Coke Wisdom O'Neal: Happy Little Accidents

About

This exhibition marks a moment of departure from O’Neal’s regular pattern of working. On October 29, 2012, O’Neal’s Red Hook studio suffered total destruction. Tools, books, completed artwork, and unfinished pieces were ruined. And yet, as the floodwaters receded, a series of old family slides emerged reborn. Instead of accepting them as lost, O’Neal rescued the slide sheets to scan and print. Before this exhibition, O’Neal was experimenting with abstraction and studying Warhol’s Oxidation Paintings, but he was questioning a photographer’s relationship to abstract mark-making. The hurricane ultimately provided the freedom to let go of what he was holding onto—both metaphysically and physically.