Justin Davis Anderson

Joel Fennell

Clive Murphy

Aengus Woods

+ More curated works from artists of Liz and Lina’s personal collection

Opening on January 12, 2019 from 6pm-9pm Elijah Wheat Showroom presents a personal and sentimental group show entitled “Living Room” with Justin Davis Anderson, Joel Fennell, Clive Murphy & Aengus Woods: All remarkable confidants that supported us without reservations, held our base together and grounded our reality, 5 years ago this January when we discovered our son Elijah had passed away in our home. During some of those darkest hours, our family was soothed by a sincere empathy that continues to fill our souls, as anniversaries of death are always difficult for families experiencing sudden loss.

Family and friends often help carry grief from the departed, and we wanted to share the gallery’s location as a comforting place to reflect on life this upcoming cold, white January. We invite passer-bys to relax in the warm space while being surrounded by a lively ready-made sculpture by Clive Murphy, an installation of designed objects and wall treatments by Joel Fennell, assemblages and woodwork by Aengus Woods and artistic super 8 film renderings and hand treated Poloroids by Justin Davis Anderson. There will also be works displayed from Liz and Lina’s personal collection which include artists: Roxanne Jackson, Camille LeCoutre, ElijahElisio Timbale Gortaire-Wheat, Acacia Barker, Mary Thiefels, Keri Oldham, Taurus Burns, Lauren Gregory, Stacie Johnson, Liz Nielsen, Frances Waite, Natalie Baxter, Carolina Couture, Gordon Matta-Clark, Jo Boyer, Ben Pederson, & Devon Shimoyama.   

Woods explains: “Last year, when the Donald Judd furniture line was re-launching itself, a profile in the WSJ noted the difficulties encountered by Judd's wife in dealing with the bed her husband had designed. A bare platform, hovering just a few inches of the floor, Judd had insisted on such austere proportions. They matched other proportional relationships in the room. Practicality was hence subordinated to a desire for systematicity, and to such a degree that Judd’s pregnant wife was forced to make the bed each morning only with great difficulty while still lying on it, unable as she was in her advanced state of pregnancy to do so while standing up.”

Further, Woods shares that: “Even putting aside the question as to why the fuck Donald (Donald!) couldn't perhaps assist in the daily bed-making, the episode points to a more general sense of how frequently oblivious our heroic male artists have been towards the practical issues of living. How does a toddler relate to Richard Serra's propped steel works? How does a parent struggling to pay for heat relate to the power usage of neon or fluorescent bulbs in Dan Flavin's pieces? How does a pregnant woman relate to a bed two inches off the floor? We don't live in white cubes. We eat shit fuck, procreate and sleep. If we are lucky we do this indoors with all the smells spills and struggles they entail.” For this, the gallery is grateful for a space to share and contemplate parentlng.

Creating a space together that addresses a safe place to reflect on nurturing, transformation and the vibrancy of life. Perhaps as fathers, or as friends, the qualities of an empathetic familial meeting place will become the gallery.

Justin Davis Anderson is a Brooklyn based artist whose work explores the poetic relation of memory and experience. Often working from photographic, film, or video imagery, artist shot or appropriated, he uses painting and mark making as a self-exploratory and self-editing process. The work then resides in the dialectic of thought and experience, and there is a strong use of chance and the embrace of the instant or unknown in the work. Anderson finds influence not only in the cannons of art, but in religion, travel, poetry, music and everyday relationships.  Often working with musicians and sound artists on collaborative films, he has worked with such names as The National, Hofferlanz, Juan Comas, Kyle Combs, F Books, and Rompers. Anderson has shown in New York City, Chicago, Los Angeles, London, Newburgh, and Atlanta, and has made films for BAM and The National's High Violet World

Tour.

Joel Fennell is a Brooklyn based artist and DJ. He earned his BFA from University of Illinois, Chicago in 1999. Since, Fennell has had several gallery and museum exhibitions, including at the Other Art Fair and David Zwirner, 533 West 19th Street.

Irish born artist Clive Murphy lives and works in Brooklyn. Previous exhibitions include: St. Isdro's Still, Anonymous Gallery, Mexico City (2018); Ambient Occlusion, Present Company Gallery, Brooklyn (2017); House of Cards, Van Horn Gallery, Dusseldorf (2016); Good Things Come..., Plymouth College of Art, England (2016); Two Machines, Knockdown Centre, New York (2015); DIWIF (Demonic Interventions With Ikea Furniture) - collaboration with Aengus Woods, Rawson Projects, New York (2015); Being: The Gameshow, Storefront For Art and Architecture, New York (2014); Saturated Phenomena, Wildlife, Brooklyn (2013); Neo Proto Demo, Kling & Bang, Reykjavik, Iceland (2013) Zypher, Jerome Fellowship funded public sculpture, Franconia Sculpture Park, Minnesota (2012); Fill The Barn, Index Festival of Sound and Technology, New York (2011); The Sixth Borough, No Longer Empty, Governors Island, New York (2010); Almost Nothing, Soap Factory Gallery, Minneapolis (2009); LMCC, New York (2008);Non-Oblectif Sud, Côtes du Rhône (2008); Kerlin Gallery, Dublin (2008); West Germany Gallery, Berlin (2007); Irish Museum of Modern Art, Dublin (2007); Fieldgate Gallery, London (2007); Mercer Union Gallery, Toronto (2006); Hugh Lane Gallery, Dublin (2005) Crawford Municipal Art Gallery, Cork (2005); Bloomberg New Contemporaries, Manchester/Sheffield/London (2005); Alma Enterprises Gallery, London (2005); British Council/CityMine(d) Brussels (2005); Eastlink Gallery, Shanghai (2004); Gallery 411, Hangzhou (2004); Zedebois Centre, Lisbon (2003) EV+A, Limerick (2002); CCFA, Prague (2001)

Aengus Woods is the co-author (with Clive Murphy) of DIWIF: Demonic Interventions With IKEA Furniture (New York: Printed Matter Inc., 2014) and a co-editor of Other Edens: the life and work of Brian Coffey (Dublin: Irish Academic Press, 2010). His writings have appeared in About Trees by Katie Holten (Berlin: Broken Dimanche Press, 2015), Critical Insights: David Foster Wallace, edited by Philip Coleman (New York: Salem Press, 2015), Winter Pages, the Irish Times and the Dublin Review of Books. He has previously exhibited collaborative work at David Zwirner, Rawson Projects and the Other Artfair, NYC..

Opening on January 12, 2019 from 6pm-9pm and will run through January 27th.