MoCA Westport is pleased to announce its Summer Exhibition, Élan Vital, juried by Max Teicher and Emily White of Gagosian Gallery. The exhibition will be on view from June 25 - August 21, 2021.

The general public is invited to attend the opening reception on Thursday, June 24 from 6 - 8 p.m.

The term Élan Vital represents the creative force within an organism that is responsible for growth, change, and necessary or desirable adaptations. Artist Arthur Dove, who had a studio in Westport, Connecticut, was greatly influenced by Henri Bergson and his term élan vital as he sought to make such universal harmonies, and this urge for growth and renewal, visible in his work. 

The exhibition is composed of artists selected through the Museum’s first Summer Open Call, open to all emerging, mid-career and established visual artists over the age of 18. MoCA Westport received over 200 submissions for consideration, from artists across the United States and abroad. The exhibition features eleven selected artists working in a range of mediums, including painting, drawing, prints, sculpture, ceramics and site-specific installation work.

"The artists we've selected have their own story and independent aesthetic and the concept of élan vital allows each of the artists to stand out on their own, while still creating an overall balance and harmony to the space." - Jurors Teicher and White 

Selected artists include:

· Jessica Alazraki (New York, NY)

· Andisheh Avini (Brooklyn, NY)

· William Buchina (Brooklyn, NY)

· Chase Hall (Los Angeles, CA/New York, NY)

· Asher Liftin (Brooklyn, NY)

· MaryKate Maher (Brooklyn, NY)

· Mieke Marple (San Francisco, CA)

· Alex Puz (Maspeth, NY)

· Annesofie Sandal (Long Island City, New York)

· Samuel Stabler (Athens, GA)

· Rachel Sydlowski (New York, NY)

Simultaneous with Élan Vital, MoCA Westport will support community LGBTQ+ Pride Month through two exhibitions, also on view from June 25 - August 21. 

• Unfit For Print is a dual exhibition featuring the selected works of Noah Fox and Patrick Perry. Fox is a Westport-born and raised artist whose Altered Books Series is generated from a deep fascination with books, typography, and the various theoretical conceptions of embodiment and identity that persist within culture at large. New York-based Patrick Perry’s Soft Blows Series relies on cross-stitch, foundational to the embroidery arts, in his body of artwork to deconstruct derogatory homosexual epithets.

• Love Wins features a site-specific mural created by Staples High School student Poppy Livingstone (Westport, CT) and the teens of Westport, celebrating Westport Pride and LGBTQ+ Pride Month.

Ruth Mannes, Executive Director of MoCA Westport, stated of the summer exhibitions, “Our mission is to share diverse and thought-provoking art with the community, and we are thrilled to collaborate with new partners to expand our scope and impact this summer. We thank the Gagosian Gallery for serving as jurors and curators of Élan Vital, and are pleased to also work with the Westport Pride organization for the first of many ongoing collaborations.”

The exhibitions are on view during MoCA Westport’s summer gallery hours. (Wednesday - Sunday,12 – 4 p.m.; no reservation required.) While at the Museum, check out the new Bar MoCA in the Museum’s lobby, serving up delicious cocktails and beverages.

For more information, contact Liz Leggett, Director of Exhibitions, at liz@mocawestport.org or 203/222-7070.

About The Open Call Jurists and Curators: Max Teicher and Emily White

Max Teicher and Emily White have a combined 18 years at Gagosian in New York. They both focus on exhibitions and artist development, with an emphasis on contemporary art. Emily has served on the selection committee for gener8tor Art, a 12-week accelerator program for visual artists in Milwaukee and Max is a committee member with the National Young Arts Foundation, an organization that supports teenage artists.

About The Unfit For Print Artists

• Noah Fox: Altered Books Series

Noah Fox is a Queer contemporary artist and educator born and raised in Westport, Connecticut. With a foundation in traditional bookbinding, Fox’s practice has transformed into an ongoing process of altering and transforming books on gender, sexuality, and society published within the last century. The books he alters, often published in the name of education, are alarmingly misogynistic, homophobic, and racist and includes titles such as Sane Sex and Sane Living, Female Sex Perversion, and A Parent’s Guide to Preventing Homosexuality. Through the reclamation of these texts, Fox aims to expose the ways in which the legacy of this rhetoric and miseducation persists today. 

Fox graduated from Oberlin College with degrees in Studio Art and Art History and received his Master of Fine Art from the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts. His work can be found in numerous private collections and Westport homes, and is a member of the Artist Collective of Westport. Notable past exhibitions and awards include a two-person exhibition awarded following his graduation at the Museum of the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts, featured work in Otherwise Obscured at Franklin Street Works, and received the 2019 Horizon Award from the town of Westport. 

• Patrick Perry: Soft Blows Series

Cross-stitch, foundational to the embroidery arts is used in this body of artwork to deconstruct derogatory homosexual epithets. It is through the genteel language of craft, the orderly gridded pattern, and pleasing hues of cotton and wool that grossly pejorative terms are delivered. These artworks take aim at the complex relationship between sexuality, class, social norms, and self-examination. Perry employs cross-stitch as an act of reclaiming and removing power from hurtful and prejudicial language. The artworks reference both ecclesiastical workshops where it is linked to the virtues of goodness, piety, and godliness and as women’s work for the middle and upper classes of the Victorian period. Yet, the craft is also aligned with subversion, a tool of resistance and sharing of knowledge.

Perry received a Diploma in Fine Craft in the Jewelry/Metal Arts Studio at the New Brunswick College of Craft and Design in 1997 and was a Sculpture / Installation major at the Ontario College of Art in 1998. In 1999 he received his Bachelor of Fine Art from the Nova Scotia College of Art and Design and a Bachelor of Education from the University of New Brunswick in 2000.  In 2006 he graduated from Maine College of Art with a Master in Fine Arts and in 2019 he completed a Master of Arts in Photography at Lehman College, New York. He has worked as an Exhibition Designer, Exhibition Coordinator, and Art College Instructor. Currently he teaches Jewelry, Sculpture, 3D Design and Darkroom Photography at Eastchester High School in Westchester, New York.  He has participated in a number of group and solo exhibitions in Canada and the United States.  He currently lives in New York City.