Parrish Exhibition Features Art, Fiction and Performance

A trio of artists kicks off the exhibition "" this weekend with the unveiling of an original short story, a performance of the piece and plenty of art by Sarmento at the .

The museum commissioned author James Salter of Bridgehampton to write a short story in collaboration with the artist for the exhibition catalog. On Saturday, Salter joins Sarmento in a discussion moderated by museum director Terrie Sultan. Reservations are required. An exhibition opening will be held immediately afterwards.

May 1 at 6 p.m., Laurie Anderson will perform a dramatic reading of Salter’s short story, "Raphael," in a multimedia presentation held amid the artwork. Space is limited and reservations are necessary.

“The confluence of these three artists creates a very unique creative fusion,” Sultan said.

The museum brought in Salter and Anderson to broaden the exhibition and connect visual art to other artistic expressions, Sultan explained. The collaborations were also a way to connect the Portuguese artist with area talent, she said.

“An important aspect of the creative legacy of the East End of Long Island is the longstanding relationship between artists and writers and we wanted to emphasize how this kind of inter-relationship has universal synchrony,” Sultan said.

"Raphael" portrays a marital affair discovered. One way the story connects to Sarmento’s art is through the artist’s “intentionally opened-ended compositions that offer more questions than answers,” as described by Sultan in the catalog essay.

The pair connects artistically through several threads, the catalog contends. In one series of paintings, the artist references books which are concerned with “…addressing distinctions between lust and love, often in the form of social, sexual and political attractions to the bodies of women,” the catalog reads.

Salter’s book, "A Sport and A Pastime," is part of Sarmento’s artwork, "Heavy Load," which is part of the Southampton show.

Sarmento’s connection to Salter began in 2008 when Sarmento created a series of artworks titled "Salter," Sultan said. The pair communicated via email during that time. It was only during the Parrish collaboration that the pair was “fully introduced,” she said.

The Sarmento-Anderson connection was established before the current collaboration, so inviting Anderson to read Salter’s story was a natural, Sultan said. Anderson is known as a “daring artist” who challenges and delights audiences, according to the Parrish. Her work includes music, visual art, poetry, film and photography.

Sarmento has exhibited extensively internationally. His work is in collections held by the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, The Museum of Modern Art, the Musee National d; Art Moderne Centre Georges Pompidou in Paris, France, the Hara Museum of Contemporary Art in Tokyo, Japan and others.

Sultan described Sarmento as “a master of the fragmented narrative, breaking apart and reassembling images to create the contemporary equivalent of ancient word-pictures. His paintings and drawings are dramatic scenes, composed almost exclusively in black and white, expressed through seemingly simple yet elegantly rendered images that describe the fleeting nature of human experience.”

Sultan became acquainted with Sarmento’s artwork during his 1999 solo show at the Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden in Washington, D.C. The Parrish exhibition is his first solo exhibition in an American museum since then, according to the Parrish.