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John Ruppert - Drift

John Ruppert - Drift

C. Grimaldis Gallery is pleased to present Drift, an installation by Maryland artist, John Ruppert. Through sculpture, video, and photography, Ruppert focuses on the wonders of the natural world and our role in its impermanence.

Ruppert’s ongoing Bergs series pairs found Vermont slate rocks with their mirrored aluminum castings. This juxtaposition of natural materials and man-made forms continues the artist’s investigation of human intervention. By simultaneously hiding and revealing his process-based practice, Ruppert provides the viewer with a harmonic balance between the earth’s own creativity and man’s effort to celebrate such vision. Floating above the surface of his scattered rock forms, Ruppert plays video documentation of melting ice. The slate and aluminum respectively absorb and reflect the projected light, creating movement that preserves the experience of encountering semblance in nature. The installation is then encompassed by photographs of the melting arctic landscape. Ruppert zooms in on a particular moment, highlighting both the temporality of these structures and the awe of their compositions. Taken during a 2019 Arctic Circle Residency in the International Territories of Svalbard, these images divulge environmental urgency and the phenomenon of change.

John Ruppert has exhibited widely at institutions in the US and abroad including the UMBC’s Center for Art Design and Visual Culture (Baltimore, MD), Academy Art Museum (Easton, MD), Katonah Museum of Art (Katonahm, NY), Kreeger Museum (Washington, DC), OMI International Sculpture Park (New York), Montalvo Art Center (Saratoga, CA), Weatherspoon Museum (Greensboro, NC), and DeCordova Museum (Lincoln, MA). He is the recipient of many awards and grants, as well as installations and commissions at Ladew Topiary Gardens (Monkton, MD), the Baltimore-Washington International Airport (Baltimore, MD), and The American Visionary Art Museum (Baltimore, MD). Drift is the artist’s seventh solo exhibition at C. Grimaldis Gallery. Ruppert is a Professor in the Department of Art at the University of Maryland, College Park and currently lives and works in Baltimore.

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Event Details

Tuesday, July 6, 2021, 12:00 AM – Saturday, September 18, 2021, 12:00 AM
Free

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