NEW YORK, NY.- Ulterior Gallery is presenting the first New York solo exhibition of work by Margaret Meehan: Bare teeth. Grow wings., on view through May 26.
The exhibition explores variations on the motifs that Meehan has drawn from her research: birds and women who act like an army of dissidents, or a murder of crows. The artist asks, “When we gather together, do we move as an unkindness of ravens or a flock of songbirds?” Turning the marginalized into defiant feminists, Meehan builds a wisecracking parliament of owls. The exhibition utilizes ornithology as a source for freedom and flight.
Meehan makes use of texts or photographs that are historically and culturally charged. Upon entering the gallery, viewers will find feathered creatures giving the bird, a gaggle of girls with exaggerated incisors, and a hood and two protesting wings sewn from a vintage pink parachute. A sound piece (a collaboration with David Coccagna) weaves together the calls of ravens and songbirds.
In Bare Teeth. Grow Wings., Meehan continues her investigation into otherness and teratology, linking feminist protest with the metaphorical invocation of another ancient species. The exhibition—consisting of ceramic and mixed-media sculptures, collages, drawings, and a zine that animates a call to arms—will invoke both the monstrosity of rage and its potential for transformation.
Born in the 1970s and educated in the 1990s during the emergence of third-wave feminism and the Riot Grrrl movement, Margaret Meehan is interested in cycles of representation—in particular, the tendency for women to be depicted as monsters. Meehan’s work undertakes a research-based, multidisciplinary exploration of difference, aggression, and love. While much of the work draws from film, music and popular culture, it also references folklore and traditional crafts. Meehan’s work has been shown at ArtPace San Antonio, the Modern Art Museum of Fort Worth, the Dallas Museum of Art, as well as Flowers Gallery in London, Conduit Gallery in Dallas, Soil Art Gallery in Seattle, and David Shelton Gallery in Houston. Awards and residencies include the Nasher Sculpture Center Microgrant; the Lighthouse Works Fellowship, Fishers Island, NY; Bemis Center, Omaha, NE; and the Dozier Travel Grant, Dallas Museum of Art, TX. Her work has been featured in The Guardian, Sculpture, and Artforum.
