Heather Gaudio Fine Art is pleased to present Cha Jong Rye: Layers of Time, the Korean artist’s first solo exhibition at the gallery. The public is invited to an opening reception on Saturday, June 8th, 2-4pm, and the show will be on view through July 20th, 2024. This exhibition was made possible with the generous collaboration of Long-Sharp Gallery, Cha Jong Rye’s exclusive representative in the United States.
Jong Rye is known for skillfully working with different types of wood and other composites to create evocative, free-standing and relief sculpture. Through a precise, labor-intensive approach, she transforms the inherently rigid material into beautifully fluid and undulating objects that deceivingly appear to consist of more malleable properties. With great attention to detail, the acclaimed artist begins with an additive approach, painstakingly layering and gluing multiple pieces of wood together before carving, sanding, shaping, and crafting them into sculptures. Jong Rye’s deep understanding and connection to the material allows her to cajole the wood grains into compelling structures that echo geological time-scale formations, accumulated sediments, eroded landscapes, and other natural phenomena. Her artistic investigations are sourced from patterns in nature, seen and unseen, Buddhist practices of patience and meditation, notions of infinity, eternity, and creation. There is a post-minimal repetition to her organic and inorganic forms, a rhythm where light becomes a significant aspect when experiencing her work. This symbiotic relationship between the curved surfaces, shadows and highlighted areas cannot be understated.
The exhibition will feature stunning contoured wall-mounted sculptures that are seemingly aerial views of mountain ridges, sand patterns, folded or crumpled linens. Another wall-mounted sculpture offers a touch of whimsy with its knobby elements akin to sprouting spores that suggest perpetual change and are compositionally arranged against a gridded system. Also on view is a sublime table-top sculpture from the artist’s cone series. This work started out as coarsely glued stacks of wood which were then laboriously sanded down and transformed into what resembles a slow, weather eroded landscape or silted riverbed standing on coned legs with fluted sides. For the artist, the cone is a new life-form that springs from the land, “it is the first form to break through the flat surface, and at the same time, the last form that arrives at the sky.”
Jong Rye earned her MFA in sculpture from Ewha Women’s University in Seoul in 1996 and has been featured in numerous solo and group exhibitions, including at the Nampo Museum of Art in Goheung; the Sungkok Art Museum in Seoul; the Vermont Studio Center in Johnson; the Berkshire Museum, Pittsfield; the In and Out Museum in Seoul; the Naro Museum, among others. Her works are in notable collections including the Sungkok Art Museum, Seoul and the Nampo Art Museum in Goheung. The artist lives and works in Korea.
About LSG and HGFA:
After a successful 20-plus year legal career defending prisoners on death row, art enthusiast and collector Rhonda Long-Sharp decided to formally pursue her passion for the arts. She founded Long-Sharp Gallery (LSG) in Indianapolis, which specializes in post-war and contemporary multiples and works on paper as well as contemporary masters. The gallery exclusively represents an impressive roster of artists including Cha Jong Rye, Julia Ibbini, Miriam Londoño, Nicole Pietratoni, the Estate of David Spiller, Amy Kirschner, and Spiller + Cameron, among others. LSG also enjoys participation in top-level art fairs including Masterpiece London, EXPO Chicago, and Art Miami; is a member of the International Print Dealers Association (IFPDA), the Woman’s Business Enterprise (WBE) and a member of the National Association of Women Business Owners (NAWBO.)
It is in this continued spirit of growth and entrepreneurship that Long Sharp Gallery and Heather Gaudio Fine Art, two women owned and run businesses, decided to collaborate in this exhibition. The gallery in Greenwich is an ideal location to expand the viewership of Cha Jong Rye, one of Korea’s most celebrated woman artists, presenting the community and its environs with a diverse, engaging visual experience.
Cha Jong Rye: Layers of Time will run concurrently with Yoona Hur: Moving Stillness, a Korean American artist who forms part of HGFA gallery’s roster. While both artists start from similar artistic approaches due to their shared heritage, their practice, materials, techniques execution render distinct, yet complementary aesthetic outcomes.
Heather Gaudio Fine Art specializes in emerging and established artists, offering painting, works on paper, photography, and sculpture. The gallery provides a full-range of art advisory services, from forming and maintaining a collection, to securing secondary market material, to assisting with framing and installation. The focus is on each individual client, selecting art that best serves his or her vision, space, and resources. The six exhibitions offered every year are designed to present important talent and provide artwork appealing to a broad range of interests. Gallery hours are Tuesday through Saturday; 10:30am to 5:30pm; and by appointment.
