When Corner'd Use The Wall
Recent work by Jonny Farrow
February 4 - April 14
Reception: Thursday, February 20, 5-7 p.m.
Artist talk: Wednesday, March 12, 12:30-1:30 p.m.
Image: When Corner'd Use The Wall, 2024, Painted vintage barnwood; 27 x 2 x 4 in.
ARTIST STATEMENT
"When Corner'd Use The Wall," refers to the situational, strategic, and material improvisations used to create the works in this show. Comprised of found-objects assembled and placed in relation with other self-made objects, the sculptures are a product of slippages, failures of meaning, purposeful mis-hearings, mis-readings and odd juxtapositions. This failure of meaning is the playful heart of this show—not to frustrate viewers, but to allow them to find their own meanings in the individual works and the works in relation to one another. One could say they are pieces from different puzzles that may or may not form a stable image when assembled. The works and their relationships are multi-valent by design.
ARTIST BIOGRAPHY
Jonny Farrow (1969, Kentucky, USA) is a multidisciplinary artist who has shown work in the U.S., Europe, South America, and the Arabian Peninsula where he had three solo and multiple group exhibits in the United Arab Emirates where he lived and taught from 2013-2022. He was co-chair of the New York Society of Acoustic Ecology from 2007-2010 and in that capacity led numerous soundwalks, co-produced an album of phonographic compositions, and co-hosted the Giant Ear))) radio show produced for Wave Farm and broadcast on WGXC 90.7 FM in Hudson, NY. From 2011-2016 he produced The Distract and Disable Program also for Wave Farm and is a member of the NRRF Radio Collective who have been producing experimental pirate radio heard around the globe since 2012. In the mid-late 90's Farrow was a founding member/songwriter in the indie rock bands Philco Bendyx and The Sixes. His music and sound works have been released by Hello CD, Dive Records, free103point9, and Must Die Records. He has performed with Moby on The Late Show with Conan O'Brien, as well as played his hand-built oscillators with Quintron and the Weather Warlock. Along with an MA in music from The City College of New York (CUNY), he holds an MFA in Studio Art from the School of the Art Institute of Chicago. He currently lives and works between Vermont and Alabama where he is Assistant Professor of Art+Design at Troy University. You can find out more about Jonny's art and practice at www.jonnyfarrow.net.
This Is Reading
Recent work by Jill Magi
January 27 - April 6
Reception: February 20, 5-7 p.m.
Artist talk: Wednesday, March 12, 12:30-1:30 p.m.
Image: (Detail) Taken from this Page, 2021, watercolor, graphite, acrylic; 473x195 cm
ARTIST STATEMENT
Inspired by 18th and 19th century fabric sample books, and based on her own most-recent book entitled SPEECH, Jill Magi's exhibition “This Is Reading” is an encounter with reading and writing as textile and text—shape, color, feeling, and impression. In sample books from around the world, and in medieval and early modern European scripts, lettering mimics thread, and what looks like contemporary abstraction is centuries-old mercantile arrangements of fabric swatches. Whereas reading is usually thought of as an act of consumption—the individual reader “getting” something from a text—Magi's recent paintings and book objects invite a multi-directional exchange of sensation between art, book, and audience. Her work refigures writing as well, where composition is an act of sampling other texts, returning the author to pre-modern scribe and language as shared. Therefore, in our current age where screens and summaries dominate, often shortcutting the material and slow experience of text, “This Is Reading” argues for embodied reading and writing: away from consumer models and toward the analogue glow of authorship shared and authentic because it occurs moment-by-moment and never alone.
ARTIST BIOGRAPHY
Jill Magi is an artist, poet, critic, and teacher. She has written six full-length books of poetry, and her collected essays, as well as a book on textiles and textility, are forthcoming in 2026 from Essay Press and Nightboat Books. Her visual work—handmade books, weavings, fabric works, and paintings—have been exhibited at numerous galleries and non-profit spaces including The Textile Arts Center in Brooklyn; Grey Noise Gallery in Dubai; 421 Arts Campus in Abu Dhabi; The Project Space Gallery at New York University Abu Dhabi; Southern Vermont Arts Center; and, most recently, at the Flow Chart Foundation in Hudson, New York. Her handmade books are collected by the University at Buffalo special collections library, and for her work in community-based publishing, Jill was named one of the world's most inspiring authors by Poets & Writers magazine. An educator with over 25 years of experience, Jill has taught for large research universities, art schools, and experimental colleges. She joined the English Department faculty at Troy University in 2024. You can find out more about her practices at www.jillmagi.net.
**In March, Jill will be showing more of her book art at the Troy University Library, across the street from the IAC. Opening date will be announced shortly.