JENNIFER LOCKE: GRAPPLE, MARCOS RIOS: DISRUPTIONS, AUG 18 - SEP 9, 2006

Queen's Nails Annex is pleased to present a solo video exhibition and premier of Jennifer Locke's latest video, Match, as well as a solo sculptural-based exhibition by Marcos Rios, Disruptions.

Jennifer Locke's current body of Video pieces, Wrestling Works, explores the dynamics of dominance and the body, drawing on her decade-long experience as a champion wrestler. Using the body as bait, she carefully constructs artist/model hierarchies. The camera is utilized to mediate this relationship and create a triangle of voyeruism. Desire is rearticulated, disciplined, and delivered through the camera′s presence, deferring unconscious visual pleasure. Locke's Wrestling Worksturns the camera on herself in the act of filming hot boys from her wrestling team. Coupled, competing bodies on blue wrestling mats reflect each other, forming a closed circuit of sweaty maleness. Multiple camera perspectives foreground scopophilic desire and invert visual expectations. Locke's framed position in these pieces as artist, object, and voyeur attempts to dominate the viewer, but is ultimately subsumed by the true dominant performer, the camera.

Jennifer Locke has exhibited in venues such as the Havana Binnial, Havana; the Basel Art Fair, Kunstalle, Basel; La Panaderia, Mexico City; Palais de Beaux-Arts, Brussels; New Langton Arts, San Francisco; Kiki, San Francisco; and Hallwalls, New York. Locke received BFA in 1991 and MFA in 2006 from the San Francisco Art Institute. Locke lives and works in San Francisco.

EXAGGERATION. STYLE. DRAMA. MYSTERY. OPERATIC.
Marcos Rios' work originates from personal experience and explores issues related to death, desire, and melancholy, but emerges in the form of humor. The use of humor in Rios' work functions as a shield against deeper emotions and attempts to mask and seperate itself from the subject matter in order to gain a more objective and critical perspective. Extreme emotion tempered by extreme trepidation forms the core of Rios' art practice. The work is convoluted, often involving hidden meanings and obscure references to film, music, and literature. Currently Rios takkes inspiration from the spirit and aesthetic of the work of Dario Argento. His work is always meticulously detailed and tends to be intimate in scale, such as 10-foot bright yellow levels or Life-size push pins. The artwork is primarily sculpture and also photography, drawing, performance, and installation. Disruptions include samples, fragments and experimentations of past and current projects. his work has been shown at Laguna Art Museum and at Los Angeles venues such as the 4F Gallery, LAX, Class C, and ACME. Rios lives and works in Los Angeles.