Morgan Lehman Gallery open for viewing works by Sara Genn, and David Rios Ferreira October 1- November 25th

Morgan Lehman Gallery is thrilled to open two fall exhibitions in our brand new gallery space! Sara Genn Everything Will Be Okay   October 1 - November 25 Sara Genn: Everything Will Be Okay, 2020 (installation view) In Sara Genn's view, one misconception about design is that it's merely about how things look. Really, it's about how things function. We may understand such a notion in the context of machines and technology, but the idea of functionality could actually be applied to many arenas, including (if not especially), art. Paintings are made to engage, incite and connect people, but they also have the ability to quietly work within the balance of their own material limits and their own systems of visual organization. Genn believes that design principles may be freely applied to paintings, and her work unwaveringly affirms this sentiment.   The Japanese aesthetic philosophy of wabi-sabi states that objects and experiences are most beautiful when they evoke a feeling of spiritual longing. Stemming from her Japanese maternal heritage, Sara Genn's interest in wabi-sabi has influenced her painting methodology well as the visual themes present in her work. Genn's paintings strive to simultaneously offer a place of shelter and tension for the viewer; they provide a place for us to rest but also ask us to consider our own longing. As much as these works exude a visual weightlessness, they assert themselves as objects in space with varied tactile and material properties. Acrylic paint and unprimed canvas planes push against one another, edges meticulously created freehand without mechanical aids, highlighting the poetry of the imperfect within idealized design structures.   Having recently set up a secondary studio in a 1960 Mid-Century house in Palm Springs, California at the edge of the wilderness of Joshua Tree, Genn found herself struck by the power of her environment to radicalize the basic principles that have always driven her practice: asymmetry, asperity (the roughness or irregularity of things,) simplicity, austerity and intimacy. These new paintings reaffirm the artist's core artistic philosophy. They are generous of spirit through restraint, everything inspired by a new sense of place.     Sara Genn is a Canadian-born artist, composer, and independent recording artist. She graduated with a BFA from Queen's University in Kingston, Ontario in 1994. After spending 15 years in New York City, Genn relocated to Palm Springs, California. Genn's work has been featured in the New York Times, House Beautiful, Create!, House and Home, NYLON Japan, Town and Country, W, Domino, American Art Collector, New York Magazine, LONY, and Tatler, as well as in the Rizzoli publication New York Parties: Private Views. The artist lives and works in Palm Springs, California. Please click here for a preview of works in the exhibition. David Rios Ferreira Gesture for want and tears for all that is dark   October 1 - November 25 David Rios Ferreira: Gesture for want and tears for all that is dark, 2020 (installation view) David Rios Ferreira's multifaceted practice draws on an array of visual sources including historical etchings, 1930's political cartoons, and children's coloring books. From these touchstones of visual culture, the artist produces highly graphic works defined by clusters of lines and layers of color, his output often spanning drawing, painting, sculpture, and installation.   As a first-generation mainland Puerto Rican, Ferreira is influenced by the detestable deculturalization practices conducted by the United States government on children in Puerto Rico up until the 1950's, strategies such as state-sponsored propaganda through nursery rhymes and school pledges. The artist's practice is also informed by his young nephews on the Autism Spectrum who borrow lines from cartoons in order to communicate, with their interest in animation going beyond childish obsession and becoming a source for language. In Ferreira's work, familiar Pop-culture characters such as Astro Boy, Pinocchio, and Peter Pan are reconstituted to become repositories for the artist's personal history and broader political commentary. Ferreira draws from similarly constructed beings found in Caribbean and West African carnival culture, whereby new identities are formed from recycled fragments and everyday objects become ingredients for new structures that emit power and spirituality, while addressing social and political issues.   Taken all at once or piece by piece, Ferreira's work coalesces into a study on identity formation, an investigation of gender, sexuality, race, and nation. In this unique moment in time in which old sociopolitical wounds resurface and new ones opened, Ferreira asks us to consider questions of ourselves and the systems of power that we inhabit.   David Rios Ferreira has exhibited in galleries and museums in the US and abroad including CoCA (Seattle, WA), Nemeth Art Center (Park Rapids, MN) and Kunstraum Richard Sorge Gallery (Berlin, Germany). He has held residencies at the Lower East Side Printshop (New York, NY), Elizabeth Foundation for the Arts (New York, NY), The Center for Book Arts (New York, NY) and has participated in professional development programs such as Emerge 11 at Aljira (Newark, NJ) and the Bronx Museum's Artist in the Marketplace (AIM) program (Bronx, NY). Awards include the National Association of Latino Arts & Culture Fund for the Arts grant, the New Jersey State Council on the Arts Fellowship,  and the ArtSlant Grand Prize. Group exhibitions include Bronx Calling: The Fourth AIM Biennial, The Bronx Museum of the Arts (Bronx, NY),  Uproot at Smack Mellon (Brooklyn, NY), and Figuring The Floral at Wave Hill (Bronx, NY). Solo exhibitions include And by each crime and every kindness, Sunroom Project Space at Wave Hill, Ni de aquí, Ni de allá at Rush Arts, Corridor Gallery (Brooklyn, NY),  And I Hear Your Words That I Made Up, Brattleboro Museum & Art Center (Vermont) and most recently Don't you see I got everythin you need, at BRIC (Brooklyn, NY). David Rios Ferreira holds a BFA from The Cooper Union. Please click here for a preview of works in the exhibition. Morgan Lehman Gallery 526 West 26th Street, 4th Floor New York, NY 10011 Thursday - Saturday 11am - 6pm and by appointment click here to make an appointment

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