LAMINA PROJECT
NEW YORK, USA

LAMINAproject

LAMINAproject showcases artwork by emerging and established artists that integrates ideas, images, and metaphors of science to communicate fundamental truths about the world. Some of the most innovative artists working today are fusing art and science and taking inspiration from science. The gallery draws together artists sharing an underlying philosophical rather than stylistic unity who find inspiration in the cutting edge of scientific knowledge that reveals the fundamental underlying processes of Nature and the Cosmos.

LAMINAproject artists not only show the beauty of science but also communicate how these images relate to our daily existence and can help us see beyond our current conditions. As expressions of both the patterns of the natural world and the metaphors underlying modern science, their art allows us to see beauty in the repulsive, to find knowledge in the unknown, and to observe the unseen to more clearly see our world. Their art challenges us to explore the world around us.

At VOLTA New York 2022 LAMINAproject is presenting the work of three artists: Amie Esslinger, Michal Gavish, and Jody Rasch.

Amie Esslinger is equally accomplished as a painter, sculptor, ceramist, and textile artist and that is evident when looking at her dazzling and complex mixed-media works based on motifs from microbiology. Many are constructed layer by layer, with both traditional and very unique materials, and all have a very sculptural and tactile feel to them. Esslinger’s work goes beyond the visual in terms of meaning and message and her references to microbiology are suggestive of the complicated parts and systems that compose and surround us, but cannot be seen by the naked eye. The forms found in microbiology are visually beautiful and are governed by uniform laws, yet influenced by chance and opportunity. As the artist explains, “I attempt to generate an aesthetic that echoes the complexity inherent in natural systems, while creating new mysterious organisms, both alluring and repelling.”

Amie Esslinger, Entanglement and Interludes (detail), mixed media installation, approx. 213 cm x 137 cm

For Michal Gavish, multimedia artist and former research scientist, viruses, proteins, and crystals aren’t abstractions—they are figures, objects and nano-scale landscapes. She is captivated by these minute shapes that are hidden from the naked eye, interpreting them in their intricate environments. Using innovative techniques, Gavish translates visual research data into paintings and soft installations, sometimes drawing and painting and at other times developing three-dimensional works by layering original chemical paint-combinations onto translucent fabric and fragile paper. The resulting works give presence to the microscopic living formations that we know exist but can hardly imagine. In her Neurodiversity series from 2022, the artist paints neurological portraits which make visible the fact that nobody is really neurotypical; our brains are infinitely complicated and each is unique.

Jody Rasch’s work is drawn from various science practices, including astronomy, biology, and sub-atomic physics. In his subject matter and techniques, Rasch builds on historical concepts and follows in the footsteps of artists such as Kandinsky, Dali, and Picasso and movements from Pointillism and Constructivism to Dada and Surrealism that were influenced by science. Abstract yet recognizable to scientists, the stunning patterns and colors in his drawings and paintings elevate the movement and behavior of their subjects. Particle showers are painted as glowing traces of post-collision movement, the blueness of Einstein’s ring is accentuated, and skin cells are transformed into a vibrant multi-color wonderland. Rasch brings images to a more human scale by enlarging the infinitesimally small or closing the distance to cosmic phenomena, making these hidden and remote elements of the universe relatable to our existence in it. As an expression of both the patterns of the natural world and the metaphors underlying modern science, his work reminds us that there’s more to the universe than meets the eye.