A Cinematic Multimedia Show Opens in Amagansett

It is no coincidence that “The Castle of Perseverance,” the second exhibition at Crush Curatorial in Amagansett, will open on Saturday in conjunction with the Hamptons International Film Festival. Organized by Molly Surno, an installation artist who works in film, video, and performance, the show, which includes work by 15 artists, is an exploration of the function of symbols as props in visual art.

“The idea is to bring people into a space that is very cinematic,” Ms. Surno said during a conversation at the gallery. “It’s about how artists use a vocabulary of objects or props to create some sort of drama or narrative that isn’t closed but rather open to the interpretation of the viewer.”

The exhibition includes a variety of mediums rarely presented together on the East End: video, photography, painting, sculpture, and installation. Mathias Kessler, an Austrian artist, shows a video of a 3-D printed model of the Rosetta asteroid, revolving as if in space; the model itself is also on view. 

Other works include Oliver Michaels’s ceramic sculpture of get-well-soon balloons, Ben Hagari’s film with a soundtrack that runs backward and images printed in color negative to create a surrealist color scheme, and a painting by Jay Davis, whose almost cinematic space includes layers of paintings and other objects deployed within the frame.

The exhibition’s title refers to a 15th-century morality play that was the first theatrical production to use props other than masks. 

A reception will take place on Saturday from 6 to 8 p.m. The show will be open Saturdays from noon to 5 and Sundays by appointment through Oct. 22. Karen Hesse Flatow, who divides her time between New York City and Amagansett, is the creative director of Crush Curatorial, which is located in a converted potato barn at 68A Schellinger Road.