For Immediate Release: FEBRUARY 20, 2009

Contact: Sarah Eberle/Ben Will

Rebekah Templeton Contemporary Art presents Spatial Delineations, a solo exhibition of recent work by Stephanie Beck. Organized by independent curator Sean Stoops, Spatial Delineations features an installation of cut paper pieces including relief, multiple layering, and three-dimensional construction techniques. Spatial Delineations will open on Thursday March 12, 2009 with an opening reception from 6pm – 9pm, and will run until Saturday, April 25th 2009.

Beck's imagery draws connections with aerial views of architecture and urban developments as well as computer circuit patterns. Her work explores the flexibility of simple patterns, shapes and textures evoking ideas of place, information and development. Inspired by aerial photography of human developments and ideas of archaeological sites, her relief work reflects her interest in the patterns people create as they settle various areas and what these patterns suggest about their cultures. The layered, cut pieces explore the visual and conceptual connections between maps, architectural drawings and circuit boards. The paper constructions expand ideas of space, place and pattern into sculptural form and represent the physical and societal fragility beneath the seeming solidity of our buildings and cities. These geometric, yet animated, structures become surrogates for ourselves and our attempts at order and stability despite, or because of, our very human frailties.

Stephanie Beck has a MFA from the Pennsylvania Academy of Fine Arts and a Post-Baccalaureate Certificate from the School of the Museum of Fine Arts in Boston MA. She earned her BA in Art History at the University of Virginia, Charlottesville. Beck's awards include the Joan Mitchell Foundation MFA Grant, the Woodmere Art Museum's Violet Oakley Memorial Prize, and the H.V. Hawley Award for Excellence from Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts.

Sean Stoops is an independent curator and new media artist based in Philadelphia. Stoops has a MFA in curating and video art from Transart Institute, Donau University- an international graduate program for new media art, based in Linz, Austria and Berlin, Germany. He earned his BFA in painting from Tyler School of Art and studied at Temple Abroad in Rome, Italy. He has worked with various art institutions in Philadelphia and San Francisco including InLiquid, Moore College of Art and Design, the Exploratorium, and Asian Arts Initiative. In the Spring of 2005, Stoops organized INHABIT: an Apartment Installation, a site-specific group exhibition about post-modern domesticity, in his former West Philly apartment. In 2006 he curated SubTerrane, a group exhibition focusing on contemporary map-making practices in visual art both as an online exhibit and as a gallery installation at the Center for Emerging Visual Artists in Philadelphia. In 2008, Stoops curated A.V.O.W. at the Painted Bride Art Center and TRANSPLANTS at the Asian Arts Initiative and the International House Video Lounge.

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