September 1 - October 1, 2023

Opening Reception: September 1, 5:30 - 7:30pm

Gallery Paule Anglim is pleased to present Terry Allen's newest masterwork GHOST SHIP RODEZ: The Momo Chronicles, an exhibition of mixed media sculpture, drawings and performance on video. The central video sculpture features a filmed performance by actress Jo Harvey Allen. 

 

GHOST SHIP RODEZ: The Momo Chronicles is inspired by an episode in the life of French legend Antonin Artaud, revolutionary artist, playwright and actor. Artaud believed a walking stick in his possession to be the staff of Jesus Christ handed down to St. George, and in 1937 departed to Ireland to return the stick to its rightful home. In Dublin followed Artaud's dramatic mental breakdown where he was arrested and deported to France. The violence and madness of this journey (he was chained, in a straitjacket, to a cot in the hold of the ship) form the thematic core from which Allen's work departs.

 

No one has ever written, painted, sculpted, modeled, built, or invented except literally to get out of hell. - Antonin Artaud

 

Central to the gallery exhibition is the large sculptural installation, Ghost Ship 2010, a bed frame with sails floating on a sea of books. Video images project onto the books and sails. In a separate room a video projection of Jo Harvey Allen's performance, "Daughter of the Heart" gives voice to Artaud's spirit as recreated by Allen.

To accompany the sculptures Allen created mixed media works on paper using collaged objects. Groups of these framed colorful drawings comprise Smile (Momo Chronicles), illustrated musings into the mind of Artaud.   

 

The inner life of any true artist has the traits of three essential characters: children (they are innocent), criminals (they break rules), and the insane (they inhabit another world). Artaud lived this construct precisely, consistently reaching beyond everything... whether in word, image, object or performance.  - Terry Allen

 

Artaud has long been an interest to Allen since his first introduction in San Francisco to an Artaud Anthology at City Lights bookstore in the 60's. Allen was so fascinated by Artaud's compelling face that owner Lawrence Ferlinghetti gave him the book.

 

Terry Allen is a renowned artist, musician and songwriter. His works have been exhibited internationally, and he performs frequently in the US and Europe. His artworks are in the collections of New York's MoMA and Metropolitan Museum of Art, as well as in San Francisco's MOMA and the Los Angeles County Museum of Art and MOCA LA. He has released eleven albums of his original music and GHOST SHIP RODEZ (A Radio Play) is available on CD.

 

Allen's Artaud-inspired work has been in development since 2005 when the theatrical piece was first commissioned by Les Subsistences Laboratoire International (in Lyon) and Houston's Texas-French Alliance. It was shown at the Massachusetts Museum of Contemporary Art (MASS MOCA) in 2008, and both performance and exhibition were mounted in Santa Fe in 2010, at the Lensic Theater and SITE Santa Fe, respectively.  Later this year the work will be performed in San Francisco.  

 

Upcoming...

Ghost Ship Rodez

A theatrical performance

Written by Terry Allen

Starring Jo Harvey Allen

At Z Space in Project Artaud