Abbott and Costello Meet Frankenstein

source: newyorker

Can slapstick be eloquent? Is screwball poetic? These questions arise in this wonderful if elliptical selection of objects and photographs by the young New York artist, whose cultural references bounce from Gertrude Stein to Preston Sturges. The key to unlocking the show’s willful mysteries may lie in a blink-and-you’ll-miss-it found object: a tiny doll-size pipe affixed to a brick wall like a readymade René Magritte. A neo-Surrealist, Fitzpatrick infuses the familiar with uncanny meaning by shifts in scale, doubling images (note the big silhouette of a pipe cut out of foam core) and surprising juxtapositions. A case of the last is seen in a saw thrust into the wall, supporting a fake hunk of Swiss cheese. It’s titled “Abbott and Costello Meet Frankenstein.”
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source: artyaleedu

Ms. Fitzpatrick attended the School of Visual Arts and the Whitney Studio Program. She has had recent solo exhibitions at Bellwether, New York and La Galleria at La MaMa, New York. Her work has been in exhibitions at The Center on Contemporary Art, Seattle; ICA: Philadelphia; Los Angeles Contemporary Exhibitions; Brent Sikkema; Orchard; Participant; Art in General; Colgate University, Hamilton NY; Jack Hanley, San Francisco and Sandroni Rey Gallery, Los Angeles. She has contributed work to the publications Artforum, North Drive Press and Interview Magazine. She is the recipient of grants from Art Matters and the Jerome Foundation. Her work can be found in the Saatchi Collection and The West Collection.
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source: aptglobalorg

Daphne Fitzpatrick was born in Long Island, New York, in 1964. Selected exhibitions include A Roll in the Hay at Bellwether in New York (2007); Shared Women at Los Angeles Contemporary Exhibitions (LACE) in Los Angeles (2007); Little Triggers at Cohan and Leslie in New York (2003); Private View: Daphne Fitzpatrick/Nancy Shaver/Amy Sillman/Kara Walker at Brent Sikkema in New York (2001). Daphne Fitzpatrick lives and works in Brooklyn.

Daphne Fitzpatrick’s practice is rooted in the historical and aesthetic concerns of the flâneur, the 19th century literary figure traditionally pictured as a dandy gentleman wandering the city streets. The flâneur defines itself in opposition to the speed, production, and values of modern urban life, stubbornly engaged in cultivating a refined aesthetic position dedicated to appropriating the overlooked and marginalized aspects of the urban landscape. For Fitzpatrick, the flâneur’s contemporary stance is romantically symbolized with an oversized photograph of worn high-top sneakers—the mark of contemporary urban travels. Fitzpatrick conflates a hobo sensibility with the care and attention of fine craftsmanship. Whether appropriated, foraged, or recreated, each of her works connects back to experiences within an ever-changing urban environment. Fitzpatrick combines appropriated images, found objects, photographs, sculpture, and video, building complex narratives littered with banal joke shop humor, sexual puns and perverse poetry. As Helen Molesworth wrote, Daphne Fitzpatrick is “reimagining…the commodity as a kind of Surrealist-inflected game piece…[she] uses the castoffs of spectacle culture to create delicate, Lilliputian tableaux inflected with visual puns”.