Patrick Duegaw presents The Innumerable Anxieties: Studies in Disorder, an examination of the ambiguous region that stretches between opposite extremes of human behavior. Stringent classifications of conduct, ratified by early Christianity into the Seven Deadly Sins and Seven Heavenly Virtues, have served as idealized guidelines for millenia, but Duegaw has chosen to focus on the mundane trials of the human condition that, while not considered mortally sinful, are also not particularly virtuous.

Ongoing since 1997, The Innumerable Anxieties portrays humorously nightmarish large-scale figures en-gaged in a myriad of circus-like spectacles; allegorical images illustrating the seemingly infinite, and uniquely personal, incarnations of mankind's primal relationship with anxiety. The circus becomes a backdrop for such largely self-perpetuated melodrama, since it offers an observer the luxury of anxiety without risk: in this con-text, the 'performers' in these paintings assume all liability and even provide an entertaining medium through which one may vicariously partake of danger, albeit the benign perils of manufactured stress. Integral to this commentary, is an intertwining second narrative illustrated by representational images from Duegaw's current Painted Theatre Project. The PTP is part installation, part theatrical event, incorporating highly rendered two dimensional characters, props and sets that replace living thespians, three dimensional objects and a stage. In this PTP production, the artist explores his unintentional self-destructive tendencies; the deliberately mis-leading and foreboding imagery reinforces the futility of any attempt we might make to rationalize, or even resolve, our fears and concerns.

*Intrinsic to the Still Play concept is its musical score, the Still Opera: this installation will include an exhibition-specific composition performed by composer Dan Racer (Professor of Music, Friends University; co-founder of Fisch Haus' annual KNOB New Music Festival).

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