Artist & Architect Duo Repurpose Materials Through Community Interaction for a Thought-Provoking Installation at Scottsdale Museum of Contemporary Art

Jean Shin and Brian Ripel: Unlocking Oct. 9, 2010 – Jan. 2, 2011

Jean Shin and Brian Ripel, Unlocking, process image, 2010.
Courtesy of the artists. Photo: Brian Ripel © Jean Shin and Brian Ripel.


SCOTTSDALE  – Artist Jean Shin sees value in the things most of us discard. She creates dynamic sculptural installations using immense accumulations of unexpected materials ranging from empty plastic prescription pill bottles, to mountains of losing lottery tickets, to forgotten trophies. The lost, used or discarded objects soon become reformatted and repurposed under her artistic vision to call attention to the complex social contexts these materials conjure. For the upcoming fall exhibition Unlocking, Shin and longtime collaborator architect Brian Ripel will create a new project for SMoCA focusing on something we all possess—keys. Shin and Ripel have discovered an uncanny visual relationship between the horizontal profile of traditional keys and the Arizona landscape. They have involved the community by collecting old keys that people no longer use. These keys hint at the lost spaces we all have in our lives. Shin and Ripel will also map a vast network (both personal and professional) of people based on the keys they share. Through drawing, sculpture and video projection, Unlocking will offer multiple perspectives on the ways in which we are connected to one another and will reveal layers of meaning embedded in the social community and the physical environment that we share.

Jean Shin and Brian Ripel, Unlocking, process image, 2010. Courtesy of the artists. Photo: Brian Ripel © Jean Shin and Brian Ripel.




ABOUT THE ARTISTS:

Shin has exhibited at preeminent American art institutions including the Museum of Modern Art in New York and the Smithsonian American Art Museum in Washington, DC., as well as the New Museum of Contemporary Art, the Museum of Art and Design and the Asia Society Museum in New York, the Museum of Fine Arts, Houston and the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston. She has also received numerous public art commissions including a permanent project for the Metropolitan Transportation Authority, Arts for Transit Commission in New York and the George H. Fallon Federal Building in Baltimore, MD, a recipient of the GSA Art in Architecture Program, the percent for art program of the federal government. She is the recipient of the 2008 Fellowship Award in Architecture /Environmental Structures from the New York Foundation for the Arts. The Unlocking exhibition at SMoCA will be her first major museum project in the western United States.



Ripel is an architect and founder of RSVP Architecture Studio. Since 2003, Ripel has worked frequently with Shin, collaborating on numerous art installations for galleries, museums and other commissions. In addition to his professional practice, he is an adjunct professor at Pratt Institute in Brooklyn where he coordinates the undergraduate Architectural Media and Communications Program. He has won numerous awards, most recently Interior Design magazine's "Best of Year Merit Award, Casual Restaurant” and a 2010 New York State Council for the Arts Independent Project Grant. Ripel earned a M.S. in Advanced Architectural Design from Columbia University and a Bachelor of Architecture from Pratt Institute.


Organized by the Scottsdale Museum of Contemporary Art.
Sponsored by SmithGroup, Paul Giancola and Janis Leonard Design Associates.

ABOUT SMoCA:

Mission: The Scottsdale Museum of Contemporary Art champions creativity, innovation and the vitality of the visual arts. We seek to build and to educate audiences for modern and contemporary art, as well as to provide opportunities for the artistic community – locally, nationally and internationally. SMoCA provides a memorable experience of art, architecture and design by exploring new curatorial approaches and by highlighting cultural context. We interpret, exhibit, collect and preserve works in these media.



The Scottsdale Cultural Council, a private, non-profit 501(c)(3) organization, is contracted by the City of Scottsdale, Arizona, to administer certain city arts and cultural projects and to manage the City-owned Scottsdale Museum of Contemporary Art, Scottsdale Center for the Performing Arts, and the Scottsdale Public Art Program. The programs of the Scottsdale Cultural Council are made possible, in part, by the support of members and donors and grants received from the Arizona Commission on the Arts through appropriations from the Arizona State Legislature.