Press Release: Cornelia Parker

05.15.97

THE INTERNATIONAL ARTIST-IN-RESIDENCE PROGRAM

NEW WORKS: 97.2

Michael O'Malley ?N ANTONIO, TEXAS

Cornelia Parker ?NDON, ENGLAND

Exhibition: June 19 ?ly 20, 1997

The International Artist-in-Residence Program sponsored by ArtPace, A Foundation
for Contemporary Art | San Antonio presents New Works: 97.2, a series of
installations by artists living and working at ArtPace. Michael O'Malley and Cornelia
Parker were selected by the March 1996 IAIR Program Panel, consisting of Elizabeth
Armstrong, David Avalos, Dana Friis-Hansen, Thelma Golden and Maaretta Jaukkuri.
Rhode Island-based Albert Chong was also selected for this residency, however, due to a
family emergency, he withdrew his participation. Work produced by the artists during
their six-week residencies will be exhibited in New Works: 97.2, which opens to the
public on Friday, March 14, 1997.

Cornelia Parker

London-based Cornelia Parker was born in 1965 in Cheshire, England. Parker has had
numerous solo exhibitions, including shows at Chapter, Cardiff, England; The
Serpentine, London; Eigen + Art, Leipzig, Germany; and Chisenhale Gallery, London.
She has participated in many group shows, including Material Culture at the Hayward
Gallery in London; and the 22nd International Biennial of Sao Paulo in Brazil.
In the past few years, Parker's reputation has grown as one of Britan's most engaging
artists, and she has just been selected as a finalist for the Tate Gallery's infamous Turner
Prize.

For her installation in New Works: 97.2, Parker has continued her
explorations of natural science, history, and allegorical images and texts. Working with
the remains of a church that had been struck by lightning, Parker has suspended charcoal
residue from the gallery's ceiling in an abstracted, weightless mass. The piece, titled
Mass, is a continuation of Parker's series of "exploded" works, however,
Mass uses an "act of God" as the explosive device, in an attempt to formalize a
temporal event. The minimal black cube of charred lumber in the dimly lit gallery creates
a somber, pensive space, allowing the viewer to bring his or her own reading to the piece.

In a third gallery, O'Malley and Parker are exhibiting objects made during their
residency. O'Malley has branded the walls with the iron rebar that was removed from the
concrete floor in his installation. Parker is exhibiting a new series of drawings, made
from poisonous snake venom and their anti-venom serum, in Rorschract forms, and
drawings made from the tarnish of Samuel Colt's soup tureen and Jim Bowie's soup
spoon.

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