Nohra Haime Gallery

"Heaven and Earth" proposes a dialogue between two aspects of Álvaro Barrios' work. On one hand, the dreamlike or surreal sense of some of his works, in which poetic or philosophical licenses are often allowed, and on the other hand, he expresses with a particular sense of humor, a critical dimension regarding the system of interests with which the contemporary world infringes the essence of art itself.

In an era with newly-changing notions on sexuality, Marmorek presents a collection of conceptual works investigating society’s concept of love and desire through the ages, inspired by contemporary ideologies and a dialogue with emblematic classic art works.

Nohra Haime Gallery is proud to present an exhibition of new works by Lesley Dill in the Windows. The artist has created a trio of collage paintings, 2 of which can be seen from the sidewalk on 10th Avenue at 21st Street. This work, DREAM WORLD OF THE FOREST is a follow-up to her series titled WILDERNESS which is currently our tour to 8 museums nationwide. This body of 3 new painting-collage works by Lesley Dill take us into a “Dream World of the Forest”, where images emerge from the crossroads of poetic text and visions in the wild. Each of these works reflects an elemental action of nature—a blazing, a bursting, a striving multiplicity. In "When the Deer Talk to Me", Dill pairs an iconic deer seemingly oblivious to the weight of beauty growing as a forest from its head, embedded in a landscape of words by contemporary poet Tom Sleigh. His words line up beneath this forest of antlers growing impossibly tall against stark white: “When the deer talk to me as they mostly do in a Dream Tongue only I can Understand… they tell me without blame all the things that I’ve done wrong and will never make better.” "Man Carrying the Wilderness Far Away on the Frontier," a gentle man peers at us calmly while barely able to contain the leaping deer’s he’s trying to carry to…where? This artwork also features Sleigh’s mythical words: “Far away on the frontier Where Trees---Still Bleed- &--Birdmen Rustle feathers & Griffins Guard!” The man in this work may appear to some as a stable trunk from which mystic deer grow and leap; but to others he may look a fragile figure, trying to contain forces beyond his control. The third image of "Blazing Tree" has biblical tones, from the fire that is God’s beacon in a forest. The light draws a lone seeker to this message, ecstatic or frightening or both. This painting-collage grew from the story of a vision by a Shaker woman, Sister Hannah Cohoon, who wrote that “This tree grows in the Spirit Land”. The fire engulfs but does not destroy the tree. Rather, the tree thrives in a wondrous, living blaze. In her dream-vision, Sister Cohoon reached out in wonder to embrace the mystic fire but at the last she hesitated: “Lest the Blaze Should Torch my Hand!”. Dill spent much of her childhood following pathways in the dark Adirondack and Maine woods, on the trail cut by deer, bear, rabbits, and porcupine. Those evergreen forests of her northern upbringing are silhouettes of spires or spikes against the sky. Even the lakes of the Adirondacks have a deep almost black depth where herons, osprey and loons flash suddenly into view. She brings these memories into her on-going themes of transcendent and visionary experiences with these new works. This body of work is composed of Asian mulberry paper, joined as squares using a glue fusion technique. The imagery and text are made from a combination of acrylic paint and intricately hand-cut paper imagery, subtly webbed by Dill’s trademark addition of delicate hanging threads. Born in Bronxville, New York, Lesley Dill grew up in Maine and the Adirondacks. Now based in Brooklyn, the artist works with a variety of materials such as horse hair, muslin, thread, photography, and metal that accumulates into sculpture, performance, works on paper, and fabric. From the early 1980s onwards, Dill has had over 100 solo exhibitions. Her work is found in museum collections across the United States, and has been shown both nationally and internationally. She was recently awarded the John Simon Guggenheim Fellowship.

The Nohra Haime Gallery is pleased to present a series of 30 works by Adriana Marmorek which are part of her lifelong investigation of love and desire. “Ineffability is the experience of death. The person who finds love is almost always unable to name this love and it seems that any language is inadequate to refer to the beloved. Yet, it is from the moment in which love is lost that the language around it finally articulates. Where Will You Be, Love? is a piece that works on this premise and materializes it in an allusion to the inadequacy of verbal language to refer to love. Here lies the key to Marmorek's later work: the language used to speak of love is not verbal but magical. That's why Marmorek begins to engage in a much closer creative dialogue with those who want to share with her their individual experiences with love. Thus, this collaborative exercise continues to expand as the artist's creative process becomes freer and gets stripped of culturally constructed tropes aimed to develop notions of desire and love. This leads Marmorek to give away almost totally the control of her creative process and to trust the quality of the dialogue with a universe of people who choose to play the game she established and to confide in her with their most intimate moments of love. This is not really a turning point in her work, but its continuity. If the artist used to make us break into the privacy of the women she showed us through her lens, we now become participants in a perhaps more intimate space that belongs to strangers we get to know through their stories of love won and lost. Marmorek's research is, of course, informed by her experience with her own love, her own desire and her own body. Indeed, has there ever been an artist that has not unsheathed their work from their experience as an individual? Yet, what's interesting is that her modus operandi is based on never limiting her explorations to individual circumstances from each moment of her life, but on seeking to understand how these circumstances may or may not be shared by partners who contribute to the construction of the work and by spectators who fill with meaning the interaction with it. The fact that the gaze is established as Adriana Marmorek's methodological axis of artistic research also means that the artist managed to build an inexhaustible field of exploration. This approach will allow her not only to gradually find new questions that continually open possibilities for examination and experimentation; it will also offer the possibility of revisiting a specific aspect of desire or even a previously explored point of view from a different position, perhaps modified by time or experience or perhaps altered by its relationship with her viewers. That's why Adriana Marmorek allows herself to be established as a narrator of desire and as a facilitator in the process of understanding the desire of all who have had the transformative experience of encountering one of her works.” Paula Silva

The Nohra Haime Gallery is proud to present from March 8 – April 9, 2022: Abstractions, an exhibition of contrasts within the world of abstraction. It proposes diverse theoretical approaches to abstract art, featuring both Painting and Sculpture that includes the following artists: James Brown, Carol K. Brown, Juan Cortés, Pierre Dunoyer, Bernard Frize, Julie Hedrick, Jacqueline Humphries, Susana Jaime-Mena, Gregg Louis, Ramiro Llona, Keith Milow, Lika Mutal, Edgar Negret, Rogelio Polesello, Anna Paola Protasio, Loló Soldevilla, Francisca Sutil, Sophia Vari and William Wood. Although both mediums are more traditional, as painting at the beginning of the 1980s and many times over, was considered to be “dead,” this group of artists will prove the contrary. Some of them are informed by more traditional sources such as the Hudson River School of painting, while others are much more experimental. More importantly, through their diverse pictorial techniques, they help revitalize the language of abstract art. The representation of their own external realities will ultimately engage us in meaningful visual dialogues. James Brown’s paintings, influenced by early modernism, Renaissance, medieval and primitive art, reflect a very fine line between figurative and abstract art. His works are labor intensive and depict somewhat rough organic figures that nevertheless signal to recognizable objects. They evoke accomplished theosophical concepts. Bernard Frize, Francisca Sutil and Julie Hedrick, using color as their goal, explore the essence of painting, using the most fundamental elements, making them technically innovative. However, Sutil transcends the aesthetic, evoking a reality that she aptly stated, “is layered and mysterious, visible and invisible.” Dunoyer’s work emphasizes the stroke and its power over monochrome. Opposing him, Wood’s strokes meander around the canvas and are blended to the point of disappearing. Loló Soldevilla, one of the fundamental figures of Cuban geometric abstraction presents a panorama of squares and circles. Soldevilla will be viewed alongside contemporary artist Jacqueline Humphries who reinvigorated the language of abstraction through her use of online idioms into her practice. The exhibition will include an early work where her drips are reminiscent of the abstract expressionists. Abstractions will also showcase the works of Susana Jaime-Mena which are a great transition into sculpture, whose forms are largely geometric and are neither sculpture nor painting. More importantly, influenced by many sources such as literature, philosophy and physics, amongst others, her work is associated with both Painting and Sculpture. This is due to her juxtaposition of sculptural objects with a combination of materials, creating painterly surfaces that extend beyond the wall allowing viewers to see both a Painting and a Sculpture.Rogelio Polesello, Lika Mutal and Sophia Vari are amongst the sculptors represented in the exhibition. Polesello re-energized the language of concrete art with his translucent work that produced an optical effect of reverberation. Conversely, Lika Mutal’s stone sculptures are informed both by Western and non-Western aesthetics, including Pre-Columbian and Pre-Historical rock art. In Stone Tide the artist interposes a smoothly polished stone with a found coral thus, uniting the universe. Sophia Vari’s early abstract bronze sculptures only hint at representation and can also be seen as amorphous. Gregg Louis and Juan Cortés represent a 21st century way of working, Louis by his approach to painting through his bold and colorful strokes and Juan Cortés through his use of technology. Cortés, a fast-emerging young artist whose sculptures and installations are based on interdisciplinary processes between art, science and technology, uses his scientific knowledge to break down complicated theories to create “translation machines,” robots and acoustic levitators. Magnetic Box II is a living drawing that is constantly changing.

The Nohra Haime Gallery is proud to present its new exhibition entitled, The Runway. It is a group exhibition showcasing seven artists the gallery represents: Carol K. Brown, Lesley Dill, Valerie Hird, Adriana Marmorek, Ruby Rumie, Hugo Tillman and Sophia Vari. The mediums vary significantly allowing viewers to see paintings, drawings, media, photography and sculpture. In reading the title, The Runway, some concepts that immediately come to mind are fashion, catwalks and clothing. However, this runway will showcase this group of established artists that are all very different. On one hand, some use garments as a tool of communication to tell stories and historical narratives. Others, portray different types of portraiture such as environmental portraiture in psychological space and ethnographic portraits that reflect issues of class, race, gender, as well as associations with politics and economy. On the other hand, some artists technical mastery in the varied mediums seen throughout the exhibition reveal: different aspects of the human condition, transformative performances of personas and characters, concepts of eternity and ephemerality, as well as self-perception. Their technical dexterity also brings their figurines and effigies to life revealing their psyches and identity. In the case of Lesley Dill, her slender and sophisticated dress-sculptures represent historical figures, where she embroiders words on them that are from Emily Dickinson’s poems. Thus, in a similar way to Emily Dickinson, she clothes her characters literally with writing to reflect the physical qualities of language as well as to expose her historical personas.

On the screens, we see the reality with bird’s eyes as it begins its journey from a forest in Canada to the mountains of Tolemaida in Colombia. The performer struggles to follow the path while collecting food for itself and its flock in an attempt not to die in the long journey.

For the first time since 1984, multi-disciplinary artist Lee Jaffe will exhibit HISTORY REVISTED a series of large-scale mixed media artworks addressing the sharp edges of American history. Born in the Bronx in 1950, Jaffe grew up with his Jewish family during the social tumult of the Civil Rights and decolonizing movements around the globe in the 1960s. Jaffe’s command over composition derives from his extensive training as a conceptual visual artist but also guided by a broader commitment towards social justice. As a filmmaker in the 1970s and 80s, Jaffe collaborated with revolutionary artists Gordon Matta-Clark (Chile) and Hélio Oiticica (Brazil). Jaffe is perhaps most recognized for his ubiquitous photo portraiture of popular culture and music figures such as reggae pioneers Bob Marley and Peter Tosh and visual artist Jean Michel Basquiat. 

 Initially exhibited at Peter Bonnier Gallery in 1984, Jaffe describes the impetus of the series, “At the time of its creation in 1983, I felt an intense need to retell these stories that have been skewed, or largely untold. By combining painting, drawing, sculptural and natural elements, as well as archival documents and photography, I could unearth the contradictions of American history, bone by bone, bill by dollar bill.” For example, in Portrait of Sacco and Vanzetti, Jaffe applies animal material, namely fish scales, and bones, against an encasement of gold leaf and decadence. Furthermore, Jaffe uses greenbacks to undermine its value in Portrait of George Washington. In The Life and Times of Sally Hemings, Jaffe uses the dollar bill to underscore how Trans-Atlantic slavery produced America’s wealth but also to reassert the story of Sally Hemings, a Black woman enslaved and coerced into pregnancy by Thomas Jefferson. 

 According to Leslie Garrett, gallery director, “It is uncanny how relevant Lee Jaffe’s artwork is today. We are excited that these works created nearly forty years ago will now be viewed in the context of today when these very questions around race, violence and power remain embittered and unanswered.” In Portrait of John Brown and Nat Turner, Jaffe reconstructs a map of the United States and wooden gallows to foreground the violent consequences of insurrection and rebellion. In HISTORY REVISITED, Jaffe reminds viewers that history is always in the making, and for the taking. Dates: October 21 – December 11, 2021 For more information: Madeline Weiss at 212-888-3550 or gallery@nohrahaimegallery.com

Larraz infuses his works with humour and a magical realism where nothing is what it seems and the fleeting moment will escape us giving different answers to what is happening and keeping us in suspense of what is really going on.

The Ravelled Edge contemplates the juxtaposition between exterior and interior; domesticity and wilderness. It reflects on the transitional moment we are currently in, on the precipice of an existential threat of climate change.

Beings of Light is an exhibition of mixed media works from the 1980s by Italian artist Silvio Merlino, on view from May 12 through June 12. Merlino’s works have been shown internationally, most notably at the Venice Biennale, Nohra Haime Gallery, and throughout Europe. Inspired by Italian landscapes, Italian artist Silvio Merlino creates magical environments where the power of nature collides with man’s struggle to control it. Through his work we enter day-glo fantasies of a universe where beauty, elegance and grace are created through phantasmagorical collages utilizing fake fur, flippers, corals, glass candy and grated glass that shimmers. This dichotomy between nature and technology is strikingly ominous. Scenes of fossilized creatures and fighter planes evoke a time-warping sensation of a different era. Mountains, volcanos, and flames are illuminated against deep blue backgrounds, showing a glimmer of light against the darkness. On first impact our skin crawls as we feel the harmful power of man but later, as we get used to these textures, we reenter the realm of the magician and his disquieting beauty. Merlino’s works explore themes of warfare, mass production, and ecological deterioration, all the while giving glimpses of satire and humor. The imagery sits on the border between dream and nightmare, reflecting the true nature of our modern world. Merlino’s use of mixed media and vibrant paints is innovative, a real tour de force that renders the viewer speechless. Silvio Merlino was born in Naples in 1952. He lives in Treviso. He has exhibited extensively throughout Europe and is in museum collections such as the Dallas Museum of Art, Museo de Bellas Artes, Bilbao, Museo del Novecento, Milan, Museo Epicentro, Pinacoteca, Bari and the famous Lucio Amelio collection Terrae Motus, GNAM, Naples.

Still Looking for the Promised Land, an exhibition of recent landscape paintings by Adam Straus, will be on view at Nohra Haime Gallery from April 6 – May 1, 2021. Subtly calling attention to issues in the news during the 45th presidency, the paintings contrast current events from 2016-2020 with an optimistic view of nature’s resilience. The exhibition can also be viewed online beginning on April 6th.

HOME VIEWING ROOMS EXHIBITIONS GALLERY ARTISTS OTHER ARTISTS NEWS CONTACT SHOP WHM SEE THE WORKS Instagram Twitter Facebook WATCH THE VIDEO TAKE A TOUR PAST Valerie Hird’s newest exhibition, What Did Happen to Alice; My Avatar, highlights her award-winning video animation with its interactive stage sets and multi-media paintings. This series explores complex questions of identity as it follows Hird’s fictional avatar “Alice” through a landscape of personal and political influences and experiences from 1960s America all the way to the current day in the Middle East.

In EVERY LAST THING, American artist Beth Lipman explores themes of time and human precarity through the use of cultural objects and prehistoric flora. Endangered plants, latent humanoid forms and communal emblems allude to mortality and transience, fossilized in glass and metal. This marks her first solo exhibition with Nohra Haime Gallery.

NIKI DE SAINT PHALLE: QUINTESSENTIAL WORKS is a whimsical exhibition of sculpture and works on paper that captures the essence of Saint Phalle’s uplifted spirit later in life, through her joyful and brightly colored works. The gallery will offer extended viewing hours on Thursday evenings until 8pm.

In THE VIEW FROM NOWHERE, Colombian artist Juan Cortes explores the connection between art, science, and educational processes to visually translate our simple understanding of complex phenomena in the universe through sound, video and sculptural installations. This marks his first solo exhibition with Nohra Haime Gallery.

Eve Sonneman instills a powerful vibrancy in her new series Navigation With Dreams. Using her signature style of pairing stills taken seconds apart, she skillfully captures the intrigue of everyday happenings among iconic locations around the world. From hip hop dancing in Coney Island to musical instruments in Cannes, the artist’s astute observations present a humanistic narrative to her work, making normally mundane moments fantastically special.

Sculpture: 1994-2018, Lesley Dill's second solo show with Nohra Haime Gallery, will be on view from January 18 - March 2, 2019. This survey of 18 works captures how Dill uses the power of written language to create art with a profusion of textures, forms and materials. In a NY Times review, Benjamin Genocchio has written: "Her art evokes an imaginative and emotional space, deftly balancing sure, concrete reference points with whimsical intimations of some other, larger, escapist universe." Dills' materials in these works are many, including wood, bronze, fabric, copper, glass, horsehair, paper, feathers and thread. But the common ground drawing together her disparate images and materials is the written word: poetic texts entwined with image have long been the consistent and unique region of Dill's explorations. What began decades ago with a deep dive into the poetic text of Emily Dickinson has since expanded into a handful of other literary sources, including the poets Tom Sleigh and Salvador Espriu, and the writers Franz Kafka and Nathanial Hawthorne. In an essay on Dill's work, curator Nandini Makrandi has written, "Dill describes herself as a collector of language, calling it the 'pivot point' of all her work. As the artist has moved through different series in different years, language has remained the constant, used to capture what she describes as the enormity of the inner self." "Ms. Dill's sculptures are less visual objects for detached aesthetic contemplation", Benjamin Genocchio wrote in the NY Times, "than knotty philosophical puzzles that use sculpture as a launching pad." Word Through, a freestanding metal sculpture, is gently pierced by a ribbon of words hand stamped with the words of Franz Kafka: I am a hesitation before birth My life is a hesitation before birth The words appear on a figure with a delicate body and large clenched hands. The visual tension acts as a metaphor of the often conflicting moment of doubt and anticipation before committing to an idea. The clenched, hard surface of the body highly contrasts to the loosely strewn ribbons of text. In Woman in Dress With Star, the bronze sculpture is cut with the words of Medieval writer John Donne: In Mee the Flame was Nevermore Alive I could Beginne again Dill has called these words "fierce, fragile and hopeful", capturing the flash of creative thought, of being alive again. Atop the head rests a star-like crown, invoking "the Flame", the inner world's fire at the point of creation. Below is the dress, with flowing layers and folds. First formed as a paper sculpture, it is then cast into bronze in a manner that retains the surface tactility of paper, and captures the tension of lightness against the hard metal, like armor. The illusion is so strong that viewers often touch the dress to confirm it is truly metal. Art writer Arlene Raven saw potent transformations held in these artworks, as she wrote: "For Dill, words are dimensional elements seen and felt, filling a room with silent yet penetrating speech.” Born in Bronxville, New York, Lesley Dill grew up in Maine and the Adirondacks. Now based in Brooklyn, the artist works with a variety of materials such as horsehair, muslin, thread, photography, and metal that accumulates into sculpture, performance, works on paper, and fabric. From the early 1980s onwards, Dill has had over 100 solo exhibitions. Her work is found in museum collections across the United States, and has been shown both nationally and internationally. She was recently awarded the John Simon Guggenheim Fellowship. Lesley Dill is the most recent artist represented by Nohra Haime Gallery.

FORMS AND COLORS CONTINUED/ COLOR AND SCALE marks Sophia Vari’s fifteenth solo exhibition with Nohra Haime Gallery. Throughout her long and internationally spread career, Vari’s work continues to take dramatic turns. Ranging from monumental sculpture to canvases, geometric collages and wearable jewelry, her work retains a signature strong yet sensitive, recognizable hand. This exhibition gathers work in multiple mediums, and includes new sculptures and collages highlighting powerful explorations into color and scale.