July 10, 2016, New York Times newspaper, acrylic ink on wood framed in mesquite
Real, fake, contradictory – the news has been overwhelming this past year. Putting it all in perspective is a new exhibit at Allouche Gallery entitled, Turn The Line. Artist Nick Georgiou conceived of this series during the presidential campaign in 2016, when truth, lies and contradiction hit the newsstands daily, and so daily he began creating a small series of artworks from the Sunday New York Times paper.
The painting-like, literary sculpture series, grew to include other printed newspapers, discarded books, dictionaries, encyclopedias, text books, classics, romance novels, instructional manuals, and on and on – cutting, painting and meticulously positioning each, creating artworks, blending the truth or lie-of-the-day, with beloved classics and factual texts. He added color to the gray and black as a symbolic gesture of truth vs fiction.
His choice of exhibition title, Turn The Line, was inspired by the idiom “turn the page,” representing not just turning a page, but transforming it. Art, which is often used as a way to present a distasteful or divisive issue, illuminates a subject matter in a way that allows for thought and conversation. The series, Turn The Line, brings words of every kind together without judgement, fact-checking or politics. The content is simply laid, side-by-side, in colorful portrait mode – representing the sum total of who we all are.
The exhibition, Turn The Line by artist Nick Georgiou, will open at Allouche Gallery on May 24. Allouche Gallery is located at 82 Gansevoort Street, directly across the street from the Whitney Museum, and the High Line, in the Meatpacking District. The exhibit will be on view to June 25, 2017.