Vanishing Point Artists' Roundtable

Consider issues relating to urban development and artistic exploration in this roundtable discussion held in conjunction with the opening of the Vanishing Point exhibition.

Panelists are artists Sarah Beddington, Fabian Birgfeld, and Rene Gabri and Erin McGonigle of e-Xplo, all represented in the exhibition, plus indie-film director Jem Cohen. The moderator is Associate Curator of Exhibitions Claudine Ise, who organized Vanishing Point. Vanishing Point explores the allure and melancholy of public spaces we pass through every day. These "everywhere and nowhere" places include airport and subway terminals, corporate high-rises, shopping malls, and government buildings, as well as hotels, gambling casinos, and other megaplexes that can appear at once seductively appealing and unsettlingly sterile. The artists of Vanishing Point reveal such sites' atmospheric qualities and invite us to immerse ourselves in environments that are at once dazzling and mundane.

After the roundtable, members and special guests are invited to The Belmont Building galleries for a closer look at the exhibition and the Vanishing Point Opening Celebration.

You can see Jem Cohen's stunningly shot first feature, Chain (2004), at a screening introduced by the director on May 25. You'll find many points of comparison between the landscape it portrays and the spaces investigated and interpreted in the works of the exhibition.

See the related events links at left for more about these events.


image credits

e-Xplo
Study for Sleeping Dogs Lie, 2005
Digital photograph
Courtesy of the artists

Sarah Beddington
Alley of Concentrated Happiness, 2005 Mixed-media installation with paintings, video, and furniture
Dimensions variable
Courtesy of the artist
Pictured: Still from Hotel ATM, 2004, one of the videos in the installation

Fabian Birgfeld
Las Vegas III, 2002 (detail)
1 of 3 Cibachrome prints mounted on aluminum
Courtesy of Josee Bienvenu Gallery, New York


support credits

Education season presented by
Bank One.

All education programs presented with the support of the Corporate Annual Fund of the Wexner Center Foundation.