Artist Jerry Ropson and curator Emily Falvey on building Ropson’s solo exhibition
“What happens when you tell a child they have no future?” Artist, educator, and writer Jerry Ropson explores this question in his debut solo exhibition, a place of safety, previewing Sept. 25 at the Owens Art Gallery. Ropson’s work engages with rural communities, making artwork created for specific spaces using mixed-material installation. He developed the exhibition with the Owens’ director-curator Emily Falvey. Last week, the pair had a question and answer with The Argosy about a place of safety:
Q: Emily, you’ve been at the Owens since 2018. Where does a place of safety fit into the plan of Owens?
FALVEY: Over the next few years, we’re shifting our focus to a more regional emphasis, and Jerry’s a local artist from Newfoundland. We did a sector research project with ArtsLink NB, which showed that New Brunswick artists face very high levels of poverty and don’t have a lot of opportunities to show their work. It also lets us cut back on shipping, greenhouse gases, and the other things that come with a wider project.
Q: Jerry, how does this exhibition tie in with your tenure here at Mt.A?
ROPSON: This is my first solo exhibition at the Owens, and my first fully developed project presented in Sackville. It’s the first time I’m not working toward a specific site, instead coming from more of a mental site. Most of it was made here in Sackville, and in some ways, it’s the first body of work I’ve made for this place, even though the impetus is still rooted in my upbringing in rural Newfoundland.
Q: Emily, what made this body of work the one you wanted to bring to the Owens now?
FALVEY: I wouldn’t say it was this specific body of work. I’d seen documentation of his exhibitions, installations, objects he’s made and sold, and publications. I knew his approach was really interesting because it speaks to things I’m concerned about: place, critiques of capitalism, ideology critique. I also trust him.
When you have a good relationship, you can do something slightly more creative, flexible, and uncertain, and that’s important to Jerry’s practice because he embraces uncertainty.
ROPSON: Emily’s nailing it. I really embrace uncertainty. I love figuring it out, even in the final moments, and that’s in the objects, not just the installation. I can never let things settle. I’m always returning to forms. This body of work is something I’ve been circling for a while. The last four years, I have been locking in on it and following different avenues, some dead ends, which will be revealed in the reading room.
Q: The premise starts from a stark question: what happens when you tell a child they have no future? Which, while seeming bleak, presents the idea as a curious exploration about what happens after the end. Was that balance intentional, or did it emerge from the work?
FALVEY: It emerges from the work. We kept coming back to two things: that question, and the Mark Fisher quote, “It’s easier to imagine the end of the world than the end of capitalism.” The idea of play in the face of despair was intentional. Children have their own perspective on what it means for the world to end. If you’d told me as a child that the world was ending, I would immediately have imagined a scenario, which is the opposite of the end. That’s thinking forward.
Q: If someone only had 20 minutes in the gallery, what’s one thing you’d want them to notice?
FALVEY: The thing I’m most curious to see is the wooden pieces. But the most dramatic element will be the skeleton.
ROPSON: I try not to be prescriptive, but if I were to prescribe an experience, I’d want someone to come and sit in there alone, in the high-wall gallery, and just be with the work. Hold a piece of wood in your palm. Experience the space quietly, listening and observing closely. Return the wood to its place, and leave.
Q: Are you releasing anything alongside the show?
ROPSON: There will be a performance later in the semester, probably early November. I’ll present a performance I’ve written specifically for this body of work. Then it opens into a performance cabaret, where community members are invited to present their own work.
FALVEY: And there’s a forthcoming publication.
a place of safety previews Sept. 25 at 7 p.m.