School of Visual Arts presents “Sensing Elsewhere (Here),” an exhibition of work by members of the MFA Art Practice class of 2016. Curated by faculty member Thyrza Nichols Goodeve and Jacquelyn Strycker, the program’s director of operations “Sensing Elsewhere (Here)” is on view Thursday, July 9, through Thursday, August 6, at the SVA Chelsea Gallery, 601 West 26th Street, 15th floor, New York City.

Exploring the notion of sensorial responses to displacement, the work on display reflects on the experience of interpreting the construction of memories.

Elissa Ecker’s this is not a trap., consisting of nine plexiglass boxes displaying synthetic hair extensions woven into Chinese finger traps, connects physical materials with concept of materialism.

Sarah Grass’ installation of objects placed on “wee wee” pads atop a vacuumed carpet enclosed by baby gates creates an absurd invitation to mark one’s territory in this tidy space.

Clark Hubert Guy’s local homage is a hanging cradle woven from recycled wood and Joss paper skins that references Chinese funeral rituals.

Point, a two-channel video by Rori Knudtson about the Global Seed Vault, uses the screen to conjure a sense of “in-between-ness,” a space between the present and future possibilities.

Griselda Lopez’s Calma, temporal uses light and shadow to construct the memory of a space.

Flashing words accompanied by fuzzy, hazy dark shapes and the sound of plucked guitar strings in Marnie Navarro’s three-channel video installation, Rubicon/Remnant/Render, evoke the exhaustion of an unforgiving desert landscape.

Laura Scandrett’s My Magic Mountain, a rock-climbing journey projected onto painted silk, addresses mortality and landscape. The artist encourages viewers to interact with the piece by touching a stone that was displaced from a mountain’s peak before it returns to the mountain next fall.

Just so you know, it’s easier to be naked because then you’re distracted from my lying mouth, a performance by Alexandra Sullivan, employs volunteers to read phrases off her nude body, allowing the artist to avoid conversation while eliciting a false sense of intimacy.

Kevin Townsend’s durational drawings invite the viewer to watch the artist as he creates a site-specific drawing in another space as it is projected onto the gallery wall. His sculptures, held, exhaled, suspended, are simultaneously beautiful and repulsive as they softly pulse and emit the odor of stale, cheap beer.

MFA Art Practice is an expansive, low-residency interdisciplinary program of study founded on the belief that artists need not be defined by their use of materials or chosen platforms. The program offers experienced artists an opportunity to deepen their studio practice and to develop an advanced body of work under the guidance of some of the world’s foremost artists and critics in the heart of New York City’s Chelsea gallery district.

Exhibition

Sensing Elsewhere (Here)

SVA Chelsea Gallery

Reception