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Revealing/Concealing
October 17 @ 12:00 pm - November 30 @ 5:00 pm
Free
GearBox Gallery
Revealing/Concealing
Featuring: Jules Campbell and Rachel Major
Dates: October 17 to November 30, 2024
Artists’ Reception: Saturday, October 19, 1-4pm
First Friday: November 1, 5-8pm
Artist Talk: Saturday, November 16, 2pm
770 West Grand Ave, Oakland, CA 94612
Contact: [email protected]
(510) 271-0822
Gallery Hours: Thursdays-Saturdays, 12-5 pm and First Fridays, 5-8 pm
Gearbox Gallery is pleased to present Revealing/Concealing, an exhibition by member artists Jules Campbell and Rachel Major. By juxtaposing their unique approaches to process-based abstraction, Campbell and Major’s paintings are steeped in a study of surface and the passage of time. Campbell hones her compositions by combining collage, painted layers and extensive sanding to create surfaces that reference an industrial roughness in their neutral hues. In contrast, Major’s vibrant drip paintings suggest an accumulation of color; giving the viewer thin slivers to look into and beyond, as if peering through blinds…or out to sea.
Campbell’s paintings emerge from experiences living in and navigating urban environments, from London to San Francisco, with side trips to reservoirs, wooded trails and marinas. In this recent body of work, precision counterbalances process, as she further explores the interplay between fabricated materials and structure and inevitable decay. Artificial color resonates against layered detritus honed to topographical nuance by repetitive abrasion and layering. Relying on process and a keen sense of composition, Campbell’s work is imbued with a sense of stability and presence.
A continuation of Major’s “Drip Painting” series, this new series involves both covering up and exposing, precarity and chance. The paintings consist of layers built up by dripping paint onto canvas. Whereas her last body of work was dominantly black and white, in this series Major is broadening her palette by exploring some color basics- primary, warm/cool, rainbow.
About the artists:
Born and raised in Pembrokeshire, South Wales, Jules A. Campbell started her creative career as a graduate of The New College of Speech & Drama, London, UK (now an affiliate of Middlesex University). Well-traveled and passionate about performing and visual arts, Campbell ultimately settled in the San Francisco Bay Area, participating in numerous exhibitions through the years. In 2015 Campbell became a founding member of GearBox Gallery in Oakland, where she now maintains a studio, exploring the beauty and grit of the urban environments she embraces as an inspiration.
Rachel Major is originally from Toronto, Canada She is a graduate of the Ontario College of Art
and Design and the Nova Scotia College of Art and Design and earned her MFA from Mills
College in Oakland, CA. Major has been a member of Gearbox Gallery in Oakland CA, since
2021. In her work, Major explores the complex relationship with food through various media,
including sculpture, painting, and photography. Currently, she is focusing on creating paintings
by dripping paint onto canvas to examine themes of covering up, exposing, and control. Her
work has been exhibited across Canada, France, and the United States. Major also works with
San Francisco Art Education Project, and SFUSD teaching art to children in San Francisco
public schools.
About Gearbox Gallery:
GearBox Gallery is an artist-run contemporary art gallery dedicated to showcasing the work of its members and a broad range of regional contemporary guest artists, fostering community and education through intellectual and cultural exchange focused on the visual arts. We are located at 770 West Grand Avenue in Oakland, California.
