Liar, Liar at Figureworks

Last night I went to an opening at Figureworks. Liar, Liar is a stunning, haunting, frightening, and beautiful exhibition of work by Meridith McNeal and Guiseppe Di Lelio. The two artists explored the concept of dishonesty. Asking "who among us has never told a lie?", the works in this show reveal a sense of betrayal, particularly a loss of trust in authority that is increasingly bureaucratic and brutal.

Di Lelio's drawing and sculptures feature evocative shapes and lines playing with the concepts of solidity and movement. McNeal's work is more narrative, delving into the imagery and disturbing ideas in Collodi's original Pinocchio. Many of these works are pen and ink drawings, highly detailed, larger than life images that convey the loss of innocence and a hard and chilling sense of injustice.

Pictured are a detail from one of McNeal's Pinocchio drawings, The Guards, 2013, ink on paper, 77x34” , and a smaller work by Di Lelio, e Regole di un Gioco Antico 5, 2014, pencil on paper, 12x16”.
 
This is a unique and powerful show, which is on view at Figureworks in Williamsburg through May 4, 2014.