Pulley

PULLEY: a collaborative exhibition with NIAD Art Center, presents a radical experiment and mutual exchange between artists from NIAD Art Center, a progressive art studio for adults with developmental disabilities in Richmond, CA, and Christopher Robin Duncan.

The show’s punchy title refers both to the physical mechanism that allowed for these works to be created and to the greater concept of a pulley system: a collection of wheels and ropes that operate in concert to lift an object. NIAD, an acronym that stands for Nurturing Independence Through Artistic Development, likewise functions as a sort of pulley system offering the support and scaffolding for these artists to explore, experiment, and elevate their creative practices within a collective and collaborative environment.

The artists in PULLEY upend the convention of the traditional group show as a collection of individual artists presenting individual works, instead prioritizing the magic alchemy of working in tandem with one another, with light, with space. The exhibition features fabric canvases, wearable fabrics, and ceramic sculpture.

Berkeley Art Center (BAC) is a hub for artistic exploration and community building that champions work by Bay Area artists and curators. Nested in Live Oak Park in North Berkeley, the gallery makes contemporary art approachable and accessible at an intimate scale. Since its founding in 1967, BAC has exhibited work by important local figures such as Mildred Howard, Hung Liu, Jim Melchert, Taraneh Hemami, Lava Thomas and David Huffman.