
a Collaborative Work by Beatrix Ost & Michelle Gagliano
william king museum of art
abington, virginia
december 7, 2023 - april 7, 2024

Artists Michelle Gagliano and Beatrix Ost have collaborated on a body of work in the midst of an unprecedented pandemic. Inspired by the differing narratives in one another’s work, the artists aim to listen and respond to each other, similar to the “call and response” arrangement found in jazz music. The culmination of their collaboration has resulted in multiple works created together, as well as their individual work juxtaposed and exhibited together, and an immersive film experience. Conscious of how few female artist collaborations there have been in the past 50 years, Gagliano and Ost are having a “conversation” through the shared canvas. While Ost’s work belongs to the surrealists, Gagliano’s work belongs to the abstracted landscape. The combination of the two narratives makes visible their connection on canvas and sculpture.
Collaboration as an Act of Intimacy: The vision is to show the connectedness between humans and nature - the psychological influence of the seasons, and the power of two minds. Many of the collaborative paintings were created using a technique that artists call “Cadaver Exquisite” to create together in a chamber of intimate respect. Ost and Gagliano would pass paintings back and forth without explanation or instruction - for a common thought of impact.
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These works celebrate humans and nature in all in that shared unspeakable yearning of survival. The vision of this exhibition is a teaching one. Gagliano is the alchemist of light and Ost is the visionary of the future. The exhibition opens in the abstract and falls into surrealism as a manifest of surprise, into the museum’s catalog of our mind. Reality is the only moment that is true; everything else is surreal. Daring to Be, daring to Become. Anger is a tremendous energy source; some use it as a fire to burn and destroy, others use it as fuel to build and ignite. But, the beauty of sitting with an empty mind, there is no place an artist would rather be than here, and now, so the artist can see herself where they all together are.
​The exhibition will include five parts, plus an introductory entrance space. The number 5 represents many aspects in life - the human body and our physical world (5 major continents). 5 major color themes are also throughout many of the works.
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The complete installation includes over 90 artworks. This exhibition is a completely immersive experience that also embraces all of the other four senses beyond the visual. Though not interactive, the sense of touch is represented by the vibrant textures of the works both as sculptural installations and paintings. There is also an audio soundtrack playing in each of the rooms - seducing the sense of sound with a symphony of music and nature sounds. For the sense of smell the natural scent of roses from rose oil will fill the experience. For taste, images of food and sculptural food items will be presented- real dried mushrooms and real baked bread.
" If you look up the tree
you look directly into heaven.
Think of the hidden entanglement
it took for him to grow... "
THE FILM
This film is a digital creation sprung out of the collaborative art of Beatrix Ost and Michelle Gagliano. A surrealist dive into the immediate realities of humanity’s affect on Earth - imploring us to pay attention, asking us to look deeper at our personal effects on our internal and external environments. How can we make our individual and collective lives more meaningful, beautiful, and with heart? What will it require for us to know we are all an integral part of nature?
Directed and Produced by Abel Okugawa Wright
Music by Red Flower Lake
THE EXHIBIT

THE PROMISE

“My beloved children, I promise you a future like an emperor’s child.”
The floor in this room is covered with black rice, a historical allusion to the Chinese tradition of Emperor’s forbidden black rice, only available to the upper class. ​Gilded objects from nature like stones and sticks are buried in the rice, symbolizing the preciousness of our nature. We want to offer this plentiful rice as nourishment to all children.​ Five gilded chairs sit in the center. Five is a recurring motif throughout the exhibition: five continents, five colors of the Olympic flag, and five parts of the human body. ​The chairs and rice create a hopeful tableau. But, gilded branches above cast a shadow over them. Paintings from the “Nature Nurture” series are on the walls to contemplate.
Tableau 1 - Collection


SYMBIOTIC TANGO


In “Symbiotic Tango”, our conversation continues with a continuing path of black rice with five additional gilded wooden chairs and objects from nature. The five chairs once sitting in serenity in the previous room have now tumbled askew. The seats of humanity are now at level with the rice and objects of nature. This room also holds a collection of five groups of nine paintings, each made with one color of the Olympic flag. Hidden within the abstract paintings are endless treasures and situations. The work required to interpret each scene practices the viewer to look deeper into nature itself, and the endless treasures hidden there. The title of each panel of each work completes a unique poem for each set of 5 paintings.
Tableau 2 - Collection
Room 3 // Nature Nurture
In this room, the viewer is presented with a huge installation of Hanging Spheres: 5 various sized balls of gilded twisted vines containing golden objects representing 5 major continents of the world. Each of these balls are suspended above 5 ceramic bowls that have been broken and then repaired using Kintsugi treatment all resting on white rice. Surrounding the installation is a series of 5 paintings titled “Nature Nurture”. The chairs and black rice of beauty are replaced with bleached white rice dotted with plastic objects. Sitting among this are the broken and partially repaired clay bowls of differing sizes and forms. Above the tainted rice hangs gilded spheres of twigs which appear as beautiful jewels but are poisoned by everyday pollution inside. Each sphere contains everyday objects of humankind, like a shoe, plastic utensils, trash, toys, etc. On the walls are paintings attempting to excavate the form and beauty of nature, but which are also threatened by a kind of human decay


NATURE NUTURE
In this adjacent space, the viewer is presented with Hanging Spheres: five various sized balls of gilded twisted vines containing golden objects representing five major continents of the world, but you can see these spheres are poisoned by everyday pollution objects of plastic holding them inside. Each one contains everyday objects of humankind, like a shoe, plastic utensils, trash, toys, etc..
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Below on the white rice are the five broken and partially repaired clay bowls using Kintsugi treatment. Some of these bowls contain a piece of bread.
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Surrounding the installation is a series of five paintings titled “Nature Nurture” for the viewer to take in plenty of food we used to have. The paintings are attempting to excavate the form and beauty of nature, but now is threatened by our human abuse.
Tableau 3 - Collection

BEAUTY IS HARSH

This room is flanked by two large canvas curtains painted with earth and holding sculptural masks (ceramic faces), embroidered mice. A table adorns the center of the room made of gilded wood surrounded by 5 bails of hay. The table contains another ceramic bowl - this one not fully repaired with its cracked pieces falling around it containing a large loaf of fresh baked bread. Text adorns the wall of Beatrix Ost’s “Beauty is Harsh: Thoughts and Ongoing Inspirations”. This room also includes two sets of natural paintings by Michelle Gagliano and a painting by Beatrix Ost.
The room welcomes visitors with its floor covered in straw. In the middle stands a modest gilded dinner table, holding aloft a large cracked bowl within which a loaf of bread sits. The straw underneath is the discarded waste left over from our daily bread. Within the straw also lays the shattered remains of broken bowls, symbolizing the scarcity of food. Beside the scene are two large linen wall hangings. Each curtain is decorated with scenes of the circus of irresponsibility, painted with Red Earth Clay. The wall hangings also feature clay face masks and embroidered dead mice. Gilded sticks and leaves also hang suspended in this chaotic scene of human folly and nature’s perseverance. Abstract paintings depicting the reclamation of nature hang on either side of the entryway, as well as another painting portraying the king of nature’s possession of the Amazon.
Tableau 4 - Collection

LOOK FROM THE EDGE

Here in our tableau we are presented with a straw goddess sculpture lying supine on a metal cart. The straw figure rolled in gilded bindings is adorned with dried mushrooms. In the center of the room is “The Truth in the Roots” - held in place by a gilded human chair. The place is completed with another series of seven paintings titled “Perpetuity Question”. Somewhere in the straw sits a little cart, on it an anvil with an egg on top. This is the strength of nature and our fragile world.
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The floor is once again covered in straw as viewers walk in on the reclining form of the straw body. Straw is symbolizing the last leftover our bread is made of. The body is partially gilded; she lays on a wheeled gurney and is burdened by a corset of lead. Mushrooms sprouting out of her body are signaling nature taking over. The lead corset is reminiscent of lead poisoning of misuse of our medicine. Among the straw at the visitor’s feet are plastic objects of artifice killing our planet. Lovely and seducing looking packaged food and medicine are scattered here and there. The paintings on the walls depict scenes of personified nature, angry at its injury by man’s hand. Blocking the exit stands “The Truth in the Roots”, gilded and exposed. From the roots hang human hands as if to be a warning. It is an altar of devotion to Nature’s immeasurable beauty. But it is threatened and solemn, asking to be protected and recognized. Dangling from the ceiling are two human forms “Into the Unknown” in black plastic. The work speaks to the weight that we carry and the baggage that we hold. What are you carrying with you? Can you let it go?
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“The Oracles of New York / Listen, See, Scream” is the farewell. This is a way showing us to think as human beings, What we can do to help? What still can be recreated? What can we still do for our children’s future? For the future of our existence? We need to listen, see and scream louder. We need to listen to the wisdom of the indigenous people and turn around our world of industrious achievements.
Turn it, turn it, turn it …