2020
Kelly Beeman, Yael Ben-Simon, Austin Eddy, John Rivas, Jessica Westhafer, Mark Yang

Thierry Goldberg is pleased to present 2020, a group show featuring works by Kelly Beeman, Yael Ben-Simon, Austin Eddy, John Rivas, Jessica Westhafer, and Mark Yang. The exhibition runs from January 5th to January 26th, with an opening reception on Sunday, January 5th, from 6–8pm.

Somehow simultaneously alien and familiar, the paintings of Kelly Beeman trace the goings on of her female protagonists. Amid their relaxed domestic interiors or casual outdoor explorations, her figures unabashedly stare down the viewer. There is a warmth to their world and a cold comfort in feeling allowed to witness it. In an equally immersive approach,

Jessica Westhafer depicts scenes from her own life, rendered here in an overtly graphic and exaggerated style. These scenes, while cut with subtle humor of a specific detail—a fingernail filing, a galactic legging—hold an introspective weightiness. Characters pause in a down storm to contemplate their reflection. Even a straight-on gaze seems to turn the canvas into a two-way mirror. Eyes meet, but there’s of course more there. 

Mark Yang turns the trope of the classical nude on its head, sometimes literally, with his strikingly colorful paintings. Wrestling with historical precedent as well as each other, Yang’s characters create compelling knots of limbs, each delicately considered. Playful but composed, geometrical but organic, symmetrical but inexact.

Austin Eddy’s paintings operate in a constant state of contradiction. Here, staid equestrians are depicted with a comical tone, with rider and beast distilled to essential forms, and a stable becomes anything but.

John Rivas adorns his paintings with objects from the past, though they’re often his own, pulled from childhood. Representing both his personal history as well as that of his family, Rivas’ paintings pull one in with expressive brushstrokes and intricate collages.

Yael Ben-Simon looks to the past for referents, pulling example imagery to the present day moment. Archival prints and ancient sculptures are juxtaposed with contemporary artifacts, rendered in illusory manners, and situated in boxes to be unpacked.