White Room: Mitzi Pederson

In our second White Room we are proud to present the first New York exhibition by the San Francisco-based artist Mitzi Pederson. Pederson’s works – which oscillate between two-dimensional collages and drawings and three-dimensional constructions – emphasize, and explore the potentiality of chance. Deceptively slight, and typically constructed from humble materials, Pederson’s works eschew formalism, preferring instead to adopt a more psychological, or even emotive, position. Her sculptural works describe a state of precariousness, and suggest a sense of both performance and flux: e.g. the ‘mobile’ structure she has created specifically for the awkward architecture of White Columns’ second White Room displays a benign theatricality. Alongside this sculptural intervention Pederson will show a group of melancholic, yet strangely seductive – and even glamorous – collage works, that include distorted images (generated using a photocopier), painted elements, and fields of black glitter.

Mitzi Pederson (b. 1964) lives and works in San Francisco. She received a B.F.A. from Carnegie University in 1999. In 2004 she completed her M.F.A. at the California College of the Arts, San Francisco. Her work was included in recent group shows at Jack Hanley Gallery, San Francisco, and Marella Arte Contemporanea, Milan. She had her first solo show at Ratio 3, San Francisco in 2005. This summer she will be part of ‘Pure Land’ a three-person show at Ratio 3 with Vincent Fecteau and Patrick Hill.