broad arts audience to artist-built environments in 1968. Echoing the sentiments of the artists whose environments he has documented for over 50 years, Blasdel says “I have no agenda, no particular philosophy. I work in my studio every day, and I am never without work in front of me.”
Tory Fair’s drawings from her Game Time Series use the presence of an empty playing field as a source of inspiration and contemplation. Fair lifts the markings from different playing fields—center circle, corner kick lines, goal lines, field boundaries—and
lays them atop homey arrangements of domestic and office furniture. Funny yet serious, the drawings ask us to consider the hidden strategies and logics that we bring our everyday conversations and activities.
Drew Katz, aka Whirly Nerd, is a commercially certified drone pilot and photographer.
“I like symmetry and I like aerial photographs” say Katz. His seemingly abstract photographs document his continuing interest in the patterns and designs of multi-use athletic fields when viewed from above. Varying combinations of sports, turf, lines, etc. are unique to each location. “These multi-use fields become like snowflakes and I’m out to capture them all.”
Joe Zane has been labeled an artist prankster. His wry, mixed media works use self-mocking humor to betray the underlying seriousness of his subject matter. Shoelace (Giacometti #1) a white sneaker shoelace rises up only to run out of energy in the act of tying itself into a knot. Referencing Giacometti’s tall figurines, Zane suggests an alignment between his lace and the Swiss sculptors existential.
philosophy.
above left:
Joe Zane – ‘Shoelace (Giacometti) #1’, 2023, steel and epoxy paint, 10” x 7” x 5”
above right:
Gregg Blasdel – ‘Devil’s House’, 2023, cut wood and glue, 24 x 19 x 22”
