Lee Relvas in New York, NY

I should be at Art Basel this week, but at the last minute I canceled my plans. I recently lost my father and decided I needed time to regroup and wander around the city I love. The galleries are quiet, but full of amazing art. It has been exactly what I needed.

One of my favorite shows in Tribeca was Lee Relvas’s exhibition “Frisson City” at Canada.

“Relvas’s series of wall works and sculptures on pedestals are comprised of sanded-down segments of construction-grade plywood that the artist joins together with epoxy putty, a home improvement paste that is commonly used to fix leaky pipes. Under Relvas’s labored care, the sculptures evoke skeletal creatures with stories to tell, further animated with other utilitarian objects found in the home, such as erasers, earplugs, rubber bands, watches, and money. Relvas spends hours in the studio cutting, sanding, and suturing her figures, transforming the most basic of household materials into dynamic forms in motion. “I like the idea of exerting massive amounts of energy into something so ordinary and disposable.” In her exhaustive work to plot her figures into existence, Relvas overlays the realm of the everyday with tactility, sensation, and theater, making it into a dream-like, carnivalesque space.” (Canada)

Good Fortune, 2020
Plywood, epoxy putty, money, erasers, rubber bands, thread, polyurethane
25” x 20” x 20 in
House of Mirth, 2020
Plywood, epoxy putty, money, rubber bands, thread,
cotton interfacing, polyurethane
30” x 22” x 30 in
Detail
Detail

Fluffer, 2022
Plywood, epoxy putty, thumbtacks, mesh produce bag, rubber bands,
eraser, polyurethane
69” x 10” x 16 in
Detail
God’s Opinion, 2022
Plywood, epoxy putty, earplugs, rubber bands, clocks, eraser, polyurethane
71” x 13” x 13 in
Detail
Detail
My Life in Art, 2022
Plywood, epoxy putty, rubber bands, eraser, polyurethane
66” x 13” x 12 in
A Leg Up, 2020
Plywood, epoxy putty, money, erasers, rubber bands, thread, cotton interfacing, polyurethane
30” x 15” x 15 in
Detail

The exhibition is open until December 22nd.

Leave a Reply