Date: Wednesday, June 2, 2021
Time: 6:30pm
Title: Soft Bodies
Panel Guests: Ryan Wilde, Rose Nestler, Joy Curtis
Moderator: Jane Ursula Harris
Please join us on Wednesday, June 2 at Ludlow House for “Soft Bodies,” an artist panel moderated by Jane Ursula Harris. Artists Ryan Wilde, Rose Nestler and Joy Curtis discuss their individual takes on soft sculpture and the vulnerability of working with a gendered media; how the ephemeral and social connotations of textiles affect their practices; how soft sculpture relates to the body; and how they came to work in this unusual form of sculpture that is gaining widespread recognition and newfound appreciation.
Ryan Wilde (b. 1980) is a New York City-based visual artist whose practice is informed by and
an extension of her career in millinery. Wilde received a BFA from Syracuse University and an MFA from Queens College. Wilde is represented by Harper’s and will mount a solo exhibition at Harper’s Chelsea in June 2021. Most recently, her work has been exhibited at Harper’s, East Hampton (2021); Hesse Flatow, New York (2021); RUSCHMAN, Chicago, IL (2021); EXPO Chicago, online (2021); and Deanna Evans Projects, Brooklyn (2019). Her work as both artist and designer has been featured in ArtMaze, The Cut, and Forbes, among other publications. Wilde will present her first solo exhibition at Harper’s Chelsea, opening on June 10, 2021.
Rose Nestler (b. 1983 in Spokane, WA, USA) lives and works in Brooklyn. She holds an MFA from Brooklyn College. Nestler has exhibited in the United States and internationally, including exhibitions at König Galerie (Berlin, GER), Projet Pangeé (Montreal, QC), Public Gallery (London, UK), Fisher Parrish (Brooklyn), Thierry Goldberg (New York, NY) and BRIC (Brooklyn). Her work was curated in a two-person show at Spring/Break in 2019 and she was a Lighthouse Works Fellow in 2018. She will be an artist in residence at the Joan Mitchell Center in New Orleans in 2022. Upcoming exhibitions include solo shows at Public Gallery (London, UK) in 2021 and at Mrs. Gallery (NY, USA) in 2022. Her work has been featured and reviewed in Juxtapoz, Vulture, Maake, and Metal Magazine.
Joy Curtis (b. Valparaiso, IN) received her MFA in sculpture from Ohio University in 2002 and, since then, has lived and worked in Brooklyn, NY. In 2021, she was an artist-in-residence at Stoneleaf Retreat. She is represented by Klaus von Nichtssagend, New York, NY, where she has had 5 solo shows. Recent exhibitions include: With Every Fiber, Pelham Art Center; Cult of the Crimson Queen, Ceysson and Bénétière; Found Outside at the Aldrich Museum (CT); Weight Over Time, T.S.A (Brooklyn); The Working Title, The Bronx River Art Center; Tensile Strength, ZieherSmith; Object ‘Hood, Leslie Heller; Eternal Return, Nurture Art; The Finishers, The Wassaic Project (NY); and Greater Brooklyn, CRG. Curtis is the recipient of fellowships from Socrates Sculpture Park and the Lower Manhattan Cultural Council, and an award from the Foundation for Contemporary Arts. Her work has been reviewed in the New Yorker, Hyperallergic, Artcritical, and Saatchi Online, and featured on Gorky’s Granddaughter and James Kalm’s Rough Cut video blogs.
Jane Ursula Harris is a Brooklyn-based writer who has contributed to Artforum,Art in America, Bookforum, BOMB, Cultured Magazine, The Paris Review, Flash Art, Frieze, The Believer, GARAGE, and the Village Voice, among other publications. Her essays appear in catalogues including Carnegie Mellon’s forthcoming Jacolby Satterwhite: Spirits Roaming on the Earth; Participant Inc.'s NegroGothic: M. Lamar; Hatje Cantz's Examples to Follow: Expeditions in Aesthetics and Sustainability; Kerber Verlag’s Marc Lüders: The East Side Gallery; Phaidon’s Vitamin D: New Perspectives in Drawing, Phaidon’s Vitamin P: New Perspectives in Painting; Universe-Rizzoli’s Curve: The Female Nude Now; and Twin Palms' Anthony Goicolea. Harris curates on a freelance basis, and is an art history faculty member at the School of Visual Arts.