Non-View of the Lake from Underground

by Torreya Cummings

5 April – 4 May 2019

In 1873, Collis P. Huntington, partner in the First Transcontinental Railroad, commissioned a painting of Donner Lake. He wanted to commemorate the tracks crossing the Donner summit in 1867, a feat of both engineering and sheer human misery. The resulting work by Albert Bierstadt succeeds in romanticising Manifest Destiny and the Sierra Nevada but nonetheless failed to please Huntington, who hoped for a more detailed view that highlighted the railroad itself.

Aggregate Space Gallery and Torreya Cummings present Non-View of the Lake from Underground, a collection of landscape leftovers, geologic scraps, photographs, partial environments, and a performance set. These works elevate immersion and complication over a totalizing “view”, using Bierstadt’s View of Donner Lake as a departure point, and creating a new moment that foregrounds the foreground.

Opening Reception
5 April,  6-10pm
RSVP on Facebook

Second Saturday Artist Talk
13 April, 11am
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First Friday Event
3 May, 5-8pm

Gallery Hours
Thursdays, Fridays, and Saturdays 1-5pm
and by appointment

Additional information:
801 West Grand Avenue
Entrance on West Street
Oakland, CA 94607

Aggregate Space is a warehouse and has a similar temperature to the outside; please dress accordingly.

Aggregate Space Gallery programs are generously supported by: National Endowment for the Arts, Andy Warhol Foundation for the Visual Arts, Neda Nobari Foundation, Creative Work Fund, Kenneth Rainin Foundation, Zellerbach Family Foundation, Clorox Foundation, Awesome Foundation, and ArtNow International.

Image courtesy of Torreya Cummings