Edy Ferguson
Born in Chicago
Lives and works in New York

Background
1996          Hunter College, MFA. Painting, Combined Media: Film, Video, Music Installation, New York
1990-1995 Art Direction. Commercial Film and Video projects:  Independent films, Music Videos, New York
1990          Parson?s School of Design.  Architectural Drafting, New York
1988          BFA.  Sculpture and Painting, Washington University in St. Louis
1982-1984 Early College Program: Drawing, Painting, Printmaking, Art Institute of Chicago


Selected solo exhibitions
2014    Coke Tragedy, Cortex Athletico, Paris, France
            Solo Show, ArtGeneve, Cortex Athletico, Geneva, Switzerland
2013    Conspiracy Theory, Bernier-Eliades Gallery, Athens, Greece
2013    America, Faggionato Fine Art, London, United Kingdom
2012    Edy Ferguson, Centre D?Art Contemporain, Geneva, Switzerland
2012    Selected Works 1993 ? Present, Benaki Museum, Athens, Greece
2008    Recent Paintings, Salon Am Hof, Vienna, Austria
2007    Post Punk Glam Rock, Sensei Gallery, New York, USA
2002    Rockumental, Suite 106 Gallery, New York, USA   
1998    Fin de siècle, Nantes Art Festival, Nantes, France


Selected group exhibitions
2012    Double Take, 2nd Biennale of Mardin, Turkey
            Parnassos, Wiener Art Foundation, Athens, Greece
            Faces, Onassis Cultural Centre, Athens, Greece
2011    Forgotten Bar, Remap, Athens, Greece
2010    Tiroler Landes Museen, Innsbruck, Austria
2009    5 x 5 Pluralism, The Mission Cultural Centre, San Francisco, USA
2008    5 x 5 Pluralism, Museo de Arte Acarigua-Araure, Venezuela
2005    Red White and Blue, Spencer Brownstone Gallery, New York, USA
2001    Song Poems, Cohen and Leslie, New York, USA
1999    Free Coke, Greene Naftali Gallery, New York, USA
1998    Oriental Nights, Gavin Brown?s Enterprise, New York, USA
            Studio Program, PS1 Institute of Contemporary Art, MOMA, New York, USA
            Video Library, David Zwirner Gallery, New York, USA
1997    PS1 Institute of Contemporary Art, MOMA, New York, USA


Perfomances
2013    Sympathy, Centre d?Art Contemporain, Geneva, Switzerland
2010    Now + Here, MIR Festical, QBox Gallery, Athens, Greece
2006    The Magician and the Exorcist, Monkey Town, New York, USA
2002    Rockumental, Suite 106 Gallery, New York, USA
2000    Heavy Energy Machine 2: Imperialist Games, Momenta Art, New York, USA
1999    Heavy Energy Machine, Judson Memorial Hall, New York, USA
1998    Fin de Siècle, Nantes Arts and Music Festival, Nantes, France        
1994    All My Troubles Seem, New York, Hunter College Studios, USA

Residencies
2011    Hydra Island, School of Fine Arts, Athens
2010    Crete School of Fine Arts, Athens
2009    Tiroler Landes Museen, Innsbruck
2008    Art Factory, Mikonos
2007    Drawing project of Ancient Greek Sculpture, Corfu, Delphi and Athens
1998    Long Island City High School, New York
1998    National Studio Program, PS1 Institute of Contemporary Art, New York


Awards
1999      Annenburg Grant , New York, PS1 Institute of Contemporary Art
1993      Art Direction, Jeremy by Pearl Jam. MTV Video Music Awards, Best Video.
1984-88 Fred Conway Arts Scholarship, Washington University, St Louis
1982-84 Early College Program Scholarships for Painting, Drawing and Printmaking School, Chicago, Art Institute of Chicago

Collections
Museo de Arte Acarigua-Araure (MAAA), Portuguesa, Venezuela
George Economou collection, Athens, Greece

Bibliography   

Exhibition Catalogues
Bernier/Eliades Gallery, Agra Publications, Edy Ferguson Conspiracy Theory, Exhibition Catalogue, 2013
Onassis Cultural Center, Faces, Exhibition Catalogue, 2012, pages 78 ? 81

Press
El Elephant Magazine, Issue 13, Winter 2012/13, page 8
KunstForum International, Bd. 219, Januar-Februar, 2013, pages 240 ? 242
Agma, Issue 13, New York, 2013
Art Forum, October 2013
Art Daily, December 26, 2012
Le Courrier, December 2012, page 22
Le Temps, December 15, 2012
Athens Insider, Interview, May 2010
Athens Katamerini, BH Magazine, June 20, 2010
Art Newspaper, September 2002
Voice Choices, October 2002

June 8, 2012
Athens, Greece

I am a product of many things, but not by choice. Therefore my inclination is to make everything into one.
This exhibition is not about individual works. It is an experience of a syntactical structure that operates like the unconscious. The syntax speaks through the work; it?s the existing language of the symbolic order, or in Lacanian terms the big Other. The big Other is not something one learns. ?It?s the language that speaks through us rather than the language we speak?.
My big question when making art, is how do the pieces fit inside the big other? How does it avoid the irrelevancy of a dead product in a market place that spins despite itself? How can a work of art become alive and occupy the space of the real?
Meaning is mutable; it changes according to physical or social perspective, with speed of approach. There is no fixity; things aren?t arranged for static contemplation. However everything is connected, like a fabric. And there are anchoring points, like a button on an upholstered chair , points de caption? where one can rest in a fixed meaning for at least a little while.  However the real meaning lies within the movement between the works of art. Each piece signifies something, but they are connected like a chain. One meaning begets another, and often results in a third meaning between the two.
In the painting The Greek Protester/ Eau de Vie, there is an image of a young man throwing a Molotov cocktail. He emerges from the depths of a Renaissance perspective. There is also another image of a flat graphic label. I enact two-dimensional design and three-dimensional perspective within the same painting. Abstract expressionist marks are segued between them to repair the breakage, forcing them to have a dialogue. I give meaning to each perspective by undermining the other. I expose and create a syntactical conflict. But the nature of conflict entails action and movement, and one must experience the painting not only through the physical action of the eye, but through the metaphysical act of the viewer?s own shifting perspective, as he or she negotiates the points of fixed resignation, reconciliation, and recapitulation of the big other within their own experience.
It challenges what the viewer thinks he already knows, and this interests me. It?s fair enough, because I am only challenged if I can?t imagine how it will look in the end. I like to use images from popular culture, because they are shared signifiers. I choose them carefully. They must already vibrate as a symbol - performing a role that has the power to remind us of the very essence of our humanity, for better or worse. These individual elements don?t have to be based in language, (they can be pre-verbal, like a scream, or a movement of the body, like a dance) but they become part of a language that produces meaning at a particular time for at least a little while.
If one can tap into the symbolic order (not easy because it constantly shifts) one can apply it to any media. The language is the same but the materials must be learned. To learn how to manipulate materials is easy. What is difficult is making the material fit inside the collective language of the symbolic order. Each work often refers to something else: a drawing refers to musical notation while words in a painting refer to a melody. There is a conflation of meanings at work within each piece. And a group of works shown together create even more meaning in between. The process never ends. This is life.