Color, Shape, Line: Six Degrees of Separation between Andrew Zimmerman, Fran Shalom and Jesse Hickman, The Terrarium Gallery at Drawing Rooms, 5/18/24 - 6/29/24

Response to “Color, Shape, Line: Six Degrees of Separation between Andrew Zimmerman, Fran Shalom and Jesse Hickman”, 5/18/24-6/29/24
Curated by Anne Trauben.
By Andrea Epstein
6/27/24

“Color, Shape, Line: Six Degrees of Separation between Andrew Zimmerman, Fran Shalom and Jesse Hickman”, curated by Anne Trauben, is showing in the Terrarium Gallery at Drawing Rooms. The three artists in this group exhibition exemplify three very distinct and original approaches to abstraction featuring a formal and elemental approach to painting, drawing and sculpture in it’s purest form. Although each artist has a truly unique approach to their own practice, what struck me immediately on entering the exhibition space, was the synchronicity between the work. There is such an affinity between all 3 artist’s sensibilities, so that the individual pieces create a wonderful visual conversation that felt very impactful to me. The insightful and careful curation by Anne Trauben clearly places emphasis on the shared visual elements in the work as a group. The press release states, ”Each artist explores the formal qualities of color, shape and line in a playful handmade way”. 

The playful, whimsical, qualities in Fran Shalom’s paintings are immediately apparent in her animated bright color choices which evolve from a very layered build up of paint over a period of time, as well as the quirky and totally unique shapes that reference aspects of the human body, but are also very ambiguous and open to interpretation as objects or other beings altogether. The artist describes the paintings as, ”ambiguous characters who inhabit my studio, keeping me company and often engaging in silent conversation.” This statement expresses exactly my gut response to these beautifully crafted paintings. I saw them as individual beings reaching out from their square confines, speaking to each other, the other artworks and to me. They tell a story of color, line and shape that has a personal narrative all its own.  

The concept of the pared down shapes taking on an animate personality is particularly evident in the paintings, “Shoot the Breeze” in which a flesh and maroon striped horizontal curvilinear shape protrudes ¾ of the way down from the curved irregular large orange oval shape which clearly refers to a human profile with a cartoon like bubble.

Fran Shalom, Shoot the Breeze, 24x24, oil on wood, 2023

This painting is adjacent to a piece by Andrew Zimmerman, “Every Other”, a small arched shaped laminated wood wall sculpture painted with vertical stripes with a high gloss automotive paint in a color scheme of deep rich brown and Indian red that very strongly echoes the palette in “Shoot the Breeze”. 

Andrew Zimmerman, Every Other (side view), 11 x 8in, Automotive Paint on Wood, 2023

A beautiful example of the shared formalities and similarity in shape, line and color is where two of Fran Shalom’s paintings, “Sashay” and “Go-between” both 24X24’ squares share a wall with Andrew Zimmerman’s large shaped painting, ”Mitten”. Whereas in Zimmerman’s large construction composed of four separate organic and geometric pieces joined together in a subtle yet quirky arrangement, the entire piece is covered with white automotive paint rendering it with a slick smooth surface. At first glance it seems that Zimmerman’s assemblage of shapes should be seamlessly attached, but on closer inspection it becomes obvious that the artist is very deliberate in his use of irregularity and possibly accident when it comes to where the edges meet. The artist describes his approach: as an exploration of “the intersection between painting and sculpture, art and design, the hand made and the mass produced” Zimmerman explains that when fabricating the sculptures and wall constructions, he uses hand held woodworking tools that create variations in line that amplify the unique hand of the artist. All three artworks share the use of the color white. In Shalom’s two paintings, the white is used as accents that form a strong contrast with the greens and black of the larger shapes and backgrounds, creating a striking figure ground dynamic.

Fran Shalom, Sashay, 24 x 24 in, oil on wood, 2023

Fran Shalom, Go-Between, 24 x 24 in, oil on wood, 2022

Andrew Zimmerman, Mitten, 48 x 36 x 1.5 in, automotive paint on wood, 2024

Throughout the installation of these three abstractionists, one can really contemplate the significance of the varied treatment of edges and the essential defining role they play in these artist’s works. As far as the treatment of the surfaces themselves, there are also many delightful surprises. On first encountering Fran Shalom’s paintings as a group and at a distance, I concluded that the surfaces were more uniform and smoother then they are. After studying them up close and taking the time to really look, one can see that there is a profound history of layers of built up oil paint that also reveal subtle variations in brushwork, texture and color with lovely surprises lurking beneath the surface.

Speaking of variations in surfaces brings me to the work of Jesse Hickman. Hickman’s paintings which utilize black acrylic and charcoal drawn or painted on burlap mounted on wood rectangles and squares also struck me as very minimal at first glance, but the use of the unconventional material of the recycled burlap bags imbues his pieces with a very immediate textural essence that is also surprising, playful and fun. The curator, Anne Trauben, did a wonderful job of displaying three of Hickman’s paintings (which were not conceived or created together) as a group, which really made the individual pieces sing for me. The grouping composed of, “An Interrupted Arc and the Number of Times I Peed Within a Square and a Rectangle”, on the top left, “An Egg and Arcs Within a Square and a Rectangle”, on the top right and “Emphatically Within A Square And A Rectangle”, anchoring the group on the bottom, allows the viewer to see the lyricism of the linear elements, the ovals, half circles, and the color within the monochromatic textured rectilinear format and is thus transformed. A very important part of Hickman’s practice are daily drawings, nine of which are also displayed in lovely groupings that document the artist’s process, also very compelling in their own way.   

Jesse Hickman, charcoal and acrylic on burlap, 2023 

The vibrant synergy that exists between all three artist’s paintings. sculptures and drawings is clearly illustrated in how they employ irregular organic shapes, deeply felt definition of line, limited palettes, and the essential role of the edges in all the artworks. Although one can enjoy each artists creations as individual pieces, the most exciting aspect of this installation is the way the paintings, sculptures and drawings are grouped together, how beautifully they echo each other and make more visible the formal components of pure abstraction that each artist explores in their particular processes. I have to confess, on first entering the gallery, apart from my immediate response to Shalom’s beautiful bright, unusual colors and quirky animated figures, I thought the work was very minimal. But on closer observation and careful looking, I found that there is nothing about this show that is minimal at all.  

Color, Shape, Line: Six Degrees of Separation between Andrew Zimmerman, Fran Shalom and Jesse Hickman is on view at The Terrarium Gallery at Drawing Rooms through 6/29/24.

Andrea Epstein is a painter and printmaker who creates vibrant abstract mixed media works on paper incorporating a variety of printmaking techniques in her own print studio in Berkeley Heights, NJ. Learn more about Andrea here.

PE Pinkman: Neither Here and There, The Alcove Gallery at Drawing Rooms, 3/1/24 – 4/13/24

Response to “Neither Here and There,” an exhibition by PE Pinkman
By Mona Brody
April 4, 2024

A single self-portrait can offer a provocative glance into an artist’s private life. But when one has an opportunity to view and explore 100 portraits from 100 days, a visual cacophony occurs.  Artist PE Pinkman offers the viewer that opportunity in his series, “100 Days of a Pandemic” and “Not Who You See(m)” as part of the broader exhibition on view, “Neither Here and There” displayed in The Alcove Gallery at Drawing Rooms, 926 Newark Avenue, Jersey City, NJ, curated by Anne Trauben.

Views from “100 Days of a Pandemic” by PE Pinkman
The Alcove Gallery at The Drawing Rooms

Pinkman’s series, “100 Days of a Pandemic,” allowed me to be a voyeur of sorts, as I delved into the inner life of a man’s psyche, emotional state, and various identities. This diaristic practice began January 1, 2021, nine months after the Covid Pandemic started and concluded April 11, 2021. PE Pinkman was completely into the throes of a global pandemic, unbridled disinformation, Black Lives Matter protests, an election unlike any in history, unprecedented vaccine development, and general mistrust. 

Day 4, I Can’t Breathe, 14 x 11 in, mixed media on paper, 2021

Day 24, Fake News, 14 x 11 in, mixed media on paper, 2021

Day 1, Do You Feel the Same Way I Do, 14 x 11 in,
mixed media on paper, 2021

It was clear to me that his commitment to this daily practice of drawing one drawing a day for 100 days, while isolated in a small apartment, was a necessary process of reflection and self-healing. This practice allowed him to find the motivation and ultimately the content for this self-directed series. Begun in a time of introspection, the series morphed into an important and profound work of art. 

Francis Bacon’s self-portrait series from 1975, "I've Had Else to Paint but Myself", cries out to me in the same manner as Pinkman’s series. Both artists face solitude and fear in a delicate balance of sanity, fantasy, and response to a challenging world.

Day 48, You Mean I can Be Brave and Afraid, 14 x 11 in,
mixed media on paper, 2021

I've Had Nobody Else to Paint but Myself by Francis Bacon
14 x 12 inches, oil on canvas

Pinkman’s other series of self-portraits from birth to a futuristic view as him as an older man, "Not Who You See(m)" takes us through the stages of his life, experiences, and challenges. Materials and touch allow the memory of youth and the reality of age and wisdom to emerge. 

                                     #22, 14 x 11 in, graphite on paper                                      

                     

#60, 14 x 11 in, graphite on paper

While responding to PE Pinkman’s drawings from this series, I had the desire to revisit Rembrandt’s archive of self-portraits. Rembrandt’s self-portraits have been an important example of documenting and recording self-exploration for artists over the centuries, and they continue to this day.  I am fascinated by the psychological intensity of Rembrandt’s late self-portraits and its relationship to Pinkman’s drawing of how he sees himself now.

Self-portrait looking in a mirror, Rembrandt van Rijn, Age 63,
possibly black conte on laid paper, 1669 

#67, 14 x 11 in, graphite on paper

The last four years have changed us. It’s changed how we communicate and interact with one another, and it’s changed who we are as individuals. PE Pinkman has thoughtfully and skillfully helped us heal through a repetition of his own drawn image.  By experiencing Pinkman’s exhibition, the viewer can reflect deeply into oneself by employing humor, exploring the mysterious, the bizarre, and the uncomfortable parts of the human spirit. This self-understanding gives us permission and strength to manage the chaotic and harmful forces that lie from within and the world around us. 

"Neither Here and There" will continue on view at Drawing Rooms Alcove Gallery until April 13, 2024.

Mona Brody is an artist whose studio is at Manufacturers Village in East Orange, New Jersey. Learn more about Mona here.

Ani Rosskam and Bill Leech: A Wonderful World, 9/29/22 - 1/13/23, The Terrarium Gallery and The Alcove Gallery at Drawing Rooms

by Bruce Halpin

Ani Rosskam left and middle
Bill Leech right

Ani Rosskam and Bill Leech have provided a fascinating look into a world of serious whimsy; full of magic and humor, as well as viscerally impressive color. A substantial portion of the show is comprised of large scale works hugely ambitious and yet touchingly intimate and personal.  

Ani Rosskam’s work, while quite different from Leech’s work, compliments his ideas. The large  painting “Plop” is like an unlikely collision of color field painting and some sort of surrealism  that really defies any categorical attempt to be defined. Another large work, “Old Black Painting“, displays a sort of dream logic that disappears when you get too close to its meaning. In addition to the large works, Rosskam’s smaller works, mostly collage, invoke a similar undefinable unease combined with a sharp wit and undeniable humor. You are not going to be able to put a finger on what’s happening here. The work is disquieting, yet familiar, almost like an X-ray of a really complicated sensibility with which you mistakenly believe you’re familiar.  

Bill Leech’s large paintings employ an astonishing variety of painterly strategies that often seem to be at odds with each other but ultimately combine as a coherent statement. And it’s fun to see.  

Leech’s command of painting techniques brings an authoritative completeness to what otherwise might be just too disparate to coexist in a painting wherein the magic lies. Leech’s use of color is equally impressive. He has included some drawings and prints that further augment his vision and provide other avenues of wonder. There’s a private intuitive logic that makes it all work. 

When considering that these two artists live together, it’s hard to believe there’s enough room in any finite place for these huge imaginations. Sometimes it seems as if they are in a dialogue exchanging oblique messages about a shared universe. Of course each body of work stands on its own strength, but together they provide a powerful experience for the viewer and a glimpse into what is indeed a wonderful world.

Ani Rosskam and Bill Leech: A Wonderful World, curated by Anne Trauben, runs from 9/29/22 - 1/13/23.

Bruce Halpin is an artist living in Jersey City. Read Bruce's bio here and view his artwork here.

Cosmic Love, 10/4/19 - 11/10/19, at Drawing Rooms, published in Jersey City Times

by Tris McCall
10/18/19

Cosmic Love 3 by Bill Stamos

The shape of the cosmos is curved.  Its lines are soft, its dimensions are mutable, and its character is defiantly feminine. That’s the message — one of them, anyway — of the Cosmic Love show at Drawing Rooms in the Topps Industrial Building at the western tail end of Newark Avenue. Nothing about this uncommonly welcoming group exhibition feels rigid or cold: These seven artists might have their minds on the distant skies, but their collective version of space is nothing like a void.

And if that sounds a little hippie-ish to you, well, yes, Cosmic Love is as eager to embrace the viewer as any flower child might be. This is an exhibition that greets visitors with cloth vines bearing bright fiber blossoms. The piece grows out of the main space and penetrates the entry hall, and Jill Scipione, the fabricator of these flowers, does intend to get you knotted up and drawn toward the rest of the show. But the exhibition that waits within — one that covers a substantial amount of ground despite its modest size — isn’t particularly starry-eyed or blissed out. Many of these works radiate impermanence. As Douglas Adams (and countless physicists) assured us, the universe is a big, daunting, overwhelming place to navigate.

Two large works on paper by Bill Stamos grapple with this sense of immensity: Cosmic Love and Cosmic Love 3 greet the visitor to Drawing Rooms with twin slices of night sky. Technically, these are abstractions — colored streaks and constellations of glitter set against deep black backgrounds. Non-figurative though they may be, they definitely suggest astral phenomena; stare at them for a while, and they may lift you well beyond the roof of the factory.

Paintings from the deft brush of Sky Kim simultaneously evoke the grand and the microscopic. Her watercolors are so precisely rendered that they take on the meticulous quality of pen-and-ink drawings. Two works in her “Multiverse Series” hang on the southern wall of the main room — one may put you in mind of star charts, the other of furry, anemone-like undersea animals. Spheres, circles, and curves recur throughout the exhibit: Across from Kim’s illustrations of jeweled discs and hairy balls is a wall installation by Anne Trauben that includes clusters of round objects (including lightbulbs) in a steady and sinuous progression. Across from the Stamos pieces, a raft of Scipione’s cloth roses — the same kind that beckon visitors in the hallway — are arranged in a colorful clutch. It’s a humble, terrestrial counterpoint to the rest of the art in the show, and its tactility is a foretaste of the show’s wild, wigged-out centerpiece.

Untitled by Sky Kim

Save a colorful scrawl by Jim Pustorino in pencil and paint, the second of the two Drawing Rooms is devoted to fiber art. Mollie Thonneson‘s strips of fabric and torn and repurposed bras underscore the pervasive femininity of Cosmic Love — the sense of the universe as a kind of vast womb, dark, mysterious but ultimately self contained and nurturing — but these pieces are upstaged by GYPSY KOOMBYEYAH, a massive tangle of colored thread, wire, torn sheets, hula hoops, and hidden nests for found objects. (This includes Spiderman himself, who peers out from a perch within the web.) Maggie Ens, the creator of this installation, strung it high across the back wall, where it hangs like a net waiting to fall on the unwary. Like all of Ens’s work, it’s chaotic but deeply warm: It feels like a ball of yarn any curious cat could get pleasantly tangled in, and it rewards close engagement.

“GYPSY KOOMBYEYAH” is, indisputably, the Big Bang of this show.  But this star plays well with its supporting cast.  Ens’s view of the cosmos as a bright and bewildering net of associations and connections — one that contains joy and confusion in equal measure — one that’s shared in varying degrees by the other artists in Cosmic Love. The installation by Ens is big and bossy enough and contains enough fissile material to shine some golden light on everything else in the exhibition. These days, the cosmos is often imagined as an airless, unyielding place; this show is a pleasant reminder that it just might possess a beating heart.

Cosmic Love is on display until November 10th at Drawing Rooms, Topps Industrial Building, 926 Newark Ave, Thursday and Friday, 5-8p, Saturday and Sunday, 1-6p.

Tris McCall is a writer living in Jersey City. Read Tris's bio here.

Cosmic Love by Tris McCall for Jersey City Times October 18, 2019.

Just Beneath the Surface, 7/11/19 - 8/11/19, at Drawing Rooms

Touching the Void 

by Peter Delman

First, this show is the color of photography— black and white photography.

Jeri Coppola, Me Without My Shadow

Second, unusual in a visual art show, the featured sense is touch over sight. The hand of the artist, literally, is everywhere. A very long arm and hand are animated by fluorescent light in Jeri Coppola’s Me Without My Shadow, wrapped in a translucent skin of hand-made paper. 

Lee Arnold, The Swim

In Lee Arnold’s The Swim, a pair of hands sweep through the bubbling sea, capturing the tactile quality of the water. As befitting a show titled Just Beneath the Surface, the submerged swimmer periodically comes up for air and glides through the choppy wavelets. 

Katrina Bellow, Hawak/Hold (Kai)

Katrina Bello draws handfuls of water, but the flesh itself has disappeared, with only the shape of the water defining the cupped hand. 

Caroline Burton, Incarnation 31

The textural surface of found afghans, fabric sacks, and rabbit fur are printed or transferred onto canvas, hydrocal, or bronze in Caroline Burton’s work.

Much of the work is a high-wire act juggling the ephemeral and the physical. 

Jeri Coppola, Listen, I Have Told You Everything

The delicate gray photographic images in Coppola’s work are often battered with industrial sealant and paired with wood and wire flotsam scavenged from under a sawhorse. 

Caroline Burton, Figure 1p

Burton’s rabbit fur is far from fluffy. It looks like the remnants of an ancient bogman’s pet — or dinner—preserved in bronze.

Memory is a touchstone for these artists. The memories here are often wrapped in an enigma. 

Katrina Bello, Hawak/Hold (8.832, -124.5085)

Bello’s charcoal meditations on the Pacific Ocean focus on the eddies that swirl water from below to the surface. The eddies and the vast ocean itself may be seen as a metaphor for the memories of her experience of migration from the Philippines, and her subsequent family narrative. 

Caroline Burton, Incarnation 2

Burton’s Incarnation 2 suggests a looming barrier from a child’s eye view—The Tower of Babel perhaps, or fittingly, a stairway to heaven. 

Lee Arnold, Stereo

Stereo, originally shot in super 8mm film by Arnold, pairs unassuming, graceful images of travels in Europe with the blurred “memory” of the same shots reduced to mild gray shapes nearing the vanishing point.

The deft orchestration of this exhibition by curator Anne Trauben leaves room for interpretation by the viewer but consistently brings us back to common ground. In Stereo, a panoramic shot of high divers breaking the surface of water is followed by a seal gliding just under the surface and then playfully emerging from below. In other work, the reference may be nuanced, but we are invited to consider the surface represented and the significance of what is to be discovered beneath.

This work contemplates empty places, often with a sense of understated spirituality, as distinct from religion or faith. Touring the exhibition might be seen as visiting points on a roadmap to the sublime, reminiscent of the intention of Hudson River School artists in the nineteenth century. The artists often rely on their sense of touch in order to consider the void.

This show aspires to a state of grace and sometimes rises to the level of Baudelaire’s definition of beauty, “a spark between something fleeting and something timeless”. 

Lee Arnold, Walpurgis Nacht

Exhibit A is Arnold’s video Walpurgis Nacht in which alpen peaks, the place where Thomas Mann wrote Magic Mountain, seem to breathe clouds of mist. I half expected Caspar David Friedrich to emerge from the fog. The show’s monochromatic austerity can be intoxicating. When you leave the exhibit, the red brick warehouses and chirpy blue July sky may seem a touch trashy by comparison.

Just Beneath the Surface, 7/11/19 - 8/11/19, featuring works by Katrina Bello, Caroline Burton, Lee Arnold and Geri Coppola is curated by Anne Trauben.

Peter Delman is an artist living in Jersey City. Read Peter's bio here and view his artwork here.

Let Me Tell You a Story, 5/23/19 - 6/23/19, at Drawing Rooms

by Peter Delman

 

Racial identity and gender identity are underlying themes in the exhibition "Let Me Tell You A Story". But to leave it at that would be to miss a great deal. For these artists, identity is a platform from which are launched many journeys of discovery. A pivotal moment or break from tradition is often the key element in their origin stories.

For Abebunmi Gbadebo, the break was a total rejection of traditional art materials because of their association with Whiteness. She says, “My material is human hair from people of the African Diaspora. Our hair is so connected to our culture, politics, and history. It is history, DNA". Ibou Ndoye’s work builds on the tradition of Senegalese glass painting to create his personal folklore. It was when he literally broke the glass he was working on and reassembled the shards that he achieved a new level of energy in his work.

Theda Sandiford’s art is, in a sense, a soap box from which her voice can be clearly heard in a culture where too often she feels that "I am disappeared. My opinion, my ‘hand’, is dismissed outright". Shoshanna Weinberger’s work is rooted in her outsider status as a woman "considered ‘exotic’ in America and ‘not Jamaican-enough’ in Kingston". She channels the Carrie Mae Weems trope of “otherness doing otherness things” to generate jarring images of fragmented female identity. The male gaze that dismantles the bodies of women, and specifically black women, in a macho body shop of the mind, is the subject of Kimberly Becoat’s Urban Hottentot Series.

The Drawing Rooms gallery itself has embarked on a journey to develop a new identity. In the first major curated exhibition in its handsome new space, curator Anne Trauben offers a thoughtful, provocative experience for viewers. A major goal for the gallery is to encourage connections between regional art communities. This exhibition, for example, includes artists Gbadebo and Weinberger, based in Newark, and Becoat, in Brooklyn. Ndoye and Sandiford from Jersey City round out the roster.

The stories these artists tell are often unflinchingly critical of the racial stereotypes and fragmentation of gender identity ubiquitous in our cultural narrative. The exploitation and denigration of the female body represented in Becoat’s work refers to the story of Sara Baartman, who in the early 19^th century was paraded around Europe because her supposedly distorted body profile was considered an example of racial barbarity. She was known as the “Hottentot Venus". “Hottentot” itself was a derogatory slang term invented by the Dutch settlers of South Africa.

This demeaning objectification of black women is not limited to the history books. In recent years, cultural icons such as Grace Jones and Venus and Serena Williams have been subjected to demeaning characterizations of their bodies.

Kimberly Becoat, Hottent Harvest, collage

In Becoat’s collages, Tootsie Roll Pops and Bit-O-Honey replace female heads. In Hottent Harvest, some figures grasp small fetish-like figures – one of these shelters under a cantilevered butt bearing the legend “SEE MOON OFFER ON.” All this presumably for the delectations of the only head with eyes to see – a white man with an ironic flower in his mouth – suggestive of a serial killer’s calling card.

Shoshanna Weinberger: Triptych left to right: My Midnight Pink Emerging, Between Atmospheres and Bloodlines, Side Part, ink and collage on paper

Much of Weinberger’s work addresses similarly haunted terrain. In her 2012 solo show What Makes My Hottentot so Hot, and in many of her paintings, she confronts the grotesque and sexualized result of taking the “male gaze” to its darkest logical conclusion. The two works in this show are kinder, gentler meditations on identity – still the pink lips in her triptych are a real “punch in the mouth”.                                                                         

 

Theda Sandiford:
Neon Auto Tune – Limited Edition, 
digital collage on metallic photo paper

Lush lips feature, too, in Sandiford’s “Big Mouth” series. The lips are emblematic of her conscious act to embrace the power of her own voice. In Stay Woke, she deploys an arsenal of collage materials to build a whimsical self-portrait. Her two digital collages shimmer with rivulets of color and graphic energy. Neon Auto Tune – Limited Edition puts in mind the view from the bridge of a starship accelerating into hyper-space.

There are also links between Sandiford’s muscular rope sculptures and Gbadebo’s hair sculptures. Both artists work with community members to create these pieces. Gbadebo writes, “My art stores have become local barbershops and people’s homes. Every piece is made by my community. Strangers trust me to give a new purpose to their hair.” Sandiford is displaying her community-made fiber sculptures here for the first time. The hair braiding ritual is also the subject of one of Ndoye’s paintings.

 

Adebunmi Gbadebo:
Am I Still Dreadful, human hair

Gbadebo’s pieces combine the soft and the powerful like a cloud in a thunderstorm. The rippling form of Am I Still Dreadful, evoking a hair shirt and the golden fleece, commands its space on the wall with nobility. Untitled 15 is like a rope or a chain that can be seen as a reminder of oppression, but oppression overcome by the strength of individual discovery and the positive bonds forged by communities.

Weinberger writes, “The work explores my experience with ‘invisible blackness,’ ‘passing,’ and ‘Double-Consciousness’…anonymous portraits or headshots, alluding to my personal relationship with intersectional-identity, alienation and otherness". In One Pink Sunset Among My Midnight Selfies, the barely discernible images in the black frames may represent the virtually invisible aspects of the artist that are overshadowed by the selfie mask. Or perhaps they conjure the under-told story of the many women struggling in the shadows, unrecognized.

In Ndoye’s monumental paintings, the theme of community is strong and vibrant. Women often play leading roles, and the gestures of the figures are affirming and evoke trust and hope. But there are hints of sorrow too in the many unsmiling faces, and all the figures look away as if distracted by some unseen concern.

Ibou Ndoye:
The Arrival of the Fisherman,
painting on canvas

The Arrival of the Fisherman is the most joyful of the paintings. The background grid is alive with fish. The figures lift their arms in exaltation. A fishing boat is held aloft. The collaged fabric patterns, the vigorous background designs, and the demonstrative gestures of the people describe a moment of peace and plenty.

Currently running in Chelsea is a Robert Longo show that lights the way for making forceful, biting political art. The five artists in this exhibition are on this path, with their strong statements on gender, racial identity, and the restorative power of community.

Let Me Tell You a Story, 5/23/19 - 6/23/19, features works by Adebunmi Ghabedo, Shoshanna Weinberger, Theda Sandiford, Ibou Ndoye and Kimberly Becoat, is curated by Anne Trauben.

Peter Delman is an artist living in Jersey City. Read Peter's bio here and view his artwork here.