Stephanie DeMer and Ed Osborn
In the Summer-Land
June 2018

This June, Grizzly Grizzly is proud to present In The Summer-Land, a two-person exhibition that questions perceptions of invisible boundaries between international lands, psychic spaces, and sonic frequencies. Using recording devices originally considered to be objective and truthful, Ed Osborn and Stephanie DeMer both employ electronic and mechanical aids to collect natural and unnatural phenomenon, but to different ends. The title of the show, In The Summer-Land, is a term coined by clairvoyant, spiritual medium and magnetizer Andrew Jackson Davis who believed in the validity of spirit photography and argued that the technological medium would provide visual access to energy (the “dearly departed” that dwell in the Summer-Land.)

Artist Bios

Ed Osborn creates poetic work from video and audio recorded on-site, presenting actual footage that looks and sounds ethereal. For the show at Grizzly Grizzly, Osborn will present Waterline, an examination of the invisible lines that make up international borders. Using video and underwater hydrophone recordings, Osborn documents the intersection of three countries, Finland, Sweden, and Norway, where they convene in the middle of a lake. His video and audio installation encourages close listening and deep viewing to experience subtle differences between boundaries.
   
Stephanie DeMer excavates the unseen through the medium of photography. Her installation Enact in Disappearance includes photographs, a large glass negative made from candle flame, a hand-blown convex black mirror (Claude Glass), and contact prints. To create these works DeMer conducted a morning ritual in which she handheld a flat circular piece of glass over a candle flame. The residual soot marks, shaped by natural occurrences such as wind, moisture, and temperature, are then printed directly onto photo paper. By distilling the elements of photography—lens, motion, and reflective light—DeMer opens herself up to the unpredictable nature of light as phenomenon, light as pure message rather than light as a means to reflect the empirical world through a camera lens.
   
Ed Osborn currently resides in Providence, Rhode Island while Stephanie DeMer splits time between Atlanta, GA and Richmond, VA. Both artists will be present at the opening reception.