Abend Gallery is pleased to present an online collector preview of Robin Hextrum's solo exhibition, Dreams from the Anthropocene, on display at our Golden Triangle downtown location starting on October 21st, 2022.

The Anthropocene is the lens through which artist Robin Hextrum has come to understand the state of our world. Picking up iconography from traditional Dutch still lifes’ Hextrum synthesizes colonial roots of environmental disruption to give life to her new surrealist pieces. Through these works, she asks viewers to consider the historical legacy of consumption and human behavior that has affected our planet.

Opening Reception and Artist Talk

Friday October 21st 

Opening Reception: 5:00-8:00pm

Artist Talk: 6:30pm

Closing Reception and Artist Talk

Friday November 11th 

Closing Reception: 5:00-8:00pm

Artist Talk: 6:30pm

Location
 

1261 Delaware St
Denver, CO 80204
303-355-0950
Get directions

Artist Statement

We now live in a new geological epoch known as the “Anthropocene.” This period refers to the significant human impact on species extinction and the climate since 1950. I chose to integrate imagery from 17th century Dutch still life paintings because this genre developed in tandem with trade, colonialism, market capitalism, and consumption. These traditional paintings displayed both local and global riches in the form of food items, Chinese porcelain, Persian carpets, and even citrus fruits imported from the Mediterranean. During the height of the “Tulip Mania” in the Netherlands, a tulip market bubble fueled by frenzied purchases of rare bulbs, some tulips cost the same amount as a home. By working within and against these traditional methods, I call these historical foundations into question and ask viewers to look at art history in a new light. Juxtaposing icebergs with imagery from traditional Dutch paintings also asks us to examine how the historical relationship between humans and the environment has generated a legacy of a warming planet.

My work also responds to the surrealist tradition. The surrealist movement offered a deep critique of the nature of reality and the relationship between our dreaming and waking states. Surrealists combined Freudian theories of the subconscious with the post WWI Dadaist rejection of rationality to generate a new take on reality. Many surrealist artists randomly combined cutout pictures to create unusual dream-like collages. They would also play with distortions in scale and perspective. Like the surrealist artists that came before my time, I also enjoy manipulating scale to create a sense of unreality and distortion. However, rather than seeking out random free association like the surrealists, I am intentionally combining images to generate a critical dialogue around climate change. By using dream-like surrealist collage to comment on climate change, these images generate dreams from the Anthropocene for viewers to contemplate. I believe art provides a valuable platform for processing the existential threat of climate change that can be both healing and transformative in its call to action. - Robin Hextrum

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