BCB ART | THAT UNRULY SUN: INTERPRETATIONS OF SHAKER INTERIORS new photographs by BENJAMIN SWETT
BCB ART in Hudson, New York
16369
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16 Nov THAT UNRULY SUN: INTERPRETATIONS OF SHAKER INTERIORS new photographs by BENJAMIN SWETT

Posted at 15:54h in Current Exhibitions, Exhibitions by

 

From October 20th through November 18th  2018, BCB ART will present

Benjamin Swett: That unruly sun: Interpretations of Shaker interiors-

Recent photographs (2016-18)

 

Since the publication of his award-winning last book, New York City of Trees, in 2013, Benjamin Swett has turned his attention to architecture, particularly to the halls and rooms of buildings constructed during the 18th century by the American Shakers. The architects for this utopian religious sect, which believed in pacifism, equality of the sexes, work as a form of worship, and celibacy, took unusual steps to harness the power of daylight in their buildings. To increase productive space while elevating inhabitants’ moods and minds, designers brought “God’s light” in through large exterior windows, skylights, light wells, interior windows, doors, portholes, and reflective walls. Networks of doors, corridors, and stairways, laid out in a double pattern of men’s and women’s sides, allowed light in from many directions and let it move in idiosyncratic ways, creating an excitement and mystery of shifting beams, shadows, and pools. It was the Shakers who coined the term “borrowed light” to describe how they exploited this restless nature of light, which connects to human life yet remains independent of it, and it is this restlessness that Swett has been exploring with his camera, visiting Shaker sites in upstate New York (where the Shakers were founded during the American Revolution), Massachusetts, New Hampshire, and Kentucky to try to recapture the feeling of life in these spaces.

 

A reception for the artist will be held at the gallery on Saturday October 20th from 6-8pm.

 

Also on view will be works by gallery artists:

Meg Atkinson, Lynn Dreese Breslin, Richard Butler, Barbara Friedman, Lynn Itzkowitz,

Dan Welden – and others-.

 

Gallery hours: Thursday through Sunday 11-5 , and by appointment.

BCB ART  116 Warren Street, Hudson , New York 12534  518.828.4539   BCBART.COM