TAYLOE PIGGOTT GALLERY ANNOUNCES TAKE THIS LONGING
AN EXHIBITION OF WORKS BY TROY PASSEY
Exhibition Dates: 27 October – 3 December 2023
JACKSON HOLE, WYOMING –TAYLOE PIGGOTT GALLERY is pleased to present Take This Longing, an exhibition of works by Boise-based artist Troy Passey, on view from October 27th through December 3rd, 2023. An opening reception will be held at the gallery on Friday, October 27th from 5 - 7pm. All are invited to attend.
Troy Passey is an interdisciplinary artist who merges idea and image in his text-based visual art. Take This Longing borrows its title from a Leonard Cohen song of the same name, and presents a selection of works on paper and neon light sculpture. These conceptual works are created through thoughtful, minimalist, and elemental compositions that utilize words as a visual–in addition to a written–language. In Passey’s art, words operate in many ways; some become figurative, emerging as horizon lines or objects themselves, while others playfully name, or intuitively explain and narrate the objects drawn by Passey.
Troy Passey grew up on a farm outside of Paris, Idaho, and was avid reader never without a pen or paper in his pocket. In these early years, he religiously jotted down quotes and ideas, ever-gathering what would later become his primary medium. Passey always wanted to be a writer, but “would never call [himself] a writer because it was way too precious.” While studying English in college, Passey also delved into art history and, later, when writing his master’s thesis on Andy Warhol, he came across words by Warhol which shifted the course of his career. “He said something that changed my life; he said, ‘People are often better at their second love than they are at their first love because you’re way too close to your first love, but, with your second love, you have some distance,’ so I changed my paradigm and called myself an artist.” His childhood habit of collecting texts, thoughts and words, and his appreciation of poetry and prose, unintentionally had been the consummate preparation for what would become his life’s work. Even today, this habit of second nature has become an integral part of Passey’s artistic practice, as he continues to record the words and phrases that he encounters on a daily basis.
Although most often based on the scholarship of past writers, Passey’s works are as physical and emotional as they are cerebral. A self-proclaimed “anti-calligrapher”, Passey does not expect viewers to read the entirety of words he uses to build his works (which are often repetitions marked with an intensity that approaches asemic writing); rather, he hopes the works as a whole speak to people on an intuitive, elemental level, and considers the titles of the works to be the real texts to be read, crediting writers ranging from Emily Dickinson to Leonard Cohen, from Rainer Maria Rilke to Robert Frost, to The Cure. When speaking of his own work and life, Passey yet turns to the words of others. “My work is not autobiographical, rather it is more reportage of the human condition. It’s kind of weird; the neon work is some of my most personal work in a way. Like “Beautawful” is almost like a Rosetta Stone for me. Joni Mitchell said, ‘Laughing and crying, you know it’s the same release,’ and I hope that my art is about that. That the world is really amazing and beautiful, but it can be awful too. You have to accept both.”
Today, Troy Passey lives, teaches, and works in Boise, Idaho. He attended Utah State University as an English major, with a minor in art history. In 1997, he graduated from Boise State University where he received master's in English. Passey's art has been included in four Idaho Triennials. He was a recipient of an Idaho Commission on the Arts Fellowship, as well as an inaugural Artist in Residence, at the James Castle House in Boise, ID. Passey has had numerous solo exhibitions throughout the American West, including at the Boise Art Museum, Boise, ID; Tayloe Piggott Gallery, Jackson, WY; Boise Contemporary Theater, Boise, ID; Herrett Center, Twin Falls, ID; Eagle Performing Arts Center, Eagle, ID; Sun Valley Center for the Arts, Ketchum, ID; and the Ogle Gallery, Portland, OR. His work has also been shown in group shows in Jackson Hole, Los Angeles, Boise, Ketchum, Houston, Dallas, Chicago, and Miami, among other locations. In 2023, Passey completed Is Where the Angels Are, four site-specific memorials to those lost during Covid-19 at St Alphonsus Medical Centers located in Boise, ID; Nampa, ID; Ontario, OR; and Baker City, OR.
