image from speronewestwater.com
We had the pleasure of seeing Charles LeDray's beautiful show workworkworkworkwork at the Whitney in preview last Wednesday. His miniatures are profoundly intricate and emotionally stirring. For us, an added layer was meeting the artist in person--his stature in direct contrast to his delicate work. The loveliness of that juxtaposition is why we've chosen him as our Hero of the Week.
from whitney.org:
Over the past twenty years, New York-based sculptor Charles LeDray (b. 1960, Seattle) has created a highly distinctive and powerful body of work using such materials as sewn cloth, carved human bone, and glazed ceramics. This major survey, which includes works from the 1980s to the present, celebrates both the artist’s virtuosity with materials and his uncanny manipulation of scale to create seemingly familiar objects that engage the collective memory. His techniques of sewing, carving bone, and throwing clay pots find precedents in the traditions of folk art and visionary art, yet rise to a level of unprecedented virtuosity and artistic invention. The exhibition is curated by Randi Hopkins for the Institute of Contemporary Art, Boston. Its Whitney installation will be overseen by curator Carter Foster.
