Shhhhhh is an updated and more ambitious version of a neon piece that I first exhibited at Kavi Gupta Gallery, in Chicago in 2012. The piece investigates the space between a word and a sound – Shhhhhh a familiar expression that gently commands silence. We are used to being shushed in a contemplative or institutional public context like a church, library, or museum. By transforming Shhhhhh into physical text ( a large sign formed in neon) and directing it towards the space outside a public building, the meaning shifts: who is requesting silence and why? Who is shushing who?
Special thanks to Spectrum Neon for their support of the project.
NOTE: This installation has been relocated to the facade of the G.R. N’Namdi Center for Contemporary Art located at 52 E. Forest, Detroit, MI 48201.
Scott Reeder is an artist who’s work has been shown widely including exhibitions at Saatchi Gallery, London, Gavin Brown’s enterprise, NY The Museum Of Contemporary Art, Chicago, and Luce Gallery, Turin, Italy. Recent solo exhibitions include Lisa Cooley, New York, the Museum of Contemporary Art, Chicago; and Kavi Gupta, Chicago and Berlin. In addition to his artistic practice, Scott has an active curatorial practice with his brother Tyson Reeder and wife Elysia Borowy-Reeder including exhibitions at White Columns, NY, The C.U.E. Foundation, NY, Frieze Art Fair, London, and Kölnischer Kunstverein in Cologne, Germany. Reeder’s work has been reviewed in Artforum, Art & Text, Art Review, FlashArt, Frieze, The New York Times, Art News, Art In America, TimeOut, The Village Voice and The New Yorker. Reeder was born in 1970 in Ann Arbor, Michigan. He lives and works in Detroit. He is an Associate Professor in painting at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago. In January 2014, Reeder debuted a major project at 356 Mission Road, Los Angeles. This multi-faceted exhibition revolved around the production and screening of a feature length film which Reeder has been working on for over eight years. Reeder is currently in post-production for this film, Moon Dust, which will premiere in NYC Fall, 2014. www.lisa-cooley.com