Hilary Pecis

Artist Biography

Guerrero Gallery is pleased to present “Half Truths and Outright Lies”, an exhibition of new works by Hilary Pecis. This body of work consists of landscapes constructed from Internet images. Interested in the dishonesty, self-regulation, and speed in which information can be delivered over the Internet, most of the images utilized in the works are from numerous untrained photographers via Google image searches. Functioning as mythological landscapes, her works call into question the ownership of imagery and the intended use and significance of those images. This exhibition is both a dialog with the history of collage and a gradual extension of Pecis’ older work.

A lover of epic landscapes, Pecis starts the construction of her landscapes with mountains, jungles, icebergs, and deserts. By way of the nature of Internet searches, other images happened upon are utilized, shifting the initial direction of the landscape. Constructed with little research or question, making for an amateur idea of how places should appear, her landscapes mix varieties of flora from different regions and mountains from across the world. Images pulled from sensational news stories have also found their way into the work, giving the image a somewhat longer lifespan.

The title of the show is based on an Intelligence Squared debate, “Good Riddance to Mainstream Media”, which discusses the relevance and fate of traditional journalism and the blog. David Carr, a writer for the NY Times said “They become an echo chamber of half-truths, sometimes outright lies, without any real data points coming in. And so you end up with a sort of mass of people talking to each other, no one has read anything. No one knows anything. They’re talking about something that someone else read that read that read that read. And we end up in a meta-world.”

Hilary Pecis’ work is a depiction of landscapes influenced by Internet, television and other media sources. With an interest and focus on the interchangeability of images and the capability to perceive and ignore them, Pecis draws attention to how we are conditioned by the media’s overwhelming supply of information. Her work is influenced by artists Jess (Collins), Marco Brambilla, David LaChapelle and Rob Pruitt. Hilary is a native Californian, having received both her MFA and BFA at California College of the Arts. She has exhibited her work at Catherine Clark in SF, Roberts and Tilton in Los Angeles, Morgan Lehman in New York, Western Exhibitions in Chicago, and will be having solo shows at both Guerrero Gallery in SF in February and Galleria Glance in Turin in March.

Curriculum Vitae

EDUCATION:

-California College of the Arts, 2007-2009, MFA
-California College of the Arts, 2004 – 2006, BFA
-Aurobora Press Residency, September 2009

AWARDS:

-Murphy and Cadogan Fellowship, 2008, SF Arts Commission
-Masterminds Grant, 2008, San Francisco Weekly
-Emerge Recipient, 2006, GenArts SF
-Best of the Junior Review, 2005, California College of the Arts
-Robert Ralls Scholarship, 2005, California College of the Arts
GROUP
EXHIBITIONS:
-Half Truths and Outright Lies, Guerrero Gallery, San Francisco, CA, February 2011
-Inaugural Show, Guerrero Gallery,  San Francicso, CA, March 2010
-Fax, Torrance Art Museum, Torrance, CA, January.   2010

-Gallery Steinsland Berliner, Stockholm, Sweden, November,  2009
-Infinity, Scion Installation, Los Angeles, CA October,  2009
-This is Your, This is My, University of Texas, San Antonio, TX, August,  2009
-Control C, Control V, EbersB9 Gallery, Chicago, IL  July,  2009
-Super Fine, Morgan Lehman, New York, NY, July,  2009
-Remix, Catherine Clark, San Francisco, CA June,  2009
-Sports, Synchronicity, Los Angeles, CA  April,  2009
-Out of the Flat Files, Triple Base , San Francisco,  CA April,  2009
-Family First, White Walls, San Francisco, CA  January,  2009

-NADA Fair with Triple Base Gallery, Miami, FL December,    2008
-Bobby Hutton, Luggage Store, San Francisco, CA  November,    2008
-Allegory of the Mountain, Mahan Gallery, Columbus, OH, October,    2008
-Murphy and Cadogan Fellowship, SF Arts Commission, San Francisco, CA September,    2008
-New Landscapes, Dominican University of San Rafael, San Rafael, CA  April,    2008
-Spaced Out, Space 1026, Philadelphia, PA  March,    2008
-Gold Rush, Okay Mountain, Austin, TA   January,    2008
-Fresh, Cerasoli Gallery, Los Angeles, CA January,    2008

-Grounded, Southern Exposure, San Francisco, CA  November, 2007
-Domestic, Roberts & Tilton, Los Angeles, CA  October, 2007
-Albedo, Eleanor Harwood Gallery, San Francisco, CA September, 2007
-Weathered Worlds, Park Life Gallery, San Francisco, CA  September, 2007
-Light from Darkness, Hinterconti, Hamburg, Germany,  July, 2007
-Ripples, Oakland Art Gallery, Oakland, CA  May, 2007
-Cut and Paste, Tag Art Gallery,Nashville, TN, March, 2007

-Emerge, GenArtSF, San Francisco, CA  November,    2006
-The Marfa Salon, Marfa, TX October,    2006
-West Coast Windows, Samson Projects, Boston, MA  June,    2006
-Lilac Ladies Mural Project, The Lab, San Francisco, CA,  August,  2005

SOLO
EXHIBITIONS:

-Intricacies of Phantom Content, Triple Base Gallery, San Francisco, CA, July, 2009,
-From the Paradigm Shift, Receiver Gallery, San Francisco, CA, September 2008,
SLIDE
REGISTRIES:

-White Columns, Curated  Slide Registry, New York, NY
-The Drawing Center, Artists Viewing Program, New York, NY
BIBLIOGRAPHY

-KQED.org:Arts, Guerrero Gallery Opening, Kristin Farr, March 18, 2010.
-Dazed and Confused Magazine, Hilary Pecis, Francesca Gavin,Issue 179, October, 2009.
-San Francisco Chronicle, What You Are, I Once Was, Michelle Broder Van Dyke, October 29, 2009.
-Art Ltd. Hilary Pecis: “Intricacies of Phantom Content” at Triple Base Gallery, Chérie Louise Turner, September, 2009.
-SF Weekly, Hilary Pecis: Intricacies of Phantom Content, Traci Vogel, July 13, 2009.
-SF Bay Guardian, Intricacies of Phantom Content, Matt Sussman, June 24, 2009.
-Flavorpill, Hilary Pecis and Elyse Mallouk, Matt Sussman, June 19, 2009.
-7×7, Hard-Boiled Wonderland: The Candy-Colored Kaleidoscopes Of Hilary Pecis, Kimberly Chun,  June, 05, 2009.
-SF Chronicle, Don’t Miss, Travis Jensen, May, 16, 2009.
-SF Guardian, Picks, Johnny Ray Huston, May, 12, 2009.
-SF Gate, New Art From Fresh Minds, JD Beltran. April 23, 2009.
-NY Arts Magazine, Traversing Wilderness, Jan/Feb 2009
-New American Paintings, Issue #79, December 2008
-SF Examiner, Q&A with Hilary Pecis, Marissa Nakasone, November, 24, 2008.
-SF Gardian, Picks, Johnny Ray Huston, September 3, 2008
-SF Weekly, Masterminds, March 19, 2008
-NeoGeo: A New Edge to Abstraction, 2007, R. Klanten, S. Ehmann, B. Meyer
-New American Paintings, Issue #67,  December 2006