Melodie Provenzano & Rachel Hovnanian

December 11, 2010—January 29, 2011

Carrie Secrist Gallery is pleased to announce two upcoming exhibitions featuring the work of Melodie Provenzano and Rachel Hovnanian. This will be the first solo exhibitions in Chicago for both artists.

New York-based artist Melodie Provenzano is inspired by objects; the way they look and the emotions that they suggest. Still life’s are composed with figurines and various items, like drinking glasses, golf balls, ribbons, and bows. The final arrangement is a meticulously rendered composition that allows a brief glimpse into the artist’s personal world. Using graphite and gouache to create these mock dramas, with accents of color and gold leaf to suggest a narrative momentum, Provenzano allows the audience to assign their own meaning to the works. The works are filled with images of love and misfortune, artificiality and intimacy, and failure and realization. The drawings are affectionately constructed but within these delicate works are strong recognitions about our own notions of power and fragility.

New York-based artist Rachel Hovnanian’s work seeks to provoke. Hovnanian explores the reward and the cost of beauty through a range of media from small and large-scale sculptures in cold, imperious marble to haunting photographs, film and artifacts – all delivered with monochromatic precision. The works are made from the artist’s simple observations honed by life experiences that often verge on the caustic and humorous. These vignettes reflect the pressures on women to conform to the typical definition of beauty found in magazine spreads, TV interviews, pageants, film, and the search for the authentic.

Melodie Provenzano graduated with a BFA from the Parsons School of Design in 1996. She was recently included in Playing Around at the Brattleboro Museum, Brattleboro, VT and Champagne & Baloney at Jeff Bailey Gallery, New York. She is represented by Lyons Weir Gallery in New York.

Rachel Hovnanian lives and works in New York City and received her education at Parsons School of Design, the National Academy of Design, The Arts Students League and the University of Texas. Her work is exhibited internationally and includes shows at Parasol Unit foundation for Contemporary Art, Collette Blanchard Gallery, Jason McCoy Gallery, and Meredith Long & Company. Hovnanian’s work has been reviewed in the New York Times, Wall Street Journal Europe and Elle Décor.