Museum of Contemporary Art - MOCA Hot Springs presents “Just a Way Out”, a new exhibition by prominent Nashville photographer Thomas Petillo, which features his first-ever nudes and is dedicated to images of the female figure. There will be an opening reception on Saturday, June 12 at 6:30 PM and the show will be on view from June 12, 2010 through August 1, 2010. Two items, a perfect-bound softcover edition book consisting of 72 pages with 48 images, and a poster will be available for sale at the opening and will be signed and numbered by the artist. MOCA is featuring “Just a Way Out” during the same months as an exclusive Ansel Adams exhibit, creating a very special pairing and focus on modern photography, evincing the museum’s dedication to fine art of all mediums. The show’s after-party will be at Maxine’s (700 Central Avenue) and will feature a performance by ambient/post-rock pioneers Hammock.

On the impetus behind this show, Petillo explains: “first, all of the artists whom I admire most dedicated some portion of their work to nudes; second, this quote from Marina Abramovic: ‘I’m not interested in doing anything I’m not afraid of.’ How to make a creative transition into doing nudes and doing so in a way that doesn’t exploit, cheapen, or compromise the natural, indisputable beauty of the female figure was something that I was admittedly afraid of, but I thought I should at least try to push myself.”

Within Petillo’s work, there have always been forms. Sometimes, objects suspended in space, and other times, featured in industrial backdrops, always laid bare so you could regard the thing as something other than its purely functional state. Then came the people. Austere, emotionally stripped, pleading—portraits that would soon garner him attention and jobs that had him shooting musicians with name recognition. Though generally clothed, these portraits were leading him somewhere new, to try a confluence of his own styles. “The thought came to me,” Petillo explains, “just shoot the nudes in the style that you approach all of your other shoots with.”

And so, his latest work, titled “Just A Way Out” found its crucible in Hot Springs, Arkansas, occasionally in the very space in which this collection will first be seen. We now see nudes placed in industrial settings, or hanging, suspended in space, begging a metaphysical reaction to something we’ve come to lazily regard in only the physical sense. Thomas is at play, his fears long behind him.

“I guess, at first, shooting them meant proving to myself that I could even do it. And then it meant proving that it wasn’t a fluke, that I could do it again. And now, it means continuing to do it at a high enough level. One that no longer scares me.”
Pre Order the book "Just A Way Out" - 5.5"x7.5", softcover, 72 pages, 48 color and black/ white images from the MOCA show. Signed and numbered by Thomas Petillo.

IMPORTANT NOTE - This is a pre order. Your book will not ship until June 14, 2010.

$30 plus shipping through PayPal
For additional information, please contact Johnny Pleasant at (615) 426-5726 or johnny@johnnypleasant.com and MOCA at (501) 609-9966.