NEWS
NEWS: JUNE
For Life: Alika Cooper - Mark A. Rodriguez
Opening Reception, Thursday, June 10th, 6-9pm
Galleria Studio Legale
Via Leonetti, 35
81100
Caserta, Italy
+39 0823 442170
NEWS: APRIL
100 Records
“100 RECORDS” ART SHOW
Gallery 16
San Francisco, Ca
April 9, 2010
Opening Reception April 9 , 6-9pm
CONTRIBUTING ARTISTS: Veronica De Jesus, Rebecca Miller, Tucker Nichols,
Alice Shaw, Paul Wackers, Chris Johansen, Kyle Ranson, Cliff Hensgst, William Wiley,
Stephanie Sykjuk,o Harrel Fletcher, Maya Hayuk,Souther Salazar, Kottie Poloma,
Alika Cooper, Nathanial Russel, Mark Todd, Maria Forde, Lisa choinacky, Esther Watson,
Rex Ray And more!
NEWS: FEBRUARY
Fuckheads - Portraiture for the Silicon Enlightenment
February 20 - March 20, 2010
Curated by Angela Dufresne
Opening reception Saturday, February 20, 6-9pm
Performance by Juliana Snapper at 7:30 during the opening reception.
Artist in the exhibition include: John Bankston, Gideon Bok, Lizzie Bonaventura,
Heather Cantrell, Geoff Chadsey, Dawn Clements, Alika Cooper, Paula Cronan,
Kevin Cristy, Jenny Dubnau, Jen Denike, Frederika Fellini, Wendy Geller,
Alexa Gerrity, Colleen Hennesey, James Huang, Whitney Hubbs, David Humphrey,
Liz Markus, Kelly McLane, Jared Pankin, Maritza Ranero, Juliana Schnapper,
Sandra Scolnik, Mike Slack, James Everett Stanley, Shannon Smith,
Fred Stonehouse, Anthony Vitti, Keith Walsh, Eric Yahnker, & Bill Vuksanovich.
Kinkead Contemporary
6029 Washington Boulevard
Culver City, CA 90232
T 310.838.7400
PAPER! AWESOME!
Curated by Brion Nuda Rosch
February 20 - March 27, 2010
Opening Reception: Saturday, February 20, 4-7pm
BAER RIDGWAY EXHIBITIONS
172 MINNA STREET
SAN FRANCISCO, CA 94105
NEWS: JANUARY
The Women of Women: The Female Form, curated by Yasmine Mohseni
January 16, 2010 - February 20, 2010
Opening Reception: Saturday, January 16, 2010 from 6-8PM
Taylor De Cordoba
2660 S. La Cienega Blvd
Los Angeles, CA 90034
THE POWER OF SELECTION, PART 1
Western Exhibitions, Chicago
Show dates: January 2 to February 6
Public Reception: Saturday, January 30, 2010, 6 to 9pm
Gallery Hours: Wednesday to Saturday, 11am to 6pm
WESTERN EXHIBITIONS
119 N Peoria St, Suite 2A
Chicago, IL 60607 USA
(312) 480-8390
scott@westernexhibitions.com
In Gallery 1
The Power of Selection, part 1
curated by Ryan Travis Christian
with Alika Cooper, Mike Rea, Allison Schulnick, Marissa Taylor, Eric Yahnker
NEWS: DECEMBER
CLOSE TO HOME
Marius Bercea, Alika Cooper, Bryson Gill, Kate Lyddon, Allison Schulnik, Jacob Tillman, George Young
Galleria Davide Di Maggio with Galleria Studio Legale is pleased to present the exhibition "Close to Home"
December 10, 2009 - February 9, 2010
Opening reception: Thursday, December 10th, 2009 6.30 pm
Galleria Davide Di Maggio
Viale Monza 10
20127 Milan/Italy
Mark Wolfe Contemporary
December 3 - 6, 2009
SCOPE Miami 2009 Booth 214
Featuring works by: Jud Bergeron, Alika Cooper, Danielle Giudici Wallis, Ryan Martin
SCOPE Miami Art Show
SoHo Studios
2136 1st Ave (Enter NW 21st St.)
Miami, FL 33127
Hours: 11am - 7 pm
NEWS: SEPTEMBER
A COLD WAVE
ALIKA COOPER
MARK WOLFE CONTEMPORARY ART, SAN FRANCISCO
September 3- October 17, 2009
OPENING THURSDAY SEPTEMBER 11, 6:30pm
"Very soon she was a star
Pretty house and shiny car
Swimming pool and a fence around
But she missed her old home town
All the world was at her door
All except the boy next door who worked at the candy store"
- Johnny Cash, Ballad of a Teenage Queen
In Johnny Cash's song: Ballad of a Teenage Queen, we are taken up into the story of a teenage beauty from a small town. She leaves her home and becomes a film star. At the end of the ballad, this fortunate woman, who found material satisfaction, but not love or happiness, returns again to her hometown and the boy she left behind, who is still at the candy store, ready and waiting for her. It is one variant on a familiar myth- where some form of inner nobility (manifested through talent, bravery, sound judgment or some other virtue) is matched by a characters rise to from a humble background to some form of fortune, power or fame. These stories work themselves out in various ways- sometimes the lost princess or prince lives happily ever after in the palace, sometimes they return to the farm, perhaps after learning a lesson about where true nobility lies (there's no place like home...).
This is also a tale that gets twisted around in the capitalist dreams and mythologies of America, where there is no clear aristocracy or obvious kings and queens. In their place, we have celebrities, tycoons and plutocrats, some are heirs or heiresses, while others struggled up from the working and farming classes and made their fortunes and marks. From the Dorothy Gale to the Great Gatsby, it seems to be one of our favorite tales, not only because it applauds our ideas of the virtues of the free markets and the frontier, but because it allows us to imagine, given the opportunity, that we can have what we want.
Looking at a group of paintings by Alika Cooper brings this meta-story to mind; fraught paintings of film stars and female celebrities, are shown alongside gouache landscapes of the outer Midwest- scenes of trailers, things left in the yard past their season. There is something in the way that each of these groups of images is rendered that keeps the viewer moving between the possible values and endings, enduring quiet shifts between them that leave questions of desire open.
Unlike so many other iterations of the tale, Coopers’ version consistently leaves out messages and morals. The groups of paintings retain the space of the story but leave out a clear direction in their internal narrative. The celebrities are ashen, their faces caught with the expressions that come in between the smiles and speeches. There is never a horizon in their world; no context surrounds them. The landscapes, though barren, reveal spaces in which a body might at least find a place to walk and sit down, a warm bed, a meal.
Which heaven? To what place are some of those driveways and fields leading to and some of the starlets looking out towards? In the end, what we are left with, the medicine cabinet or the candy store? The images reflect one another, or perhaps they look at each other from either side of a vast field. Somewhere there is a fence, and as viewers, we perch on it, looking to either side, considering what we wanted and what we got.
Text by Ted Purves
In addition to two solo shows at Wolfe Contemporary, Cooper has staged solo exhibitions at Galleria Studio Legale in Rome, and Hamish Morrison Galerie in Berlin. Her works have been featured in the Crocker-Kingsley California Biennial, the DiRosa Preserve, and Paul Morris Gallery in New York. She received her MFA from the California College of the Arts in 2006. She lives and works in Los Angeles
Mark Wolfe Contemporary Art
49 Geary Street, Suite 202
San Francisco, CA 94108
(415) 369-9404
September 3- October 17 2009
Full Color Catalog available here
Selected Works