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Book of Lies: Volumes I, II, and III
This project has been supported by grants from the
Foundation for Art Resources, the Southern California Institute
of Architecture (SCI-Arc), Public Access Press, the Graham Foundation, and the LEF Foundation
Comprised of 81 works by 78 artists in three volumes, The Book of Lies exhibition is the result of a 16-year art project conceived and organized by artist Eugenia Butler to explore private and public forms of deceit.
With works by artists Kim Abeles, Lita Albuquerque, Steve DeGroodt, Jill Giegerich, Seth Kaufman, Tom Marioni, Kim McCarty, Michael C. McMillen, John Outterbridge, and William T. Wiley, among others, this exhibition examines the lie as a human strategy using examples drawn from life situations including childhood, love, and war. Butler has conceived each volume as a collectively themed artwork examining particular kinds of lies.
The exhibition includes 3 sound works and 3 video works, including a project by participating artist, Madame X, that captures a series of dinners among Butler and her artist friends. In 3 Lies Dinners, Butler asks her guests to consider the questions, what is the lie with which I am most complicit, and what is the truth that most feeds my life? This work asks the viewer to contemplate how one can think and act clearly in a culture of lies, whether the deceptions are private or public.
A pioneer in the conceptual art movement of the late 1960s, Butler’s recent exhibitions include The Arc of an Idea, a retrospective survey of 35 years of work at the Ben Maltz Gallery at Otis College of Art and Design, Los Angeles, and A Laboratory With Velocity, a 25-person conversation on the future that took place at the William Andrews Clark Library, UCLA, supported by the French government.
Image:
John Outerbridge, Untitled, 2004, collaged small box sculpture, mixed media, 3 x 2 x 1-1/2 inches.
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email | call Robin McCarthy at 626.577.9696 extension 300 |