September 2 - October 17, 2021

Periphery Space @ Paper Nautilus is delighted to present Convergence, a collaboration between artists Serge Marchetta and Masha Ryskin. Convergence is the duo's tenth collaboration; this exhibition shows a suite of new abstract mixed media panels made during Ryskin's extended visit to Montreal in winter 2021, after nine months of separation. Made in the confined space of a small apartment, they describe the experience of making the work as: "[…] providing an escape to an expanded imaginary space. Put together, these paintings become fragments of thoughts, longings, and conversations."

Masha Ryskin (Providence, RI) and Serge Marchetta (Montreal, QC) met in 2009 at a residency at CAMAC Contemporary Art Center, France, and have been working jointly since 2010. Together, they have participated in numerous collaborative international residencies. Their work has been exhibited in solo and group exhibitions in the United States, Canada, The Netherlands, Finland, and Slovakia. Most recently, an exhibition was reviewed in Art New England.

In conversation with the artists the question of how they happened to choose each other to collaborate with and how they view the collaboration in regards to their individual work, they replied:

When we met at the CAMAC Contemporary Art Center, we saw that we shared common aesthetic and conceptual concerns. We also felt that our processes had the potential to be complementary. At the same time, we had tremendous respect for each other's work, which is crucial in any collaboration. We began with a series of works on paper and gradually expanded to include video and installation.

Collaborative work allows us to develop a distinctive vocabulary, which at the same time enriches and expands our personal work.

Statement

Serge Marchetta and Masha Ryskin’s collaborative practice stems from investigations of memory, a sense of place, and displacement. They are interested in the memory of a place evidenced by traces of presence in a landscape, both urban and rural. Utilizing a variety of materials and processes, they manipulate the space through the use of drawing, light, and shadows. In their video work, they explore subtle shifts in movement that occur in space over time. The viewer is invited to be aware of the subtleties of one’s surroundings, providing space for contemplation and reflection. Marchetta and Ryskin’s new line of inquiry is loosely aligned with immigrant artists who deal with the relationship between place, history, and identity.

Ryskin and Marchetta’s collaborative process is symbiotic and is a melding of their identities and ideas. They are able to explore the work together in an intuitive manner, allowing for an awareness of both their thought processes. This allows for more intertwining of the vocabulary, where it is not always possible to separate the individual ideas and visual language. While one meticulously plans, the other responds, then the roles flip. The collaborative process provides an opportunity to expand their way of thinking and fosters cooperation and flexibility. They have sometimes divided the roles, with Marchetta providing the geometric framework and Ryskin weaving between the framework and the architectural space in a more organic manner. Regardless of methodology, the conceptual framework of the practice is always collaborative.

This body of work was made during Ryskin’s extended visit to Montreal in winter 2021, after 9 months of separation. Made in a confined space of a small apartment, the pieces provide an escape to an expanded imaginary space. Put together, these paintings become fragments of thoughts, longings, and conversations.

Bios

Masha Ryskin is a Russian-born painter, printmaker, and installation artist. Her work has been exhibited both nationally and internationally. She holds a BFA from Rhode Island School of Design and an MFA from the University of Michigan and is on the faculty of Rhode Island School of Design. Ryskin has worked and taught in the United States, Europe, and Indonesia and is a recipient of numerous grants and awards, including the Rhode Island Artist Fellowship and two Fulbright Awards, a Student Fellowship to Norway and Senior Scholar Award to Israel. Ryskin teaches drawing at Rhode Island School of Design. She is a recipient of 2015 Rhode Island Artist Fellowship and the Distinguished Scholar Fulbright Award to Israel in 2021-22.

A graduate of Université du Québec à Montréal, Serge Marchetta has participated over than forty solo and group exhibitions in Montreal, the Province of Québec, Europe, and the United States. He participated in residency programs in France, Italy, Iceland, and United States. He is also a recipient of numerous grants from Fondation Ténot, France, Conseil des arts et lettres du Québec and Société de Développement des Entreprises Culturelles du Québec. In addition to his artistic practice, Marchetta is a curator and is a founding director of C2S Arts et Evenements, a non-profit organization in Montreal that organizes public art events in Montreal as well as residencies in schools and senior communities.

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Interview

Abby Goodman interviews Masha Ryskin and Serge Marchetta on their show “Convergence” at Periphery Space @ Paper Nautilus in the fall of 2021.

Goodman is an artist and educator based in Brooklyn, NY.

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Abby Goodman: Themes of memory, sense of place, and displacement inform your collaborative works. How does working together remotely affect this narrative? For example, does location alter the outcomes of your collective works?

Masha Ryskin/Serge Marcheta: Our work is always informed by the place where we are working. In most of our projects, we react to our surroundings. In this exhibition, it was more about yearning to be somewhere else while we were stuck in perpetual quarantine in a small space.

AG: There is a dialogue created through the use of repetitive marks and gestures in these works.

Were these markings initiated as a result of the collaborative process, or did each of you bring your own distinct styles of mark-making to the work?

MR/SM: It is a bit of both. Each of us brought our own language into the collaboration. Over time, some of it began to merge. In some cases, we are no longer able to tell whose marks they are. There is always a tension between Masha’s organic and Serge’s minimalist vocabulary but sometimes the roles are reversed.

AG: How have these marks developed over the course of your partnership? Are these elements unique to each piece or series, or do they continue to resurface as part of a continuing conversation?

MR/SM: It depends on the project. In this particular exhibition, we are continuing the work we have been developing for some years now. In other pieces, like in our Tangle of Time installation at a former synagogue, the form was dictated by the space and its history, although the drawings in that installation were definitely a continuation of our previous collaborations.

AG: What are some of the major differences between your individual working styles? How has that played a role in the creation of these cohesive works?

MR/SM: Our individual working styles are vastly different. Serge is a planner. Most of the time, he needs to have everything sketched out in advance. Masha, on the other hand, organizes everything in her head and then jumps directly to the piece. These differences have actually proven to be very useful in our collaborations, as we have both processes working in tandem.

AG: Has working collaboratively influenced your individual practices, and if so, how?

MR/SM: We have started asking ourselves each other’s questions as we work on our individual projects. We have also began adopting some of each other’s visual language. At the same time, our individual work stays distinct from our collaborations.