Friday, May 16 at 7:00 pm
Talking Leaves...Books & Hallwalls Contemporary Arts Center present
Blending the emotional depth of memoir with the breadth of biography, I Am Here You Are Not I Love You attempts to piece together clues from the lives and art of Aidan Ryan’s late uncle and aunt, Andrew Topolski and Cindy Suffoletto.
The book presents a critical reexamination of Topolski, an overlooked luminary of intermedia and postminimalism. In repositioning Topolski’s legacy and vast body of work, Ryan makes compelling findings about the interplay of talent, luck, and community support in the making or breaking of artistic careers. At the same time, the story shares the significant and never-before-seen body of work by Cindy Suffoletto, a talented and inventive artist little shown and never cataloged during her short life. Ultimately, Ryan argues that the time is right for both to take up a privileged place among the great artists of their generation.
“I Am Here You Are Not I Love You is a rich and romantic tale of rediscovery for the author, but outright discovery for us. In prose that wanders seamlessly between deeply personal recollections and the cold reality of history, Ryan introduces the reader to his late aunt and uncle, the artists Cindy Suffoletto and Andrew Topolski, the New York art world at the end of the twentieth century, and the long overlooked artistic ferment in his native city of Buffalo. Through the story of his beloved aunt and uncle, Ryan has restored an important missing chapter of the history of American art.”—Mary Gabriel, author, Ninth Street Women
“I Am Here…is a detective story, a bildungsroman, a critical reappraisal…it is a valentine to the couple, to the idiosyncrasies of the [cities] that made them, and to the idea of artistic community. It is itself an artwork of surprising ambition, an attempt to push literature to the limits of its ability to reanimate memory…an original and deep exploration not only of the world of two underrated artists, but of the power of the creative mind to reimagine others’ realities. The unified project of the book, conveyed by its subject matter as well as the author’s expressive treatment of it, is about the courage—author’s and subjects’ alike—to undertake art at all.”—Melissa Holbrook Pierson, Brooklyn Rail
In addition to the discussion and book signing, artworks by Topolski and especially Suffoletto will be exhibited in the Hallwalls Cinema. Significantly in this year of Hallwalls’ 50th anniversary, Topolski was one of four artists included in what is considered to be the first Hallwalls exhibition (although it took place at UB Gallery 219) in January 1975: