Part of Jude Tallichet’s ongoing exploration of post-apocalyptic imagery, Rowing in Eden memorializes poetic moments of discard, making art of what we leave behind. Cast in bronze, stone and hydrocal, these abandoned garments evoke many compelling narratives: of excitement and celebration, departure and interruption, even violence and disappearance. They scatter across the gallery floor, as if just thrown off, whether in exhaustion or ecstasy. They could be everything from the remnants of a wild party, to the detritus of a less-than-organized tenant, to the only evidence of bodily assumption and biblical rapture. Just as clothes trace the margins of the physical body in action, Tallichet’s sculptures measure the median between adornment and abandonment.

Cast as sculptures in historic, resilient materials, they defy their woven models, arguing for a sense of permanence and durability in the face of ephemerality. In their lumps and folds, they question our relationships and our responsibilities to our possessions, asking where animate ends and inanimate begins. Seriously playful and artfully tongue-in-cheek, their entertainment of multiple readings and interpretations parallels the same flexible relationship and uncertain dominion we hold over our own garments.