Travis LeRoy Southworth
Where I End And You Begin #3

Mixed Greens is pleased to announce a site-specific window installation by Travis LeRoy Southworth. In his first solo project in New York City, he will use all three of Mixed Greens’ exterior windows to create one large, glowing Duratrans piece.

Growing up in a military family, Southworth developed an interest in shifting space, both physical and emotional. Working as a photo-retoucher, he eliminated imperfections such as blemishes, shadows, dust and the other unsavory elements in photographic portraits. As an artist, he combines those two very disparate parts of his life to make artwork that moves beyond conventional representation and redefines portraiture.

For this site-specific project, Southworth photographed the faces of twenty-four individuals—mounters, collectors, curators and artists—whom he met in the art world since moving to New York two years ago. Then, utilizing his photo-retouching skills, he developed a meticulous and satisfying process that left only the imperfections in each photo. The resulting collection of fragments and stray marks becomes the final Twombly-esque, minimalist, digital portrait.

Where I End and You Begin #3 combines all of these fragmented portraits into one finalized work. Southworth’s “self-portrait” lives at the center of the piece and the other “portraits” spiral out. A solar system begins to take shape with the people he knows best orbiting closest and those less familiar living at the outer fringe.

Inside the gallery, visitors can view a video project that animates the erasure and ultimate explosion of Southworth’s self-portrait. Over the course of the animation, his complete portrait dissolves and is swallowed by the white of the screen. While the window installation is a clean, lyrical representation of Southworth’s art world, the video highlights the more tedious and absurd aspects of digital manipulation. It demonstrates the compulsive process and more performative elements in the work.

Travis LeRoy Southworth was born in Honolulu, HI and now lives and works in Brooklyn, NY. He received a BFA from the University of Arizona, Tucson (2004) and an MFA from The School of the Art Institute of Chicago (2007). In 2009 alone he showed at Vox Populi in Philadelphia, PA; Bronx Museum of Art, New York; Real Art Ways, Hartford, CT; Evanston Art Center, Evanston, IL; and Arthouse at the Jones Center, Austin, TX among many other venues. He received a BRIC Media Arts Fellowship and he was chosen for the prestigious AIM Program at the Bronx Museum. In 2008, he participated in the documentary TV series ARTSTAR: Season Two that followed six recent MFA graduates through their transition from school to becoming practicing artists in New York.

For more information, please visit travisleroysouthworth.com.


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