Ruminations
A solo exhibition by 2021-2022 Artist-in-Residence Nancy Daly
March 3 - April 7, 2022
Important Dates
Artist Talk: Ruminations on Ruminations, March 1st at 6:30PM Black Box Theater at Loyola’s College Center
Residency & Collaborative Piece Making Period: March 21-25
Closing Reception: March 31st, 5-8PM in the Gallery
Image: An Ode to #PolishMountain
Date: 2020- , Dimensions: 7 x 9 x 4 inches, Medium: Nail Polish, Plaster
Prismacolor Hot Pink, Date: 2022, Medium: Prismacolor Hot Pink on Paper
Papermate Inkjoy Teal Tryptic, Date: 2022, Medium: Papermate Inkjoy Gel 0.7 Teal Pen on Paper
Micro Orange 05, Date: 2022, Medium: Micro Orange 05 Pen on Paper
Title: Aluminum Foil Ball, Date: 2020- , Dimensions: 4in x 4in x 4in, Medium: 100 yards of Aluminum foil, Black 3.0 $1500
Exhibition Statement
To ruminate is to mediate or muse, to ponder, to brood. There is no completion to the thought, there is only the thought, performed over and over, often resulting in increased anxiety. It is simply the act of thinking, the work of thinking, with no conclusion. “Ruminations” is a series that labors over the ideas of work and time in the era of late-stage capitalism. It explores the absurdity of this era, the impulse for constant productive action, and how this changes our relationship to time. The works in “Ruminations” are visualizations of time wasted. The series is split into two sections, “Ruminations on Work” and “Ruminations on Time.”
“Ruminations on Work” are all solitary durational performances in which I perform a single action simply for the sake of performing the action. All of the sculptures in the series could be described as documentation of these performances, completed between 2019-2022. Although the actions reference a productive, purposeful form of work, the products of said work in this case are pointless, non-functional objects. The actions are repeated, sometimes to a point of destruction – absurdity to challenge the notion of productivity. They are documented and presented here as complete objects representing a specific period of time, although they could be added to ad infinitum.
The lone piece from “Ruminations on Time,” “Melt: Still Life with Ice Cream Sandwich,” acts a reminder of our relationship to time.A video of an ice cream sandwich melting over the course of 8 hours. The piece draws attention to the idea that it might be more difficult for us to contemplate our own mortality if the food substances around us don’t behave how they should.
Artist Bio
Nancy Daly is a Washington, D.C. based interdisciplinary artist whose work examines how the development of the online social world is affecting identity and social behavior. Repetitive action and the subsequent build-up of material and information to an absurd degree is a common theme in her work, reflecting the vast quantity of information that we are bombarded with every second. Daly earned her MFA in Photographic and Electronic Media at the Maryland Institute College of Art (MICA) and holds a BFA in Studio Art with a concentration in Graphic Design from James Madison University. She was a D.C. Commission on the Arts & Humanities Fellowship Program grantee from 2016-2021 and is an alumni of the Hamiltonian Artists Fellowship Program in Washington, D.C. (2014-2016). Her work has been exhibited nationally with 15 solo and two-person exhibitions including: American Miniature at artspace, Richmond, VA (2020), 621 Gallery, Tallahassee, FL (2019) and Pellissippi State Community College, Knoxville, TN (2019); Existential Wreck Room at Hamiltonian Gallery, Washington, DC (2017); About 286,000,000 Results atVisArts, Rockville, MD (2015); Subject to Terms and Conditions at School 33, Baltimore, MD (2013). In addition to her studio practice, Daly is the co-founder of but, also, an artist-run business dedicated to the sustaining of art practices, in a multitude of forms, through a series of short-term projects whose mission is to support all the aspects of an artistic practice that surround the making of art.
Artist Talk
Ruminations on Ruminations