NYAB Event - Elana Herzog “SHIFT; The Angel of History”

Elana Herzog “SHIFT; The Angel of History”

Studio 10

This event has ended.

Studio 10 presents Shift; The Angel of History, a solo exhibition of Elana Herzog’s work. This installation addresses the relationship between material and memory, activating the space through drawing, painting and stitching. An entire jacket has been pulled apart to form vertical sutures in the walls. The room itself is splitting at the seams.

Two groupings of cut logs on Persian carpets reference the twentieth century Swiss author Robert Walser, who after the decline of his literary career would take long walks in the woods around his sanatorium. The log sculptures are heavily scarred, but also ornamented with fabric and staples, connoting moss or some other naturally occurring growth. The solidity of the logs stands in contrast to the ephemeral nature of the vertical zips around the perimeter.

The word shift could be seen as referring to the inevitability of change—as in the way that our material existences are altered by wear, or the fact that the earth shifts during a geological trauma. The show is a fault line that draws our attention to the close relationship between destruction, repair and transformation.

Elana Herzog lives and works in New York City. In 2014 she mounted a major project, Valence, at The Boiler (Pierogi), in Brooklyn. Previous solo exhibitions include: Lmak Projects, the Daum Museum of Contemporary Art, the Aldrich Museum of Contemporary Art, Smack Mellon, the Herbert F. Johnson, Morgan Lehman Gallery, PPOW Gallery, Diverse Works in Texas and the Zilkha Gallery. Her work has been exhibited in Norway, Iceland and Sweden and she has participated in numerous group shows at institutions such as the Tang Museum, the Weatherspoon Museum, David Castillo Gallery in Miami, and at The Brooklyn Museum and The Museum of Arts and Design. Herzog has a B.A. from Bennington College and an M.F.A. from Alfred University. She is currently a lecturer at Yale University.