Charlotte Kruk – EYE CANDY
November 9, 2012 – January 5, 2013
Guest Curator: Marc D’Estout
Exhibition Design: Ted Cohen
This exhibition was generously supported by the Windgate Foundation, Grants for the Arts, Gauger + Associates, Gary Hutton Design, McCall Design Group, Wells Fargo Foundation, and The Bernard Osher Foundation.
Bay Area artist Charlotte Kruk creates wearable sculptures that humorously comment on a culture often known for comparing women, particularly well-dressed women, to decorations, consumables – “eye candy.”
With an obsessive-compulsive approach to the assembly of her designs, she initiates a dialogue on packaging, brand association and power structure by reusing discarded candy wrappings and various other packaging as her primary palette. Her sculptures also make a pointed commentary on the gluttony and wastefulness of a disposable, packaged society. Kruk is fascinated by the energy and creativity involved in creating flashy packaging – carefully researched branding and graphics that seduce – which encourages consumers to purchase, only to later toss away the alluring rubbish. Repurposing these discards in her work, she transforms their inherently enticing designs into multi-layered works of beauty…with a bite.
Photo courtesy of Keay Edwards.
CHARLOTTE KRUK
Kruk earned a BFA at San Jose State University and has had work exhibited at the Legion of Honor, San Francisco, the Kohler Art Center and the San Jose Museum of Art. Her work has been featured on KQED SPARK with Kaleid Gallery, in the National Enquirer and Jane magazine, on RAI Corporation Italian television, The Rosanne Barr Show, and has been purchased by 49ers’ Vernon Davis. In 2001 Kruk was served a cease and desist letter from the candy giant M&M/Mars for the use of their packaging in her work. Documentation of that event, and her response, are on display in this exhibit.
