September 13–December 14, 2014
Opening reception: Friday, September 12, 6–8pm
Mills College Art Museum
5000 MacArthur Blvd.
Oakland, CA 94613
Hours: Tuesday–Sunday 11am–4pm,
Wednesdays 11am–7:30pm
T +1 510 430 2164
Sarah Oppenheimer presents a unique examination of the artist’s artistic process and current research through previously unseen archival materials. Based in New York, Sarah Oppenheimer’s work spans the disciplinary boundaries between sculpture and architecture. She is internationally recognized for her architectural interventions that explore how space is animated and experienced, providing a deeper understanding of architecture as a constructed, social space.
For each of Oppenheimer’s large-scale spatial interventions, there is an extensive archive of material created. This includes both hand and digital drawings, aluminum, glass, and wood prototypes, three-dimensional models, light studies, and customized computer code, among other materials.
For the exhibition at the Mills College Art Museum, Oppenheimer has designed a series of tables, each highlighting an area of her process, including mapping spatial arrays, exploring the effects of multiple sight-lines, predicting the movement of bodies through architectural space, disrupting surface continuity and direction, and testing the impact of lighting variables such as reflectivity and color. Oppenheimer’s exhibit focuses on this extensive body of unseen work, highlighting a set of key projects that demonstrate the physical and conceptual specificity of her practice, particularly as it effects her current methods and ideas regarding materiality, light, perception, and spatial engagement. The exhibit includes materials from a crosssection of Oppenheimer’s projects but focuses primarily on research around two related projects: D-33, at PPOW, New York (2012), and 33-D, at Kunsthaus Baselland, Switzerland (2014).
An exhibition catalogue featuring new scholarship by Julian Rose, architect and Senior Editor at Artforum, and Stephanie Weber, art historian and curator, accompanies the exhibition. The publication documents previously unseen works featured in the exhibition.
Sarah Oppenheimer is supported by the Graham Foundation for Advanced Studies in the Fine Arts and the Agnes Cowles Bourne Fund for Special Exhibitions.
About the artist
Sarah Oppenheimer received a BA from Brown University in 1995 and an MFA in painting from Yale University in 1999. Oppenheimer’s first solo exhibition was held in 2002 at the Drawing Center, New York. Since that time, her work has been exhibited internationally. Recent projects include W-12302, an architecturally embedded permanent commission at the Baltimore Museum of Art (2012); 33-D, a double threshold at Kunsthaus Basel (2014) and a solo exhibition at MassMoCA. Her work has been exhibited at venues including The Andy Warhol Museum, Pittsburgh; the Museum of Contemporary Art, San Diego; the Saint Louis Art Museum; and the Sculpture Center, Long Island City. Oppenheimer has been the recipient of many prestigious awards including the Guggenheim Fellowship (2007); the Louis Comfort Tiffany Foundation (2010–11); the Rome Prize (2010–11) and the Joan Mitchell Foundation Fellowship (2011). She is a critic in painting/printmaking at Yale University.
Public programs
Visit mcam.mills.edu for full details.
Sarah Oppenheimer artist talk
Wednesday, September 10, 7pm
Danforth Lecture Hall, Mills College
“Fabricating Art”
A series of studio visits with local artists—Michael Arcega, Chelsea Pegram, and Stephanie Syjuco—who deal with fabrication in their practice. Details to be announced on mcam.mills.edu.
About the Mills College Art Museum (MCAM)
Founded in 1925, The Mills College Art Museum is a forum for exploring art and ideas and a laboratory for contemporary art practices. Through innovative exhibitions, programs, and collections, the museum engages and inspires the intellectual and creative life of the Mills community as well as the diverse audiences of the Bay Area and beyond.
Media contact
Maysoun Wazwaz, T +1 510 430 3340 / [email protected].
