SANTA FE, NM.- Peters Projects presents two solo exhibitions by painter, Suzanne Caporael; and photographer, Laura Wilson.
Suzanne Caporaels paintings embody a distinctive style that is not easily defined. Although abstract in content, the shapes create spaces that feel familiar. Her palette, in part taken from swatches of color used in corporate identities, reinforces the idea that we are already acquainted with these pictures. The results culminate as elegant paintings that are both accessible and mysterious Caporael explores the illogic of perception in this body of work examining the act of seeing as both a physical and cultural act.
Caporael earned her Bachelors and Masters degrees from the Otis Art Institute in Los Angeles, California. She had her first show at thirty-five, when then Director Paul Schimmel debuted her work at the Newport Harbor Art Museum (now the Orange County Museum of Art). She was awarded a National Endowment grant in Painting in 1986, and has been a visiting professor at the University of California, Santa Barbara and the San Francisco Art Institute. In 2009 she was a guest artist-in-residence at the Josef and Anni Albers Foundation.
Her work is represented in many major museum collections including the Whitney Museum of American Art, New York, NY; The Museum of Contemporary Art, Los Angeles, CA; the Art Institute of Chicago, Chicago, IL; the Los Angeles County Museum of Art, Los Angeles, CA; the Milwaukee Art Museum, Milwaukee, WI; the Legion of Honor, Fine Arts Museums of San Francisco, San Francisco, CA; the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art, San Francisco, CA and the Yale University Art Gallery, New Haven, CT, among others.
Laura Wilsons photographs capture a candid point of view with subject matter ranging from the isolated Hutterites of Montana to glamorous Hollywood celebrities. Wilson has completed four books of photography and text. The most recent, Avedon at Work (2003), documents one of the great photographers of the twentieth century. Wilson was Richard Avedons assistant for six years and her photographs and journal entries show Avedons creative process, working methods, and range of subjects as he worked to complete In the American West.
Yale University Press published Hutterites of Montana (2000). The Hutterites live in isolated communal groups that shun the modern world. Historian David McCullough wrote A book such as this a book so clearly and genuinely extraordinary comes along rarely and only as a result of exceptional skill and dedication.
Wilsons photographs have appeared in the New York Times Magazine, the New Yorker, Vanity Fair, GQ Magazine, Londons Sunday Times Magazine, Wallpaper and the Washington Post Magazine.
Wilson is currently working on three projects. The first is a collection of portraits and reportage of writers, The Writers Project, for the Harry Ransom Humanities Research Center. This book will include 36 influential writers - those with a lasting literary legacy. The second, Artists at Work, is a collection of portraits and reportage of painters, sculptors and architects, which will also become a book and exhibition. The third project, Making Movies, documents Hollywood directors, screenwriters, cinematographers and actors behind the scenes.