History and Prophecy:
A Bestiary for the 21st Century

Jessica Balsam
Howard Barlow
Shannon Eakins
Justin Gibbens

July 7 – 31, 2005
Art Walk / Thursday, July 7, 6–9:30pm
Closing Reception / Friday, July 29, 7–10pm

The SOIL Gallery is pleased to present the work of four Washington state artists, Jessica Balsam, Howard Barlow, Shannon Eakins and Justin Gibbens, in the exhibition History and Prophecy: A Bestiary for the 21st Century. The work features in this show will spin cautionary tales about the world in which we occupy. These artists use subjects of the animal kingdom both literally and as metaphor in playful, didactic and sometimes terrorizing ways. Askew scientific illustrations, wind-up kinetic animals, an installation which explores our cultural fear of germs, and armies of altered specimens transformed into small machines of war will make up the body of this exhibit.

Jessica Balsam is an artist who lives and works in Tacoma. She is the president of Tacoma Contemporary, a visual arts non-profit, and works as Development Coordinator at Tacoma Art Museum. Jessica's current installation-based work considers the complex relationship between minute organisms and ourselves.

"My work employs disposable materials that humans use to guard themselves from sinister organisms. I combine these agents of cleanliness with referenced images from science textbooks, whose greatly magnified imagery of minute and microscopic organisms plays a major role in our developing fears during our formative years."

Howard Barlow lives in Thorp and is part time faculty at Central Washington University and Columbia Basin College. In his current work Barlow deals with relationships between humans, the environment, and our self-made predicaments. His work is a showcase of wit-driven commentary, using an ironic humor to convey a heavier subtext.

"Using the theme of nature's counter-adaptive measures to control human overpopulation, this work centers on the natural biological "warfare" of virus. One piece consists of a butterfly collection transformed into bomb toting viral bugs. Another presents an installation of birds comprised of various modified taxidermic, bald-bodied 'specimens' morphing into militaristic machines of death."

Shannon Eakins lives and works as a visual artist, educator, and dog trainer in Tacoma. Her battery-operated and wind-up sculptures investigate animal movements and stimuli.

"These machines explore the motions and functions of blinking, scratching, reaching, and twitching. I am attracted to various parts of animals, and the movements they make. These machines are made of glass, metals, animal products, existing toys, and found objects. As primitive contraptions, their movements are repetitive, inefficient, and possibly domesticated."

Justin Gibbens resides in Thorp and has recently shown in Tacoma, Missoula, Spokane, Pasco, and the THREAD shop in Ballard. His drawings take both a speculative and a nostalgic look at animal anomalies, prophecies, legends, and other biotic marvels as he considers the ambiguous relationships between humans and the rest of the animal kingdom.

"I'm interested in the curious balance between informed, scientific illustration and the imagined world of what could only be called 'science fiction.' By tinkering with biology and natural history, these drawings invoke a subtle, awkward humor as they allude to evolution, biological diversity and the origin of species."