Hot Spring: Brian Rochefort, Ryan Schneider, Allison Schulnik

April 22 - May 27, 2023

The Pit Los Angeles

The Pit is pleased to present a group exhibition "Hot Spring" featuring artists Brian Rochefort, Ryan Schneider, and Allison Schulnik at The Pit LA! The exhibition consists of new ceramic pieces by Rochefort, new sculptures by Schneider, alongside new paintings by Schulnik. The exhibition will be on display from April 22 - May 27, 2023. Join us for an opening reception at the gallery on Saturday April 22, from 5 - 7pm. ⁠

In the California desert where flora and fauna survive with very little rain, where people live among lack, where the horizon looks like it will extend forever, the phenomenon of hot water coming up from the ground seems unreal. Natural springs of hot water moving beneath the surface of the dust and dirt heated from the earth’s center. We build on top of them, directing the springs into pipes to move the water out of the ground and into pools. We place things around these networks to make ourselves comfortable; lawn chairs, blue tiles, cement. We perfect the vessels the water comes from; we twist it to match our desires and we decide that it's good for us to sit and soak in this hot water from the ground.

For “Hot Spring” at the Pit LA, Brian Rochefort, Allison Schulnik, and Ryan Schneider engage nature in their work in a similar way, each bending to the requirements and limitations of their chosen medium, like building around a natural form. Each artist’s practice centers around the natural environment, whether with material, subject matter or setting. Working across wood, paint and ceramic, these three Southern California-based artists demonstrate this connection in their embrace of naturally seductive texture, drawing on both the beauty and precarity of the West Coast environment.

Working in the desert around Joshua Tree National Park, Ryan Schneider is influenced by desert culture, landscape, and history. In his painted chainsaw carved sculptures and layered works on canvas, the artist's hand is apparent but so is a tension between the human desire to control the material and the material’s inherent restlessness. Similarly with his ceramic sculptures, Brian Rochefort, gives way to the material’s ambitions. The result is ceramic sculpture with a fluidity and a diversity of textures. Each is an amalgam of glazes, resembling something like lava, teasing between solid and not. Allison Schulnik’s expressive landscapes convey the contradictions inherent in the natural world. Among her subjects is the Oleander plant that grows one of the deadliest flowers in the world which adorn man-made gardens throughout the desert. Though alluring and beautiful at a distance they are riddled with poison. Schulnik that the flowers’ symbolism are a constant reminder that we are living on this place that doesn’t want or need us.” And yet, perhaps we need it.

For more information email us at info@the-pit.la