Chinatown, New York
Group Exhibition
Eat the Heat
Frosch & CoElise Engler, Leslie Kerby, Jean Lowe, Joachim Marx, Edie Nadelhaft, Brad Nelson, Lucy Beecher Nelson, Judy Simonian, Fedele Spadafora, Jeanne Verdoux, Becky Yazdan Frosch & Co is pleased to present Eat the Heat, a group show featuring eleven artists. The works in the exhibition address food and drink as aesthetic subject, cultural artifact, and site of social exchange. Referencing the history of artistic engagement with the table—from symbolic still lifes to explorations of mass culture—Eat the Heat brings together paintings, drawings, and sculptures that examine the visual and cultural language of food and drink. From art historical allusions to humorous reflections on appetite, ritual, and abundance, the exhibition considers the shared experience of consumption in all its complexity. As part of her long-standing practice of visually cataloging everyday objects, Elise Engler’s vertically elongated drawing Sixteen Lunches at MacDowell documents each item of food delivered during her artist residency. Leslie Kerby reflects on food as a symbol of sustenance and community, focusing on its role in hospitality and shared spaces. Working on vellum, with its semi-translucent, smooth surface, adds an extra layer of delicacy to these shared rituals. Lucy Beecher Nelson draws inspiration from antique china, much of it packed away, inherited from generations of women in her family. Her watercolors explore the tension between these treasured yet impractical objects and their place in contemporary life Becky Yazdan treats us to Hot Dog Party, an assembly of colorful buns and dogs. Her paintings evolve through a balance of intuition and intellect, allowing daily events and memories to merge into new, often unexpected, realities. Fedele Spadafora’s eye has always been drawn to scenes of vivid chromatic intensity; Dim Sum captures the vibrant atmosphere of a Chinatown meal—a scene just steps from the gallery—allowing him to unleash bold color. Joachim Marx loves coffee and paints with it; on small wooden panels, he transforms his daily ritual into an ongoing exploration of how many ways he can depict a take-out cup. Edie Nadelhaft’s Cherry Biter paintings embody all the feels of chomping on the ultimate summertime treat: a perfectly ripe Bing cherry, evoking the sensory pleasures of biting into ripe fruit, celebrating both paint and indulgence. Finding subject matter in the routines and rituals of everyday domestic life, Brad Nelson embraces the quotidian by painting mundane events and objects, many centered around the kitchen and dining table. Judy Simonian draws from personal memory in her painting Limoges Tankard, inspired by a family heirloom that sat on her grandparents’ mantel throughout her childhood. After accidentally breaking it, she turned to painting as a way to restore it, obsessively reimagining the object to bring it back to life. Jeanne Verdoux’s ceramic sculpture Not So Short Strawberry Cake—a massive partially-eaten slice of cake, sitting next to a very small porcelain plate—plays with exaggerated and miniature scale to humorous and surreal effect. In a similarly playful approach to form and meaning, Jean Lowe’s casein on board book sculptures poke fun at weighty subjects, tapping into self-help culture and societal authority. Her slightly cartoonish, disarming books bear titles such as The Hidden Meaning of Beer and The Ultimate Nose to Tail Dining Experience. Eat the Heat serves a fresh look at an art-filled table. Join us for a summer picnic—we have cake, coffee, cherries, hot dogs, dim sum… and plenty more.