JIM CONDRON: DIMINISHING RETURNS
THE SILBER ART GALLERY Sanford J. Ungar Athenaeum | Goucher College
Jim Condron: Diminishing Returns incites viewers to examine the application of the economic principle of the law of diminishing returns to art and art making in the 21st century. The sculptural works in the show reference farming practices and consider the framework by which the economic concept of the law of diminishing returns was founded and explained. The agriculturally based sculptures and abstract paintings also investigate the law of diminishing marginal utility. A highlight of the show is a sculpture made from a vintage 1940s General GG tractor in a bed of Red Bird Peppermint Puffs. Visitors are invited to experience the principle of diminishing marginal utility by eating as many of the candies as they like.
“Thinking about the economic concepts diminishing marginal returns and diminishing marginal utility and the extent to which they apply to art raises interesting questions about how one can view art from the artist’s, consumer’s, and museum curator’s perspectives.”
– Dr. David W. Findlay, Pugh Family Professor of Economics of Colby College, ME.
Through the paintings in this exhibition, Condron presents a haptic convergence of scale, size, color, texture, and dimensionality. The works explore how the physical size of a painting impacts the meaning and power of a work of art for both the artist and the viewer. The paintings in the show are hung in succession, both vertically and horizontally, from the largest works to the smallest works. It is the artist’s hope that as the viewer confronts the exhibition and then each painted canvas, the importance of the scale and size of the work diminishes, and the viewer is absorbed in the experience of each individual work of art. The sculptural works in the exhibition, constructed from vintage farm equipment, are poignant reminders of America’s rich, though tainted, agricultural past and the economic challenges American farmers face in the year 2018 at a moment in history when the commodification of art is unregulated.
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Mental excitement was apt to send me with a rush back to my own naked land and the figures scattered upon it
Subsequent experiences with rattlesnakes taught me that my first experience was fortunate in circumstance
I could never lose myself for long among impersonal things
2018
2017
vintage plow, felt, paper, wool, plastic, foam, fur
oil on linen
34” x 72” x 22”
30” x 36”
2017 acrylic, plaster, wool, latex, on canvas 58” x 70“
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Their beauty shone out too boldly against a conventional background 2018 vintage tractor parts, fur 30” x 30” x 34”
JIM CONDRON: DIMINISHING RETURNS JANUARY 30 – MARCH 25 ARTIST’S RECEPTION Friday, February 9, 6–9 p.m. PANEL DISCUSSION, “DIMINISHING RETURNS: A DISCUSSION OF THE ECONOMICS OF ART” Friday, March 2, 6–7:15 p.m. Merrick Lecture Hall, Dorsey Center The artist, Jim Condron, will be in conversation with Doreen Bolger, former director of the Baltimore Museum of Art, David Findlay, Pugh Family Professor of Economics, Colby College, and Laura Amussen, Goucher College’s director of exhibitions and curator. COVER: It opened with the melancholy reflection that, in the lives of mortals, the best days are the first to flee, 2018, 1940s vintage General GG tractor, fur, paper, plastic, acrylic, oil, Red Bird Peppermint Puffs, 72” x 120” x 54”
THE SILBER GALLERY
Sanford J. Ungar Athenaeum GALLERY HOURS
DIRECTIONS
11 a.m. to 4 p.m. Tuesday – Sunday 410-337-6477
Baltimore Beltway, I-695, to exit 27A. Make first left onto campus.
The exhibit is free and open to the public. The Silber Gallery program is funded with the assistance of grants from the Maryland State Arts Council, an agency funded by the state of Maryland and the National Endowment for the Arts, and the Baltimore County Commission on the Arts and Sciences.
18350-6969 01/18
WWW.GOUCHER.EDU/SILBER