Dike Blair / Noah Sheldon / Tony Feher

Dike Blair , Noah Sheldon Opening Reception: March 22, 6-8pm

D’Amelio Terras is pleased to present an exhibition of new work by Dike Blair and Noah Sheldon.

Dike Blair writes: “The artist Molly Smith introduced me to Noah Sheldon about ten years ago. I liked him immediately and was taken by his inexhaustible, nearly obsessive curiosity about people and pretty much everything. I followed his early photography and sound installation work. Then a few years ago, his “Almost Vegetarian,” show at Southfirst, in Brooklyn really captivated me. In part that was because he was working with some ideas I’d previously explored; but Noah did it with more ease and subtlety. Then his “Pink and Tan” show at D’Amelio Terras in 2007 really wowed me. It also wowed Roberta Smith who described how Noah “is skilled at separating beauty from the material world while reminding us that it is just about everywhere.

As I write this, Noah is on a road trip to Canada, collecting the images that he will exhibit in about 8 days (Noah is often best when flying by the seat of his pants). I think Maggie Peng, a talented architect and his wife, will help him design some armature for the hundreds of images he’ll bring back. I can’t wait to see what he does with snow. And I hear there will be beer.

My prints of women’s eyes are digital scans of paintings I’ve done over the last few years. There are 18 individual images, repeated 9 times in the gallery. The models are my wife, friends and former students, many of whom are artists. These are portraits but the image of the eye is so metaphorically rich, that I hope they do more. For me, isolating and slightly enlarging the eye amplifies its eroticism. I think there are also aspects of a ping-pong gaze and an inside-and-outsideness (windows are another of my favorite subjects) in these works.

While Noah and I didn’t try to create a collaborative work, I’m looking forward to seeing how all the eyes look at my eyes and how they scan Noah’s prints. I think something interesting might happen between all the images. We’ll see.”

Dike Blair has exhibited internationally since 1974 and was included in 2004 Biennial Exhibition, Whitney Museum of American Art, New York. He is represented by Feature Inc., New York, NY.

Noah Sheldon was born in Fort Wayne, IN. He studied Percussion and New Music at New England Conservatory of Music, received his BA from Sarah Lawrence College, and graduated with an MFA from Columbia University in 2000. Noah has an upcoming solo show in May at Cherry and Martin Gallery in Los Angeles. He had a solo exhibition in 2007 at D’Amelio Terras in New York and in 2005 at Southfirst in Brooklyn. Sheldon was included in the 2007 exhibition, “Ensemble,” at the Institute of Contemporary Art in Philadelphia curated by Christian Marclay. His work has been shown in New York at PS1 Contemporary Art Center, P.P.O.W. Gallery, and John Connelly Presents, among others. In 2006 he curated a show titled “Mystic River” at Southfirst, Brooklyn, NY, which traveled to Arcadia University Art Gallery, Glenside, PA.

Tony Feher Opening Reception: Saturday March 22, 6-8pm

D’Amelio Terras is pleased to present a Front Room exhibition by Tony Feher of seminal works dating from 1987 to 19993 that employ the use of a “vessel”. These works are the first examples where Feher utilized found and forgotten materials such as marbles, lidded jars, chips of glass, coal and washers in order to create formal, Post-Minimal sculpture imbued with personal and poetic resonance. This will be Feher’s fifth one-person exhibition with the gallery. Concurrently, a show of new sculpture will be held at PaceWildenstein, 32 East 57th Street.

Tony Feher arrived in New York in 1981 and six years later turned his attention away from painting toward the formal diversity of objects and materials culled from the sideshow of consumer culture. Prompted by the reflective brilliance of new marbles displayed in the window of an East Village children’s store, Feher began creating his first mature sculpture in 1987. With their ribbed sides and golden lids, he would involve a utilitarian counterpoint to the flotsam he collected in the form of an equally common and unassuming honey jar. These first sculptures were the genesis of a lifelong exploration of sculptural assemblage. Speaking of the chips of glass, Tony Feher said in a March 2001 interview with Adam Weinberg:

“I pick theses things up because I’m curious. And I’ll think, this really is a remnant of our society… And then I become obsessed, and I’ll fill a whole honey jar with these things, and feel as if I just took a swipe across the night sky, grabbed a fistful of stardust, and put it in a jar.” The journeys and personal explorations through specific neighborhoods and places resembled the practice of an archeologist. Feher’s early creative process was ritualistic excavation – uncovering artifacts whose selection suggested an autobiographical narrative. The use of a vessel as a means of containment and transport first appeared in the work of the late 80s. If carefully examined, their contents offered insight into their creator as well into society at that time.

Tony Feher’s sculptures are in numerous public collections, including the Whitney Museum of American Art, New York; the Guggenheim Museum, New York; the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art; The Art Institute of Chicago; the Baltimore Museum of Art; the Henry Art Gallery, Seattle; and the Museum of Modern Art, Fort Worth. He has recently exhibited in “Poetic Justice,” the 8th International Istanbul Biennial and was a featured artist at the Chinati Foundation’s Open House in 2005. In 2007 Feher exhibited “Some Time Soon” at the Art Museum of South Texas, Corpus Christi and "A Single Act of Carelessness Will Result in the Eternal Loss of Beauty," was the inaugural exhibition in the Efroymson Pavilion at the Indianapolis Museum of Art.

Dike Blair / Noah Sheldon
Front Room: Tony Feher