From Helmut Newton to Tauba Auerbach, A Summer Exhibition Highlights Artists Across Media and Generations

Summertime group shows can be a chance for galleries to experiment with new curatorial concepts and explore new ideas. At Washington’s Addison/Ripley Fine Art, the gallery has put together an exhibition highlighting the depth of the gallery’s program, that includes everything from a fashion photograph by iconic imagemaker Helmut Newton to urban landscapes by Frank Hallam Day to a photorealistic tapestry by portraitist Chuck Close.

Titled “In Edition,” the exhibition features a wide range of works created in multiples, including prints and photographs. The works in the show are arranged to spark conversations between artists across media and generations.

Such juxtapositions include the pairing of a print by Tauba Auerbach, Fold/Slice Topo 1 (2011) with Tom Orr’s three-part etching Waterfall I, II, III (2008). Created by folding and slashing a sheet of paper, then using it as the basis for creating printing plates, Auerbach’s print is full of geometric shapes and strong colors that form an almost topographic relief. In contrast, Orr’s two-color work uses the most minimal of line to suggest moving water.

Abstraction is pushed even further in a pair of works by Caio Fonseca and Louisiana Bendolph. Bendolph’s etching Shared Legacy (2007), calls to mind the rich visual geometry of the Gee’s Bend quilters of Alabama (including the work of her own mother-in-law, the accomplished quilter and artist Mary Lee Bendolph), a tradition which she carries on in her work. While Fonseca’s Three String Etching, OMBRA (2006), replaces Bendolph’s organized rectangular shapes with organic looking drip-like forms, both works share a delicate sense of color harmony and a balanced tension created by the thoughtful use of negative space.