Magical Realism Revisited

Magical Realism is a term largely attributed to a 20th Century literary genre best represented by South American writers like Gabriel Garcia Marquez, Borges and Isabel Allende, but in fact it was coined by the German photographer, art historian and critic, Franz Roh in 1925 to describe paintings that blended fantastical elements with realistic ones. Magical Realism became a strategy, both in literature and in the plastic arts that conflated a dreamworld with a waking one, abstraction with representationalism, that which is certain with the unknown. It is a genre whose profound influence on global culture continues to this day in many forms.

This exhibition brings together a diverse group of artists, from different cultural heritages and backgrounds who in the 21st Century have, in their own way, not only arrived at some of the original qualities and tactics of this genre, but have also helped to evolve it. Spanning the gamut of mediums these artists probe the threshold between the real and imagined. Through distinct techniques, palates and socio-cultural motifs each of these artists employ psychological, mystical and historical tropes to construct both collective and personal worldviews. In light of our current global situation- steeped in persevering hardships of seemingly biblical surreality- this show offers bothh a satirical escape as well prophetic omen to more strangeness to come.