Anne Buckwalter: Two Story House

Friends Indeed Gallery and Rebecca Camacho Presents are pleased to announce a dual venue exhibition of new paintings by Philadelphia based artist Anne Buckwalter. Inspired by the culture and folk-art traditions of her Pennsylvania Dutch heritage, Buckwalter’s intricately detailed, small scaled domestic spaces serve as a framework to explore themes of gender identity, intimacy, and the body. Exposing the contradictions, pluralities and dualities coexisting in one orderly space, Buckwalter allows for things that are often perceived as disparate to live harmoniously together – documenting elements that suggest a wholesome, conservative household alongside elements alluding to sexuality, eroticism, and female hygiene.

Titled Two Story House, the exhibition emphasizes duality. Structured in a split-level home, Buckwalter’s paintings delve into doubles, pairs, opposites, and other twosomes. Either technically, in Red Room and Dollhouse where the compositions are bisected into two equal spaces; conceptually, in Rainforest Documentary where the tonal temperature shifts from the warm jungle to an austere winter landscape; or literally, in Five O’Clock News or View from the Backyard where bodies sensually embrace, the works create nuanced environmental duplicity.

Throughout the exhibition figures and personal effects appear and reappear painting to painting, lending an atmosphere of familiarity to the home. A red glove casually discarded in one setting is seen again in another. A singularly featured alarm clock is observed anew in a larger midst, one element in an ongoing dialogue. The ease and recognizability of Buckwalter’s environments concede an intimacy that is both exciting and awkward. Shifting perspective between voyeur and participant, interior and exterior, the viewer is in continuous proximity to quiet, private moments of comfort and titillation.

In support of the exhibition, Anne Buckwalter engaged in a public zoom dialogue with Veronica Roberts, Director of the Cantor Arts Center at Stanford University, on Tuesday 12 July at 1pm PST.