Decipher: Beck Lowry & Alex Paat

Weeks Gallery, Jamestown Community College

October 4 - December 5, 2025

In this pairing of sculptural works, the artistic practices of Beck Lowry and Alex Paat are linked by the experience of trying to understand. Their compositions present as code or symbols for us to decipher, as each artist grapples with big questions around connection, ritual, and transformation. These works play with dualities like fear and joy, the haptic and the intangible, and image versus object.

Artists: Beck Lowry, Alex Paat

Photos: Erika Diamond

In this pairing of sculptural works, the artistic practices of Beck Lowry and Alex Paat are linked by the experience of trying to understand. Their compositions present as code or symbols for us to decipher, as each artist grapples with big questions around connection, ritual, and transformation. These works play with dualities like fear and joy, the haptic and the intangible, and image versus object.

Both artists use pattern and repetition to explore notions of legacy, lineage, growth and belonging. The repetition of shapes and marks is a carryover from our survival instinct, a skill that helped us recognize threats like poisonous plants or allowed us to predict weather. It can also be calming, a defense mechanism against anxiety when we feel we have no control.

Beck Lowry uses the meditative act of making to channel all their anxiety about the world. Viewing Lowry’s work is like an archaeological experience, as we excavate unique forms and patterns and interpret their dialog with one another. They are especially interested in the way a pattern can feel like it “belongs” on a certain form, imbuing embellishment with intention. In smaller works, Lowry considers the frame and the woven canvas as integral parts of the “painting”, resulting in a hybrid entity between painting, sculpture, and textile. Larger sculptures look as if they are being pulled apart, despite them having been slowly and carefully built up and carved away. They evoke topography as well as the anatomy and markings of mysterious creatures. Lowry views them as shields or protective objects, envisioning future animals that evolve to survive a hostile environment. At the same time, they are skeletal with an inherent vulnerability, a quality Lowry views as inextricable from bravery.

Alex Paat connects his interest in biblical literature to broader topics like duality and the potential for generativity. He believes that generativity (productivity or fruitfulness as opposed to stagnation) springs forth from connection. Celebrating the joyous mystery of life, Paat combines neon and ceramic materials to represent the convergence of heaven and earth or human and divine. The tree form is prevalent in Paat’s work as a symbol of abundance and eternal life. Works like “Another” illustrate an encounter between two beings, considering each other in a moment of nonverbal communication. Paat connects to his own lineage in “Elder”, whose form references burnay jars - fermentation vessels originating from the Philippines. This functional object, reminiscent of an ancestral homeland, is flattened and rendered into symbol rather than tool.

Together, Lowry and Paat explore the vastness of time, connecting the ancient with the contemporary. Their works play together like generative syntax, with contrasting symbols and shapes arranged to form meaning and create flow. Take notice of the points of connection, the substrates, and the edges. Gestural yet meticulous like poetry, these works reveal the labor of connection and the shapes of comprehension. They show potential for growth and change. The exhibition has its own pulse, like an indecipherable morse code that feels primordial yet familiar.

-Erika Diamond / Curator

Special thanks to Colin Shaffer, Managing Director of Weeks Gallery, for curatorial cheerleading and exhibition install.