Buffalo, NY – Beginning February 27, the Albright-Knox Art Gallery will open two new exhibitions, For The Love of Things: Still Life, and Torey Thornton: Sir Veil. On February 26, at 7:15 pm, as part of the Emerging Voices Lecture Series, the museum will present a free talk with artist Torey Thornton where he will discuss his practice with Godin-Spaulding Curator & Curator for the Collection Holly E. Hughes. 

For the Love of Things: Still Life 
During the seventeenth century, still life painting surfaced as a distinctive thematic genre. For nearly five hundred years, the appeal of its flourishing flora and abundant fare has remained constant. For the Love of Things: Still Life, selected predominantly from the Albright-Knox’s renowned Collection, considers the more recent history of the form. 

In the twentieth and twenty-first centuries, meticulousness has given way to new mediums, such as photography, the moving image, and, more recently, large-scale installations. Where objects were once elegantly rendered in careful brushstrokes, they are now larger than life, fragmented and reassembled. 

This is the third exhibition in a series of Collection-based installations that consider the trajectory of traditionally defined genres in art and how they continue to flourish while often being challenged and, in many ways, transformed. This exhibition is organized by Godin-Spaulding Curator & Curator for the Collection Holly E. Hughes. 

Torey Thornton: Sir Veil
Torey Thornton’s (American, born 1990) purposely ambiguous imagery is nestled between abstraction and figuration. The result is a distinct visual tension that characterizes his pictorial spaces. This mini-survey exhibition considers Thornton’s process and the important role language, both graphic and visual, plays in his practice.

Thornton intentionally confuses the viewer by manipulating the conventional approaches to building a composition. His imagery will often trigger what the mind wants to see versus what may actually be present. Through morphing shapes and chromatic anomalies, familiar content becomes questionable. Thornton’s titles are equally paradoxical, often emanating from a personal reference. For Thornton, they present another opportunity to continue playing beyond the canvas and to create an ulterior dialogue for the object.

Thornton was recently included in Artsy’s “16 Emerging Artists to Watch in 2016.” Sir Veil is Thornton’s first solo museum exhibition. This exhibition is organized by Godin-Spaulding Curator & Curator for the Collection Holly E. Hughes.

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