Burning Issues

GAME II, a collaborative exhibition featuring work by mutually inspiring mother-daughter artists Gayle Wells Mandle MFA 97 PT/PR and Julia Mandle, opens at Leila Heller Gallery in Chelsea on Thursday (all RISD friends are invited to the opening reception from 6:30–8:30 pm).

This collaborative piece – called Burning Throne – epitomizes the show.

Inspired by the Arab Spring, the Occupy movement and the 2012 presidential election – recent events that brought issues of social justice and economic disparity to the forefront – the Mandles are presenting paintings, sculpture and mixed-media pieces they hope will inspire people of all backgrounds to think more openly and inclusively about what’s going on in the world around them.

Gayle’s mixed media piece Red Carpet (47 x 47")

“By using their own techniques and technologies as tools to express concerns about social, political and environmental issues, my wife and daughter are attempting to extend viewers’ sights past the work seen in the gallery and outward towards the larger world,” notes Roger Mandle, RISD’s president from 1993–2008. Roger wrote the essay for the catalogue accompanying GAME II, which continues through February 16.

Julia’s embroidery on fabric piece Unraveling (28 x 15")