“Requiem: Aching for Acker,” a mixed-media exhibition Aline Mare, opens May 6 with an artist’s reception from 5-7PM
Mare’s new photo-based works interpret “Requiem,” the last poem of Kathy Acker’s final book, “Eurydice in the Underworld.”
L.A.-based artist Aline Mare grew up in New York City and began her career as an image maker and performer in the thriving avant-garde arts scene of downtown Manhattan in the 1970s and 1980s. During that time, she began a friendship with the experimental and subversive writer Kathy Acker that would last on and off for decades.
Ultimately, the relationship inspired Mare’s new body of work, “Requiem: Aching for Acker,” a photo-based multi-media exhibition, with each piece incorporating alternative processes and technologies to create unique, hand-finished artworks. Mare uses imagery and elements – including actual artifacts of Acker’s – that infuse the series with magic and myth.
The work is based on “Requiem,” the poem on the last page of Acker’s final published book, “Eurydice in the Underworld” (Arcadia Press, 1997). Confronting her own illness and death, Acker filters her cancer diagnosis through Greek mythology. In her artist’s statement, Mare says, “I was looking for a vision to match the feelings: the loss and the power I felt reading this final piece. Something that would remind the world of her power as a creative female force of nature.”
Reception to be followed by a reading/performance from 7:30-9PM: Chris Kraus (After Kathy Acker & I Love Dick), Dodie Bellamy (Writers Who Love Too Much), Matias Vieneger (The Assassination of Kathy Acker), Aline Mare (performing “Requiem” with Kris T Force soundtrack)
Regular gallery hours to view the exhibition are: Friday – Saturday, 3-7PM; Sunday, 2-7PM; and by appointment, through May 26
The reception is free and open to the public. The reading/performance event at 7:30 requires a ticket through Beyond Baroque.
