Tom Friedman
My creative process fluctuates between an open system and closed system approach. I would characterize this new body of work as one that follows a more closed system, with ideas that are more compressed. For me, every piece has been an evolution of surprises and will continue to be until completion. – Tom Friedman
Luhring Augustine is pleased to announce an exhibition of new work by the American artist Tom Friedman. This will be Friedman’s first solo exhibition with the gallery and his first in New York since 2005. Friedman is known for his meticulously crafted sculptures and works on paper that inhabit the intersections between the ordinary and the monstrous, the infinitesimal and the infinite, the rational and the uncanny. His work skews perception and is often deceptive, its handmade intricacy masked by a seemingly mass-produced or prefabricated appearance. Friedman’s deadpan presentation implies content and form are seamless; expectations are overturned as the viewer slowly perceives that chasm between illusion and reality.
This exhibition will include all new work, both sculptures as well as works on paper, in a wide range of materials, scales, and genres. Among the pieces to be exhibited will be a new self-portrait, a still-life sculpture, abstract wall works, text drawings, and a new large-scale stainless steel sculpture. Several works explore ideas of technology through an analog lens, such as a life-size video camera hand-crafted from wood and paint; a handmade wall collage with an upbeat futuristic pattern that mimics a high-tech flat screen; and an antiquated television screen with a pixelated static pattern made of tiny hand-applied paint tiles. Other works touch on the trials and tribulations of the artistic process itself, such as a work on paper listing the word “Verisimilitude” misspelled several times, as well as a pile of “bitten” apples sitting on the floor like an accumulation of so many failed ideas.
Available in Fall 2012 will be an artist’s book by Friedman, published by Luhring Augustine and conceived specifically within the context of this exhibition.
Tom Friedman was born in St. Louis, MO in 1965; he lives and works in Massachusetts. He has had numerous solo exhibitions in the United States and abroad, most notably at the Museum of Modern Art, New York; the New Museum of Contemporary Art, New York; the Museum of Contemporary Art, Chicago; Magasin 3 Stockholm Konsthall; the Fondazione Prada, Milan; and the South London Gallery.
For further information please contact Lauren Wittels at lauren@luhringaugustine.com.