About the exhibition

Join us for the exhibition reception of “Disobedience is Not Careless” by Jen Mazza in the James Gallery on Thursday, September 20, 2018, from 6-8pm with a special poetry reading by Jess Laser.

What does painting specifically do? Painting has been a mode of public expression throughout many systems of culture and politics, and as Theodor Adorno noted, painting contains sedimented time. It is a slow medium, unfolding as it works on and with the viewer. The material of paint is itself a language, that because of its specific materiality, proportion, and location, creates friction. In the contemporary moment when all images seem recognizable, painting stands aside from the digital realm. Painting is a site where viewers may experiment with piecing together constellations of meaning from fragments. In today’s visual culture, such a practice of precise looking and questioning is “disobedient,” in the words of Robert Duncan’s poem The Law. Examining a painting offers a valuable slice of time to wrestle with what we assume we know about visual language and to question what we take for granted in making meaning. 

The exhibition and related programs “Disobedience is Not Careless” is a project with painter Jen Mazza that explores language and quotation through painting, philosophy and poetry, curated by Katherine Carl. The exhibition and series of programs is open from September 12 to December 15, 2018.

The Center for the Humanities, CUNY Graduate Center