Known for her bold and provocative compositions, Margaret Curtis, who resides in Tryon, opens a new show that addresses issues surrounding a shattered social contract, looming dystopia, and creative resistance. Collide-O-Scopic/Conflate-O-Matic delivers a timely response to the devolving political climate increasingly characterized by shaming, shunning and schadenfreude. The show opens Friday, June 2 at 7 p.m. and runs through July 1 at the Satellite Gallery, 55 Broadway, Asheville.

Curtis states, “In this body of work, I’ve tried to counter this period of cultural upheaval with my own creative or artistic flux, and as open a mind as possible. This is a survival strategy more than anything. Imagery is coming at us hard and heavy. Meaning is not stable. Dystopia is looming. A singular artistic stance at such a moment seems counterproductive or maybe naïve.  Collide-O-Scopic: the singular refracts into the multiple. Conflate-O-Matic: the multiple collapses into the singular. The artist grabs onto what she can.”

Margaret Curtis’ work can also be seen at the Mint Museum in Charlotte, N.C. in a show called “Gendered,” which opens June 16. 

Born in 1965 in Hamilton, Bermuda, Margaret Curtis is a painter and visual artist. She has been creating feminist based work since the mid-1980s. Ms. Curtis’ work was featured in Marcia Tucker’s 1994 “Bad Girls” exhibition at the New Museum of Contemporary Art in NYC. Other shows include “Another Side of Modernism” at the Newhouse Center for Contemporary Art, N.Y., curated by Lilli Wei; “The Name of the Place,” curated by Laurie Simmons; numerous solo and group shows at P.P.O.W. gallery in N.Y.C. where she was represented for many years.

Curtis has been included in shows at The Brooklyn Museum, The Andy Warhol Museum, The Huntington Beach Art Center, and The Wexner Center. In 2002, her work was the subject of a retrospective at the Amelie A. Wallace Gallery at Stony Brook University in NY. Recently she enjoyed a solo exhibition at The Hickory Museum in Hickory, NC, as well as solo exhibitions at The University of South Carolina, Columbia, and The Flood Gallery in Asheville, N.C.

Critical reviews and features of Curtis’ work have appeared in Art Forum, The New York Times, Art in America, Art News, Art Issues, Modern Painters, Time Out, New Art Examiner, Interview, New York Magazine, among others. Her work is in the permanent collections of The Fine Art Museum, Western Carolina University, Cullowhee, N.C., and The Tang Museum, Sarasota Springs, N.Y. She is the recipient of the Ellen Battell Stoeckel Fellowship, Yale Summer School of Art, Norfolk, Conn., and The Predmore Award from Duke University, Durham, N.C., where she graduated Magna Cum Laude. She taught painting at The School of Visual Arts, N.Y., for several years, and has been on the boards of both The Flood Gallery in Asheville, N.C., and The Upstairs Gallery in Tryon, where she currently resides.

– article submitted by Tracey Daniels