Lorna Simpson

Darkening

April 25 - July 26, 2019

New York, 22nd Street

Hauser & Wirth is pleased to present ‘Lorna Simpson. Darkening,’ the artist’s first solo exhibition with the gallery in New York. Debuting a suite of new large-scale paintings, the exhibition finds Simpson returning to and building upon themes and motifs at the center of her practice: explorations focused on the nature of representation, identity, gender, race, and history. For more than 30 years, Simpson’s powerful works have entangled viewers in an equivocal web of meaning, drawing upon techniques of collage through the use of found materials, often culled from the pages of vintage Jet and Ebony magazines. In ‘Darkening,’ Simpson continues to thread dichotomies of figuration and abstraction with vast and enthralling tableaux that subsume spliced photos and fragmented text, abstracted beyond comprehension. Equally arresting and poetic, the paintings engage viewers with layers of paradox, capturing the mystifying allure of an arctic landscape in inky washes of blacks, grays, and startling blues.

Installation views

Event

Opening reception: ‘Lorna Simpson. Darkening’

Join us for the opening reception of works by Lorna Simpson in New York. Over the past 30 years, Simpson has continued to probe questions about the nature of representation, identity, gender, race, and history, while expanding her oeuvre to encompass various media including film and video, painting, drawing, and, most recently, sculpture. Her powerful works entangle viewers in an equivocal web of meaning: what is unseen and left unsaid is equally important as that which the artist does disclose. In this exhibition of new paintings, collages, and sculptures, Simpson continues to engage viewers with layers of paradox, threading dichotomies of figuration and abstraction, destruction and creation, past and present.

About the Artist

Born in Brooklyn, Lorna Simpson came to prominence in the 1980s with her pioneering approach to conceptual photography. Simpson’s early work—particularly her striking juxtapositions of text and staged images—raised questions about the nature of representation, identity, gender, race and history that continue to drive the artist’s expanding and multi-disciplinary practice today. She deftly explores the medium’s umbilical relation to memory and history, both central themes within her work.

Current Exhibitions