William Lamson : Experiment

Robischon Gallery presents New York artist William Lamson in his first solo exhibition in Colorado. Aptly entitled "Experiment," Lamson's current exhibition features the artist's investigational photographic and video works. Physically engaged in elaborate "studio tests" and creative play in distinctive outdoor locations, the works are both compelling and entertaining. Represented in the exhibition by several different series including "Interventions," "Sublunar," "Actions" and "Me in America," Lamson employs gigantic paper airplanes, balloons, bubbles and air pistols that serve as preposterous foils in his comic, yet poetic vignettes. In the video Emerge, one by one, colored balloons gurgle to the expansive surface of the sea where they drift away before making their solitary ascent. For the "Actions" series, the artist, masked with a deadpan expression, stages ingenious and humorously diabolical set-ups targeting black balloons as his unsuspecting subjects.

Lamson's series entitled "Me in America" was featured in part this past winter in Robischon Gallery's "Out of Place" exhibition as well as in "Art on the Edge" at the New Mexico Museum of Fine Art in Santa Fe. Using his body as an element in the landscape, Lamson segues from the traditional role of landscape photographer as observer and elects to inhabit the terrain in a range of ways. Concealing his face in order to emphasize the physicality of his body in relation to the landscape, Lamson playfully relates to tree, forest, billboard - even a mailbox in seemingly simplistic ways both absurd and reflective. Whether represented by a balloon obscuring a surveillance camera or playfully tossing a balloon skyward to a cricket serenade beneath a night sky, Lamson is fully engaged in his environments. His wit and inimitable sensibility are played out with full commitment in each scenario. Lamson spirited work engages the viewer through humor and wonder to discover a different sense of self and place.

William Lamson received a BA from Dartmouth College and his MFA from Bard College in New York. His work has been widely shown in both solo and group exhibitions in the Eastern US with additional exhibitions in the Southwestern US and Australia and Germany.