Carl Solway Gallery Features a New Portfolio by Jay Bolotin at the IFPDA Print Fair 2014

JAY BOLOTIN The Book of Only Enoch   at Carl Solway Gallery/IFPDA 2014 November 5-9, 2014 Carl Solway Gallery · Booth 106 Park Avenue Armory 643 Park Avenue at 67th St. New York, NY 10065 Opening Night Preview Wednesday, November 5, 6:30 - 9 pm Fair Hours Thursday, November 6, 12 - 8 pm Friday, November 7, 12 - 8 pm Saturday, November 8, 12 - 8 pm Sunday, November 9, 12 - 6 pm Carl Solway Gallery presents The Book of Only Enoch, a new portfolio of twenty combined woodcut and etching prints by multi-disciplinary artist Jay Bolotin. The portfolio is in an edition of  twenty (with five artist’s proofs). Of the twenty prints, seventeen measure 23 x 31.5 inches, one folded print measures 46 x 31.5 inches, and two folded prints measure 63 x 23 inches - all drawn and cut by Jay Bolotin over a four year period, 2011-2014.  A catalogue of the portfolio is available at the booth. The Book of Only Enoch is a remarkable tour de force of printmaking that combines Bolotin’s written text printed as etching amongst woodcut images depicting the story of Only Enoch, the son of the only Jewish coal miner in Kentucky. As described by writer and critic Ilan Stavans, “The protagonist is Only Enoch, a sensitive Jewish boy in Kentucky who is named after an apocryphal [i.e., non-canonical] book left out of the Hebrew Bible…It is said that Enoch was the only human who could reach into heaven and spy upon angels.” The Book of Only Enoch is a mesmerizing visual and language pilgrimage, an ambitious journey through the Kentucky landscape with all its mysterious topography, strange human characters and animals passing along the way making up Only Enoch’s universe. Ilan Stavans, in his essay, Jay Bolotin’s Phantasmagoria, continues, “Jay Bolotin’sPhantasmagoria, however, is, more than anything else, an astonishing visual feast and it needs to be understood in artistic terms. As far as influences go, one thinks of William Blake, particularly the dualism of Marriage of Heaven and Hell. As a pre-romantic, Blake was drawn to the Bible but was critical of institutionalized religion, as Bolotin seems to be.” Jay Bolotin was born in Fayette County, Kentucky in 1949. He attended the Rhode Island School of Design and then apprenticed with sculptor Robert Lamb. He is known for works that cross multiple disciplines. Bolotin’s visual work is represented in collections including Museum of Modern Art, New York; Museum of Contemporary Art San Diego; Seattle Art Museum; Cincinnati Art Museum; Pennsylvania Academy of Fine Art; Australian National Museum in Canberra; Georgia Museum of Art; Smith College Museum; University of Richmond Museum and the collections of Bucknell and Vanderbilt Universities. Bolotin is a prolific songwriter, performer and filmmaker. Bolotin composed the opera Limbus: a mechanical opera, for which he wrote the score and created the set. This opera was produced in 2001 at the Opera Theater of Pittsburgh. He has contributed music to dance productions, films and documentary television programs. His songs have been recorded by Dan Fogelberg, Porter Wagoner, Dickey Betts and David Allen Coe. Bolotin’s first motion picture, completed in 2006, titled The Jackleg Testament, part one: Jack & Eve, is believed to be the first movie constructed from woodcuts. It won “best animation” at the 2007 Santa Fe Film Festival. The movie, along with all its source material, has been the subject of many solo exhibitions at museums in the US, with special screenings in England, the Pokoleniy Theater in St. Petersburg, Russia, and the Festival Internacional De Animacion in Valparaiso, Chile. 424 Findlay Street Cincinnati, OH 45214 Tel 513.621.0069 solwaygallery.com Gallery Hours: Monday – Friday 9:00-5:00 Saturday noon-5:00pm

Julia Wachtel Exhibition Opens at the Transformer Station in Cleveland

Opening October 11 from 12 - 5 p.m.

Landscape No. 15 (mutant ninja chernobyl), 1991. Julia Wachtel (American, born 1956). Oil, flashe and screen ink on canvas; 152 x 335 cm. ©Julia Wachtel. Photo: Alan Wiener. Private collection. 

Artist Talk: October 11, 2 p.m.
Transformer Station 

Born in 1956 in New York, Julia Wachtel lives and works in Brooklyn. Active since the early 1980s, Wachtel became known for her paintings employing cartoon characters appropriated from sources as everyday and relatable as greeting cards and magazines, deliberately commenting upon our quickly evolving visual culture. Often comprised of multiple panels, her paintings also include pop stars, figures from so-called primitive cultures, and scenes from Hollywood films.

“This exhibition will survey Julia Wachtel’s career from the 1980s until now,” said Dr. Reto Thüring, associate curator of contemporary art. “It will include early paintings that juxtapose outlandish cartoon figures and politically charged imagery to her most recent works, which continue to investigate the ever-increasing pace and complexity with which images proliferate and merge."