List Projects 29: Brittni Ann Harvey and Harry Gould Harvey IV

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A white gallery with five artworks on display. On the left wall hangs a gold tapestry depicting two figures, one standing and one kneeling. Two small creature-like sculptures made of metal and fabric sit on low pedestals. In the center of the room is a vertical wooden bathtub sculpture on metal supports. A large black frame-like wooden sculpture hangs on the back wall.

Exhibition view: List Projects 29: Brittni Ann Harvey & Harry Gould Harvey IV, MIT List Visual Arts Center, 2024. Photo: Dario Lasagni

Location
Bakalar Gallery
Featured Artists
Brittni Ann Harvey
Harry Gould Harvey IV
Explore all artists who have exhibited at the List in our Artist Index.

Brittni Ann Harvey and Harry Gould Harvey IV harbor deep connections to place—and especially to the region surrounding their home of Fall River, Massachusetts. 

In their respective practices, both center themes, materials, and visual motifs that relate to the South Coast. The two also tend to a shared social practice as cofounders of the Fall River Museum of Contemporary Art. This artist-led educational and exhibition space sustains a dialogue with the town’s cultural present, as well as its past as a former home to over a hundred textile mills and hub for the maritime trades of whaling and fishing that drew Portuguese, Azorean, and Cape Verdean immigrants to the area.

The finale in a season of List Projects inviting artistic collaborations, their exhibition debuts a newly commissioned sculpture jointly authored by the pair and features recent and new pieces by each artist that engage South Coast visual culture and economic history. Rendered in sinewy bronze and upholstered trefoils, the creaturely forms of Brittni Ann Harvey’s Robot Dog series (2021–ongoing), for example, connect the town’s once-thriving textile mills to the robotics and tech companies now flourishing in Massachusetts. Harry Gould Harvey IV’s sculptures and works on paper also consider area class dynamics, reclaiming architectural ornamentation from Gilded Age mansions in Newport, RI, as the handcraft of laborers from nearby Fall River.

Interwoven with the critiques of industry that surface in both artists’ works are references to devotional and mystical iconography. Their shared affinity for the esoteric and transcendental lends a spiritual dimension to their artistic reflections on place and hints at the restorative impulse behind their observations. The capacity for healing attributed to mystical and visionary art complements the optimism of their joint contributions to the stewardship of Fall River’s past and present cultural life, or what the artists have called its “ecology of place.”

Brittni Ann Harvey (b. 1992, Newport, RI; lives and works in Fall River) has been the subject of recent solo exhibitions at NOW: Gallery, San Isidro, Peru (2022); Someday Gallery, New York (2021); and Anthony Greaney, Somerville, MA (2021). She has shown in group presentations at Nino Mier, Los Angeles (2023); the Hessel Museum of Art, Annandale-on-Hudson, New York (2022); PPOW, New York (2021); and Nir Altman, Munich (2021), among others. She received her B.F.A. in Textiles from the Rhode Island School of Design.

Harry Gould Harvey IV (b. 1991, Fall River, MA; lives and works in Fall River) has been the subject of recent solo and two person exhibitions at PPOW, New York (2023); the Hessel Museum of Art, Annandale-on-Hudson, New York (2023); David Winton Bell Gallery, Brown University, Providence (2021); Bureau, New York (2021); Alyssa Davis Gallery, New York, (2018); Motel, Brooklyn, (2018); and Atlanta Contemporary, (2018).

List Projects 29: Brittni Ann Harvey and Harry Gould Harvey IV is curated by Selby Nimrod, Assistant Curator.

About The Series

This special series of experimental List Projects programming commemorates the tenth anniversary of the series and is comprised of three exhibitions in the Bakalar Gallery. Each presentation will pair two artists who share a history of conversation and foster their continued collaboration through a joint commission. A closing workshop featuring all six artists will round out the series, offering an opportunity for the artists to reflect on what it means for institutions to prioritize conversation and collaboration in their exhibition spaces.

Sponsors

General operating support is provided by the Massachusetts Institute of Technology; the Council for the Arts at MIT; Philip S. Khoury, Vice Provost at MIT; the MIT School of Architecture + Planning; the Mass Cultural Council; and many generous individual donors. This exhibition is also supported by generous donors to the 2023 McDermott Award Gala, hosted by the Council for the Arts at MIT. The Advisory Committee Members of the List Visual Arts Center are gratefully acknowledged. 

Images

In the foreground, a vertical wooden bathtub sits on horizontal wooden beams, which are held up by eight metal supports. Inside the bathtub are small painted scenes and a red and blue checkerboard pattern on the base. On the left walls, five small drawings hang in wooden frames. In the rear, a golden tapestry depicts two figures, one standing and one kneeling.
A white gallery with two artworks on display. In the foreground, a small creature-like sculpture made of metal and fabric sits on a low pedestal. In the background hangs a gold tapestry depicting two figures, one standing and one kneeling.
In the center of a gallery, a golden abstract tapestry hangs on the back of a wooden bathtub sculpture that is raised on black planks and metal supports. On the left wall in the foreground is a small white shelf with a plexiglass case. Further along the wall hangs a large black frame-like wooden sculpture. Across the background two small drawings in wooden frames hang on the left and two other drawings in wooden frames hang to the right of an entryway.
On the left, a golden abstract tapestry hangs on the back of a wooden bathtub sculpture that is raised on black planks and metal supports. The tapestry has swirling forms of yellow and gold, with some sections of blue near the periphery. In the background, five small drawings hang in wooden frames on a white wall.
In the foreground, a vertical wooden bathtub sits on horizontal wooden beams, which are held up by eight metal supports. Inside the bathtub are small painted scenes and a red and blue checkerboard pattern on the base. In the background, a gold tapestry depicting two figures hangs. On the floor to the left, a four-legged creature-like sculpture sits on a low pedestal. On the right wall is a small white shelf with a plexiglass case.
In the foreground, a small creature-like sculpture made of metal and fabric sits on a low pedestal. A small piece of fabric showing an animal hangs from the central axis or “spine” of the sculpture. In the background hangs a gold tapestry depicting two figures, a standing blue one and a cartoon-like kneeling one.
A gold colored tapestry hangs on a white wall. The left side of the tapestry is occupied by a vertical blue form that resembles a figure, draped in flowing cloth. On the right of the blue figure is the cartoon-like outline of another figure, kneeling in its direction. They are surrounded by abstracted yet recognizable forms: a sun overhead, climbing leaves and vines, rays of energy that recall physics diagrams.
A white gallery with five artworks on display. On the left wall hangs a gold tapestry depicting two figures, one standing and one kneeling. Two small creature-like sculptures made of metal and fabric sit on low pedestals. In the center of the room is a vertical wooden bathtub sculpture on metal supports. A large black frame-like wooden sculpture hangs on the back wall.
In the center of the room, a vertical wooden bathtub sits on horizontal wooden beams, which are held up by eight metal supports. Inside the bathtub are small painted scenes and a red and blue checkerboard pattern on the base. On the left wall, a small diptych drawing in a wooden frame hangs. In the background behind the wooden bathtub, a small creature-like sculpture made of metal and fabric sits on a low pedestal. On the right, a white shelf hangs off the wall with a plexiglass case on top.
A detail photograph depicting the inside of a wooden bathtub titled upright. A red and blue painted checkerboard pattern is painted onto the wooden base where two red stones are placed on blue squares within the checkerboard and a white knight chess piece and a black queen chess piece are placed in the back overlooking the checkerboard. In the background, two miniature landscape paintings hang.
In the foreground, a vertical wooden bathtub sits on horizontal wooden beams, which are held up by eight metal supports. In the background on the left side is a small white shelf with a plexiglass case. On the right hangs a large black frame-like wooden sculpture.
A plexiglass case hangs off of a white wall. Inside the case, two burlap-like square artworks are adorned with embroidered details. The left shows the decorated head of a horse, while the left is more ambiguous but has a similar medieval flavor. Each square has a border of red wax around the piece.
A white gallery with two artworks on display. In the background, a large black frame-like wooden sculpture hangs on the wall. In the foreground, a small creature-like sculptures made of metal and fabric sits on a low pedestal.
A white gallery with four artworks on display. On the left a large black frame-like wooden sculpture hangs on the back wall. To the right of the frame-like sculpture, two small drawings hang in wooden frames. In the foreground, a small creature-like sculpture made of metal and fabric sits on a low pedestal.
On a white wall hang two drawings in wooden frames. The left drawing is horizontal and has colorful abstract forms scattered across the paper, including forms that resemble globes, playing cards, and waves. The wooden frame is adorned with thorn motifs in each corner. The right vertical drawing depicts a four-legged animal-like form with red flame-like designs in the background and a gray and white checkerboard print at the bottom.
Two drawings, both of churches, are set side-by-side in a wooden frame with carved ornamentation and pointy finals at each corner. In the drawing at left, geometric forms in bright, primary colors wash the façade of a cathedral-like structure with many steeples. The drawing at right, executed in graphite with heavy shading, could be a zoomed-out view of the same building, and features a moody, swirling sky with a crescent moon flanked by text reading SAINT ANN rising above the spires.
Four green crushed velvet panels each shaped like a trefoil spear to perch on top of a skeletal armature of sinewy braided bronze giving the overall impression of a four-legged animal crouching on its forelegs. At the animal’s belly, a flag of the same green cloth bears an embroidered design of a dog that appears to be either mid-gallop or hogtied.

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List Projects 29: Brittni Ann Harvey and Harry Gould Harvey IV

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