FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

It's not a great movie, but I was interested in its generic film noir qualities, its "atmosphere," and the fact that it wasn't popular enough to be available on video - therefore there would be a minimum of nostalgic misreading. The actors and the genre provide a set of expectations for my misadventures with them in the paintings.

FISHER disrupts the atmosphere evoked by the film's imagery with the addition of text and his familiar vignettes. There is a discrepancy between how each painting looks and what the added writing says. The text mimics typewriting, with numerous handwritten notations and corrections added, and is situated on each painting like a film subtitle. This serves to confuse the reading of the image and to further distance it from the cinematic source. The viewer is also engaged by the addition of the smaller, hovering vignettes, which may suggest anything from cartoon thought balloons to desktop icons.

Additional work by VERNON FISHER can be seen in Almost Warm and Fuzzy: Childhood and Contemporary Art, beginning in February at P.S. 1 Contemporary Art Center in Long Island City, NY. Last year, FISHER was included in the 2000 Biennial at the Whitney Museum of American Art, New York and was the subject of a one-person exhibition at The Glassell School of Art of the Museum of Fine Arts, Houston. FISHER is included in major public collections including the Museum of Modern Art, New York; the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, New York; the Art Institute of Chicago; the Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden, Washington, DC; the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art; and the Los Angeles County Museum of Art.

The exhibition will be on view at Charles Cowles Gallery new location at 537 West 24th Street, between 10th and 11th Avenues in Chelsea. Hours are 10am to 6pm, Tuesday through Saturday. There will be a reception for the artist on Saturday, January 6, from 6-8 pm.