Aug 25 - Sep 10, 2023
New York
T-Party emerged as an opportunity to clarify the intentions of the Pop Gun project, while contextualizing it in relation to its influences.
Tramps, the British gallery run by Parinaz Mogadassi, occupied most of the second floor of the Chinese mall when Pop Gun opened its first exhibition down the hall. Highlighting conceptual practices while maintaining a defiantly non-commercial attitude, their program served as a foundational model for Pop Gun.
There’s a literal response to Tramps in the title “T” - Party. There’s a historical allusion to the revolutionary supplanting of British institutional systems; Hidden in the corner vitrine Andrew Straub has a small sculpture composed of three East India Tea Company boxes and a party hat. Holistically, however, T-Party becomes not an act of retaliation, but rather an acknowledgement of a supplanted scene.
As Tramps and other galleries have been replaced with vintage clothing stores, the exhibition takes the form of a clothing pop-up. Continuing a spirit of non-commercial conceptualism, prices are available only upon request. Some are north of $24,000. Some are free. One is rancid from being worn a week without a wash, and priced at a week’s worth of wages. None may not be removed from the installation until the end of the exhibition.
We’ve invited every artist who’s meaningfully contributed to the Pop Gun project to participate in the exhibition. Artists ranging from our art-world mentors, to those endearingly persistent emergent young-guns, who consistently come to all the openings; All have been given the same initial substrate, an off-white Gilden T-shirt, and all are hung from a single horizontal beam. The beam itself is hung at 60in center, considering the entire installation to be one collective work: Pop Gun’s ’T-Party.’