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February 4, 2004
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

Smith College to Host "Bodysuit: Works on Paper and Sculpture" by Chris Costa

Editor's note: For a high-res digital photo of Costan's work, e-mail your request to Marti Hobbes

NORTHAMPTON, Mass. -- Smith College will host "Bodysuit: Works on Paper and Sculpture" by New York City artist Chris Costan at the Oresman Gallery, Brown Fine Arts Center, from Saturday, Feb. 14, to Friday, March 5. A reception for the artist will take place from 2 to 4:30 p.m. on March 5. The exhibit and reception are free and open to the public and the gallery is open 8:30 a.m. to 4:30 p.m., Monday through Friday.

After putting aside large-scale painting, Costan has continued her exploration of collage and montage. In "Bodysuit," she uses found images from books, advertisements, magazines and newspapers, which she then photocopies onto fine papers. The images are sometimes superimposed, sometimes painted, and often collaged with mixed media, graphic cutouts and small found objects.

Also on exhibit will be a wall installation composed of paper components that forms an environment as well as sculpture composed of beads and chains. The installation and hanging sculpture evoke a search for a lost realm, and, as in all of her work, Costan endeavors to suspend the normal order of things and change the everyday to an exotic, sometimes humorous and often edgy parallel world.

Of her work Costan says, "[It's] always been about making sense out of culture and the condition of being human. By collecting the small, non-meritorious things of life, things we trash thoughtlessly, yet consume, crave and covet at the moment of consumption ..., I assemble reflections of the secret language of our culture."

Costan has just returned from a residency in Cadaques, Spain, awarded to her through the foundation Nota Bene. Her latest solo exhibition at Cheryl Pelavin Fine Arts in New York City closed in January and included works on paper as well as hanging sculptures composed of beads and chains.

Costan has also been the recipient of individual grants from the New York Foundation for the Arts, the National Endowment for the Arts, the Adolph and Esther Gottlieb Foundation and the Academy of Arts and Letters. She lives and works in New York City.

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Office of College Relations
Smith College
Garrison Hall
Northampton, Massachusetts 01063

Marti Hobbes
News Assistant
T (413) 585-2190
F (413) 585-2174
mhobbes@email.smith.edu

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