The emphasis of this exhibition is not on illustration, but
rather a conceptual response to, or interpretations of, stories,
characters and texts.

Although Jim Campbell has never actually read the Bible,
using the information encoded in a digital file and LED
technology, he “reads” the Bible to the viewer one letter at
a time.

Stumbling on Happiness by Daniel Gilbert inspired Julie
Chang’s painting of the same name. Using her unique visual
language culled from her experience as a first generation
Chinese-American growing up in California, she questions
our ability (or inability) to predict our own happiness.

Andrea Higgins’ paintings continue her interest in depicting
personalities through representation of their clothing and
possessions. In these new works, however, all of the
people are fictional characters from novels. Higgins’ intricate
painting Babbitt demonstrates that the description by
Sinclair Lewis of George Babbitt’s suit is key to fully
understanding the character’s condition and aspirations.

In Catherine McCarthy’s new painting Too Blue, Too..., she
recalls the dilemma of Fanny Price in Jane Austin's Mansfield
Park as symptomatic of Western ideas of women’s servitude
and duty still embedded today in our cultural psyche.

Inspired by writers including Homer, Thomas Mann and
Henry James, John O’Reilly’s montages represent the internal
workings of fictional characters. Using a Polaroid camera he
photographs scenes he sets up, as well as re-photographs
images from magazines, history books, gay porn, and other
sources. He then turns the various pieces into collages to
create intimate and illusive panoramas.

Riverbook by Lordy Rodriguez maps a fictional river inspired
by a passage in Simon Winchester’s The River at the Center
of the World: A Journey Up the Yangtze and Back in
Chinese Time. With visual references to microbiology,
animation, Op Art, and textile design, Rodriguez delights in
deconstructing the utility and function of maps, turning the
coded language of cartography into a diagram of
displacement.

Among the other artists featured in the exhibition are Su
Blackwell, Lesley Dill, Rebecca Goldfarb, Joan Grubin, Amy
Hicks, Paul Ramirez Jonas, Liliana Porter, and Ana
Tiscornia.