The Kind Of Calmness Chaos Brings

Andrea Alonge

August 22 - September 6, 2020

Opening Reception

Saturday, August 22nd, 2020
6:00–9:00pm

Open Hours

Fri-Sun 12-5pm
or by appointment

Email Visit@carnationcontemporary.com
to schedule a visit

Exhibition Statement

In our current time of social distance, Andrea Alonge presents her solo exhibition about touch, intimacy, and relationships. Exploring connection with others and with our inner worlds, her practice utilizes symbols, textures, colors and patterns to express the subtle ways we relate to one another physically and spiritually.

Relationships between friends, lovers, and with ourselves color our lives and inner states. Our realities are a mosaic of chemical and mental exchanges with others and our own inner dialogues; an ever-updating download of sensations and feelings. We also give and take in our relationship to our environments; our “here” plays a role in crafting a coherent sense of place, presence, and connectedness. In times of stress, our experiences with all of these factors become heightened, and during this pandemic, the tactility of our connections becomes apparent through its absence- who do you get to touch? Where do you get to go? Our realities are influenced by and shaped by the inner worlds of others and how they are outwardly expressed; our perceptions are colored by these exchanges. As we strengthen connections with others, we gradually join our worlds, the overlapping Venn diagrams joining me and you slowly growing as we connect long-term with lovers and friends- this is how we are the same, this is how we are different, this is when we’re together, this is when we’re not.

Connections can be seen as both macro and micro- our friendships and romances can span years, and yet are made up of everyday interactions both in person and through secondary communications that make up a whole shared life. Small things make big things- atoms make up matter, matter makes up stars, stars make up galaxies. Our intimacy is a series of jokes, gestures, a million tiny knowings that fill the space between me and you. Our joy and suffering becomes the road that makes up the journey we sometimes walk alone and sometimes share. In a long-term relationship of any kind, there are valleys and peaks; the chaos of life becomes navigable only when there is a still center we can access. Are you with me in the center? Am I alone here?


Click here for a virtual view of The Kind of Calmness Chaos Brings

Bio

Andrea Alonge was born in Mesa, Arizona. She received her BFA from The School of the Art Institute of Chicago in 2013, and her MFA in Fiber from Cranbrook Academy of Art in 2015. She currently lives and works in Portland, OR and has been featured in exhibitions nationally and internationally, including most recently at Fiberart International 2019 at The Brewhouse Association in Pittsburgh, PA, Focus: Fiber at Kent State University in Kent, OH, and Form Not Function at Carnegie Center For Art and History in New Albany, IN.