Kristin Nason
Exeunt Omnes
February 1 - 28, 2020
Exeunt Omnes — or ‘all go out’— is a Latin phrase which comes to us from the theater, indicating that all actors should leave the stage. This directive is visible on the final page of an open book in William Hogarth’s 1764 engraving, The Bathos, depicting a fallen Angel of Death surrounded by broken objects. Bathos is a Greek term for a sudden change in tone from the sublime to the ridiculous.
The horror and humor of Hogarth’s engraving is brought into dialogue with other images and objects in a new body of work by San Diego-based artist, Kristin Nason. A diver, a stunt double, a plumber, a fountain, a tavern at the end of the world — these and other elements address the uneasy traffic between the ‘meat world’ and the ‘spirit world’ (M. John Rebennack, aka Dr. John).
‘What does it mean to be a squishy being in a world with hard edges?’ This question is at the heart of Nason's practice and these new works continue this call, with responses that oscillate between ‘gravity and grace’ (Simone Weil).
Born in Boston, Massachusetts and raised on Cape Cod, Kristin Nason received her BFA from UMass Amherst and her MFA from the School of the Art Institute of Chicago. In 2019, she and her husband, John Murphy, opened Island Farm Press in Cherokee Point, San Diego, a print workshop with a focus on fine art screenprinting and artist-in-residence program.
