Walker Art Center, Minneapolis, MN January 29 - May 8, 2011
Contemporary Arts Museum Houston, Houston, TX July 23 - September 18, 2011
Montclair Art Museum, Montclair, NJ October 8, 2011 - January 1, 2012
Ackland Art Museum, Chapel Hill, NC January 14 - March 18, 2012
Inspired by artist Mike Kelley’s observation that “the mass art of today is the folk art of tomorrow,” The Spectacular of Vernacular embraces the rustic, the folkloric, and the humbly homemade as well as the crass clash of street spectacle and commercial culture. It explores the role of vernacular forms in some 40 works by more than two dozen contemporary artists, which run the aesthetic gamut: the hand-crafted work of Aaron Spangler juxtaposes with Lari Pittman’s carnivalesque day-glo paintings; Marc Swanson’s glittering trophy heads with Rachel Harrison’s urban relics. Also on view are photographs from William Eggleston and Shannon Ebner, who both revel in the signage and other elements of roadside culture.