Pae White plays exuberantly with the boundaries between art and design. She is influenced by all things Californian—from West Coast modernism, to the glitz of Hollywood, to the cult of sunshine and leisure. White looks carefully at the objects that populate our world, with equal interest in popular culture and "high" art. She has an amazing ability to transform materials: her wonderfully hybrid objects claim a quirky social space. White’s hypnotic paper mobile, for example, is partly a hip, formal play on modernism; partly libertarian decoration; partly a brilliant evocation of nature. Might it be a metaphor for a sunlit rain shower? a windswept flock of birds?

White amplifies the "artfulness" of everyday things, to use her term. Books, advertisements, barbeque grills, a shopping bag, even a theatre curtain become the objects of her witty elaborations and re-constructions. She looks far beyond the question posed by Charles Eames: "Who ever said that pleasure wasn’t functional?"

White titled this exhibition after a favorite teen novel by John Neufeld, Lisa, Bright and Dark, 1969, © SG Phillips. The installation is organized, accordingly, into a "bright" and a "dark" gallery, which suggest opposite psychological moods. The artist thus refers to the complexity and the duality of the human psyche—to our propensity to swing between the "bright" and "dark" sides of our natures. In the "bright" gallery, three of White’s signature paper mobiles become a magical forest of lively colors and free-floating whimsical shapes. In the "dark" space, richly hued objects of weighty materials like bronze and cast iron create a meditative, somber environment. Throughout, White’s intricate craftsmanship will charm viewers, along with her inventive use of surprising materials, from electro-luminescent wire to real spider webs.

The catalog accompanying this exhibition is the first major U.S. museum publication on White’s art, which is widely shown abroad. Designed in close consultation with White, it includes an interview by Hans Ulrich Obrist, co-director of exhibitions and programs and director of international projects at the Serpentine Gallery, London, and texts by Cassandra Coblentz, implementing curator, and Marilu Knode, originating curator and now assistant director, F.A.R. [Future Arts Projects], Arizona State University, Tempe.

^{Organized by the Scottsdale Museum of Contemporary Art. Sponsored by the Peter Norton Family Foundation and the SMoCA Salon.} 

Pae White, Tapestry/red, (detail), 2005, cut paper collage, 42 x 369 inches. Courtesy of the artist and greengrassi, London. © Pae White.

May 17, 2008-
September 7, 2008

Gerard L. Cafesjian Founder's Gallery, SMoCA