"We prepare students to engage in the world that is and to help bring about a world that ought to be."
The Oakes Brothers: Friends' 2019 Visiting Artists
Ryan and Trevor Oakes, pioneering artists who specialize in large scale drawings at the center of mathematics, science and art, will serve as Friends Seminary’s 2019 Visiting Scholars.
The Oakes’ are Colorado-born identical twin brothers and collaborators who have forged a unique path in the art world. Together they have spearheaded new techniques using self-designed concave easels to create freehand drawings with precise detail that exhibit their joint fascination with light, the visual perception, order and systems. Over the past decade they have conceived considerable breakthroughs and developed a “method of precisely representing three-dimensional space using only the principles of binocular vision.”
Through their spring residency at Friends, the Oakes will engage with students across divisions, leading lectures and presentations to the Middle and Upper School focused on advancing the thinking of the Renaissance, their formal process, and the state of the contemporary art market and their career. The Oakes will visit math, art, science and history classes, and will also lead a longer term assignment with Upper School students in Photography II.
The brothers will also lead a lecture open to the community on Wednesday, April 17, 2019. To attend this lecture, RSVP here.
To conclude the anticipated program, they will engage in a live demonstration April 8-19 of an original piece based on the historic Meetinghouse.
To conclude the anticipated program, they will engage in a live demonstration April 8-19 of an original piece based on the historic Meetinghouse.
“The Oakes brothers’ unique perspective and innovation in drawing is a welcome addition to the program at Friends,” Principal Bo Lauder explained. “We are looking forward to together engaging in a dialogue on the human perception of light and space and the melding of old artforms with the new techniques.”
Ryan and Trevor Oakes graduated from Cooper Union with B.F.A.’s in 2004. Their art is in collections including the Museum of Modern Art, NY; the Getty Research Institute, LA; The Field Museum, Chicago; and the New York Public Library, NY. They have had residencies at the New York Public Library (2016), the Drawing Center (2015), the Getty Center (2014-15 and 2011), the North Dakota Museum of Art (2013), EMPAC (2012), Palazzo Strozzi Museum (2011), and the Field Museum (2009). Their body of work also includes large-scale outdoor sculptures first exhibited in Chicago’s Millennium Park and are now housed at O’Hare International Airport.
To learn more about Ryan and Trevor Oakes’ work, visit http://oakesoakes.com
ABOUT THE VISITING SCHOLAR PROGRAM
The Visiting Scholar Program at Friends Seminary is made possible through the generosity of an anonymous donor. The program augments the curriculum by exposing students to scholars and artists who would not normally be accessible to pre-collegiate students. The impact of this experience will further inspire and motivate students to go out and “bring about the world that ought to be.”
Friends Seminary actively promotes diversity, equity, inclusion, and anti-racism in all its programs and operations, including admissions, financial aid, hiring, and all facets of the educational experience. To form a community which strives to reflect the world’s diversity, we do not discriminate on the basis of race or color, religion, nationality, ethnicity, economic background, physical ability, sex, gender identity or expression, or sexual orientation. Friends Seminary is an equal opportunity employer.
Friends Seminary — the oldest continuously operated, coeducational school in NYC — serves college-bound day students in Kindergarten-Grade 12.
