Rebekah Bogard, “You + Me”, 2024; earthenware and oil paint; 25 x 28 x 21 in. Courtesy of the artist.
The Daum Museum of Contemporary Art features artist Rebekah Bogard in “You + Me =”. This installation portrays love, loss, risk, and the important role of friendship. Walking among this cloud-filled dreamscape, one questions mortality, the possibilities for life anew, and alternate realities.
Through Bogard’s symbolic use of animals, she incorporates existential notions about love, loss, risk, and friendship. Questions about life, death, and mortality are imbedded in this body of work. The viewer walks among the clouds (painted on the walls at floor level), alluding to ideas about an afterlife, dreamscape, or perhaps an alternate reality. The viewer is enveloped in a space that invites exploration. Upon entering the gallery, they become an essential part of the piece, walking through an environment teeming with life. This experience requires them to be present, actively making sense of the realm they’ve entered. As such, Bogard’s installations allow various interpretations as the works will have different meanings for different people.
When viewing this work, people are allowed to contemplate their own reality and perhaps escape or re-think their place in the world. By exploring complexities through animals, it becomes a safe space to readdress many of our social complexities, revealing a desire for connection and the risk that comes with it. Through illusions of clouds, water, and trees, the space draws attention to the relationship between the human-made and the natural world, prompting viewers to consider environmental themes. The serene, almost utopian vision of animals peacefully cohabiting can be interpreted as a commentary on environmental harmony and the hope for a balanced coexistence, aligning with the notion of innovation in response to environmental crisis.
Rebekah Bogard received her MFA from the University of Nevada Las Vegas in 2003. She received a BFA from the University of Wyoming in Laramie in 2000. She is currently an Associate Professor in Ceramics at the University of Nevada Reno, as well as a studio artist. Bogard employs fictional animals in her artwork to explore the narrative of her life and personal history, as they can disarm expectations. She utilizes animals because they are beautiful and mysterious creatures, vulnerable to relations with humans. This susceptibility gives them a sense of benevolence that is often lacking in human interactions. The fictional creatures juxtaposed with non-fictional animals are there to turn the world upside-down and to leave the viewer off balance. By changing the rules of engagement, fantasies become realities and dreams become actuality. Concrete gender roles no longer exist. Females can be more like males and males can be more like females.
As a female artist, Bogard is interested in gender and how specific gender roles are assigned to both girls and women. She exploits normative female iconography such as flowers, butterflies, and curving sensuous lines as well as “feminine” color combinations such as pinks, purples and pastel blues. She embraces female sexuality, vulnerability, and romance not as the stereotypical taboo, but as an empowered re-contextualization. Through these creatures, She embraces, reclaims and redefines female stereotypes; powerful messages relevant to today’s world.
This exhibit will be open from September 20, 2024- March 2, 2025.
