Patty Horing “Underdressed”

Anna Zorina

[Image: Patty Horing "Adoration, American Family" (2018) oil on linen, 72 x 48 in.]

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Anna Zorina Gallery presents Underdressed, Patty Horing’s second solo exhibition with the Gallery, which inaugurates the Gallery‘s new location at 532 West 24 Street.

The show features the artist’s latest series of nude and semi-nude portraits of friends in unguarded moments that shine with tenderness and existential complexity. Caught in the midst of candid, introspective gestures the figures are physically and emotionally exposed.

The works in Underdressed undermine the art historical reverence for “The Nude” — particularly the female nude — as it has been idealized, fetishized, and objectified for centuries. Rather, here, the body is naked: functional, humorous, defensive and beautiful in a variety of forms and circumstances.

The artist captures intimate moments of everyday life: a couple fawning over their child, dancers amid a family performance, an expectant mother luxuriating on her bed, a woman assessing herself at a vanity. Subjects gaze back at the viewer with directed intensity, recognizing the viewer’s presence in their private domain. This fixed moment of awareness in the presence of complicated human beings, confirmed by their eye-to-eye confrontation, pulls the viewer into an experience of mutual engagement, and perhaps, empathy. With the added element of exposure of the body, this two-way gaze intensifies the inherent awkwardness, vulnerability and humor of the experience.

As in Horing’s past work, these pieces examine specific psychological states and relationships. Pictorially, the artist’s nuances and visual idiosyncrasies add layers of meaning and visceral impact to her implied narratives. In these paintings, people still appear in their natural habitats and personal spaces, but now the scenes are even more intimate, sexually charged, or emotionally ‘naked’.

Patty Horing received her BA from Brown University and MFA from The New York Academy of Art. Notable exhibitions include the Outwin Boochever Portrait Competition showcase at the National Portrait Gallery in Washington, DC, About Face at the Southampton Art Center, NY and UPRISE/ANGRY WOMEN at The Untitled Space, New York City. Patty has been interviewed by Create! Magazine and her work has been featured in W Magazine.