Opening: rocki swiderski: the muck

On view: May 3 – June 7, 2025
Opening reception: Saturday, May 3rd, 7:00–9:00 p.m.

Everybody is excited to present 𝘵𝘩𝘦 𝘮𝘶𝘤𝘬 by rocki swiderski, opening Saturday, May 3rd from 7-9pm.

The exhibition presents a selection of paintings, works on paper, and sculptures made from found objects, truck parts, and dirt. swiderski spends a lot of time with dirt—roaming Tucson’s ditches and washes with their dog, finding discarded material to transform into amulets and sometimes, if they’re lucky, stumbling upon mud or water. Traversing the washes and taking inspiration from them is tied to the traditions of western landscape painting, but for swiderski the landscape expands into both the personal and the political. In swiderski’s paintings, some images are formed through observation while others come forth as visions. Bucolic scenes are woven with less-than-idyllic motifs—power lines, cinder block walls, and urban discard.

Trucks are a theme in these works, which swiderski sees as one of the great American signifiers, a symbol of power, freedom, gender, destruction, a means of escape. Delicate, careful objects and images are contrasted against crude equipment, a busted tailgate, or a faded jack stand. swiderski relies heavily on intuition and chance encounters with images and material, making the works come through as both apocalyptic and dream-like, as quiet prayers for the end times.