Stella Artois Art Wall ft. Clynton Lowry (Art Handler Magazine) - Press Release

For Immediate Release

Clynton Lowry for Stella Artois : Stella, 2017

Organized by : Lily Fierman

New York, NY— September 2017

Clynton Lowry has created a new series, Stella, which is composed of four canvases and will be on display at the Stella Artois Art Wall.

As Lowry is Founder and Editor-in-Chief of Art Handler magazine, his idea, in part, is a tribute to the behind-the-scenes work that goes into both the making of a commercial and the making of an art exhibition.  Lowry is interested in the ways that these two industries collide, and are ultimately not as dissimilar as many tend to think. Just as much is kept hidden behind gallery doors as is edited out of a commercial frame and hidden from consumers—the material traces of production that risk exposing the desired illusion.  

Thus, in Lowry’s “Stella” we see the “art handler” as our protagonist on opening night, holding cases of beer and hanging various artworks before collectors and guests arrive to the gallery. The canvas-within-a-canvas construction reflects on the making of the work itself.  Lowry intentionally borrows from the commercial language of advertising throughout this series, making each piece part fashion ad campaign and part gallery advertisement, as an appeal to and an awareness of its display within the Stella offices rather than a traditional gallery space.

Here’s an attempt to present a work about its own making, a metacommentary in which the “making-of” is the actual work. This is also an attempt to show how the project of framing what tends to remain outside the frame is a subject within itself that is worth demystifying, exploring, and producing.   

Clynton Lowry is an artist living and working in New York as well as the founder and editor-in-chief of Art Handler magazine. Art Handler is the only publication of its kind dedicated to examining labor’s typically hidden role within the art and fashion worlds. The magazine provides an unprecedented glimpse into the lives and work of art’s lesser known and prominent figures, featuring a range of articles including Chuck Close & former MoMA curator Robert Storr, critics Joshua Simon and Pascal Gielen, as well as profiles of art and fashion workers who are artists themselves. In 2009, Lowry incorporated beer into his artistic practice in his sculpture and photo-based series, Bud Light.