Exhibition Dates: May 1–June 19, 2021
Opening Reception: Saturday, May 1 from 12–7 pm
Gallery Location: 432 Julia Street, New Orleans, LA 70130
Hours:  Tuesday–Saturday, 10 am–5 pm
Contact Info: 504.522.1999; www.arthurrogergallery.com 

The Arthur Roger Gallery is pleased to present Misdirection, an exhibition of work by Shawne Major. The exhibition will be on view at the Arthur Roger Gallery, located at 432 Julia Street, from May 1–June 19, 2021. 

The Arthur Roger Gallery is pleased to present the inaugural exhibition of Shawne Major’s work. The exhibition is comprised of Major’s assemblage pieces. The artist uses the detritus of everyday human life to serve as a filter to see one’s life and the pain, happiness, loss, guilt, and shame that we all experience. The artist sews discarded power cords, jewelry, toys, and string to a substrate to serve as a metaphor for the build-up, organization, and assimilation of information. 

One wall features a group of 11 pieces where the found objects are sewn onto plush toy “skins” that have been unstuffed and flattened. Major says, “with the animal skins I had imagined hunting down intangibles like love, success, or fulfillment and mounting them on the wall, thus securing them forever.” Five of the pieces have been created on dresses that belonged to Major and her daughter. The dresses are saturated with the residue of expectations and lived experiences of both mother and child. 

Shawne Major’s abstract work addresses the individual perception of reality. With Misdirection, the artist is questioning what that reality is. Just as a magician or politician uses misdirection to divert attention away from the truth, the artist transforms the unloved dross of civilization into beautiful objects to be loved and cherished. 

Born in New Iberia, Shawne Major received her BFA from the University of Southwestern Louisiana in 1991 and went on to the Mason Gross School of the Arts at Rutgers University to acquire her MFA. Her work has been exhibited around the United States for the previous two decades and included in the collections of the Hilliard Museum of Art, the Ogden Museum of Southern Art, the New Orleans Museum of Art, the Smithsonian American Art Museum, and the US Embassy in Brazzaville, Congo. 

For more information please contact the Arthur Roger Gallery at 504.522.1999 or visit our website at arthurrogergallery.com.