Farm Projects

On view August 1–11, 2025

Opening Reception: Saturday, August 2, 6–8pm

Artist Talk: Friday, August 8, 6pm at Wellfleet Preservation Hall

Farm Projects is pleased to present WindUpTheCatAndPutTheClockOut, a solo exhibition by 2023 Guggenheim Fellow, John J. O’Connor. Known for his elaborately patterned, research-driven drawings, O’Connor constructs visual systems that merge diagram, data, and text in ways that are both deeply cerebral and disarmingly playful.

The works in WindUpTheCatAndPutTheClockOut take the viewer on a labyrinthine odyssey—where psychological fallacies bump up against sunspots, and sleep-talking meets the physics of car crashes.

Working with hand-drawn systems that feel at once scientific and absurd, O’Connor gives form to what he calls “phase changes” —those elusive shifts from one state to another that can only be recognized in hindsight.

O’Connor’s drawings mine a wide array of materials—from conspiracy theories and cognitive science to moments in chess history—synthesizing rigorous research and contingent storytelling into a wholly unique visual language. With the tone of a curious skeptic and the hand of a master draftsman, he creates work that invites both analytical scrutiny and poetic drift.

An artist talk will take place Friday, August 8 at 6pm at Wellfleet Preservation Hall.

O’Connor will also be featured in Project Project, an annual event and platform for experimental and collaborative temporary outdoor public artworks. Spread across sites throughout Wellfleet, this year’s event will take place at dusk on August 09

About the Artist John J. O’Connor was born in Westfield, MA, and holds an MFA in Painting and an MS in Art History from Pratt Institute. He was awarded a Guggenheim Fellowship in 2023 and has participated in residencies including MacDowell, Skowhegan, and Civitai AI. His work has been reviewed in The New York Times, Artforum, Bomb, The Brooklyn Rail, and Art in America, and is held in the collections of MoMA, the Whitney Museum, the New Museum, and others. He teaches and co-chairs the Studio Arts program at Sarah Lawrence College and is a member of the experimental art and technology collective NonCoreProjector.