Gallery Spotlight - Byron Black - Ex Cathedra

Black uses dynamic compositional structures and a range of materials and styles in this collection of works. Found object constructions and digital drawings aren’t the most compatible mediums stylistically, but each provides the right vehicle for an exploration of chairs and their symbolic significance. In the drawings and paintings in this exhibition, Black explores power dynamics as shown through the relationship between chairs and their human counterparts. To sit, in many instances, is a privilege. A sign of influence, status, wisdom, justice, or even corruption. When we sit, how we sit, and where we sit is significant. An armchair can simply be a restful place for contemplation, or a throne of action and intrigue. The “seat of power” is at the heart of our political and religious institutions and, as such, is a source of conflict and the reward for victory. Chairs can suggest stability and balance, but what about one that is not firmly grounded? Or flipped upside down and its occupant upended? Unoccupied chairs also have significance too. An empty school desk suggests absence and presence simultaneously – the ghost of a figure, perpetually bound to a prescribed pose.