Bloom

Now open at LEA 22 is Bloom, a new and impressive installation by Gracie Kendal (a.k.a. in real life the artist Kristine Schomaker). It's a dizzying tower of textures — the experience is almost like looking into a kaleidoscope — applied to intersecting discs that ascend into the sky, with an inner pathway that visitors can climb to near the pinnacle of the structure. (More than one route will take you there.) Followers of Gracie's work will notice an immediate connection to her earlier immersive build, Ce n’est pas une peinture, from 2012, which included a similar dazzling array of patterns. "The original title was Ce n'est pas encore une peinture," quipped Gracie, "but I decided I want something I can pronounce."

The textures are of every sort, and are so disorienting that one could as easily be looking sideways, up or down: polka dots, electrical cords, floral patterns, a map of Paris with Russian text, tossed paint, Arabic script, and so on. "I am planning on bringing it to real life galleries and the artwalk that we have in a couple weeks via projection, plus I want to make it an immersive installation," Gracie said of her interest in merging her Second Life artwork with that in the real world. Bloom will remain on display through the month of June.