Ana Benaroya’s cartoonish and sexually empowered figures challenge the still lingering effects of a puritanical America.
Benaroya picks up where Eric Fischl’s monumental 1980’s figurative canvases left off. Her paintings are more comic and abbreviated, more relevant to our current dialogue, but nevertheless still a continuation of a certain kind of irreverence and rebellion. To quote the painter Katherine Bradford: “Saw this young artist’s work recently; now have to completely rethink nipples.”
Benaroya was born in New York in 1986 and raised in New Jersey. She is graduating from Yale University, New Haven, CT, with an MFA in Painting, in 2019. This is her first exhibition with Richard Heller Gallery.
“Gordopelota literally translates to ‘fat ball,’ a perfect connection to the cherubic, cartoon-like sports fans painted by Buenos Aires-based painter and muralist, Martin Gordopelota. Endowed with features that resemble lowbrow, street-centric Botero figures, Gordopelota doesn’t paint the iconic stars or legends of the pitch. His works are colorful depictions of football culture, like comic book versions of Bill Buford’s iconic soccer hooligan memoir, Among the Thugs. But these are Argentinian scenes, not European, laced with particular details and elements that speak to a specific fandom and culture on the streets of South America.”— Evan Pricco, Juxtapoz
Gordopelota was born in 1985 and currently lives and works in Buenos Aires, Argentina. This is his first exhibition with Richard Heller Gallery and in the U.S.
Andrew Chuani Ho’s fantastical drawings suggest a richly saturated verdant world masking the tormented nature of its imagery. As his story expands, a familiar cast of individuals are depicted in a purgatorial microcosm in which they wrestle with their surroundings, circumstances and ultimately with themselves. The obstacles that Ho’s characters face reflect the difficulties in his environment and from personal experience. Ho rigorously uses color pencil as his primary medium to portray the unforgiving yet deliberate nature of his drawing practice. Pulling from a variety of cultural influences, his works are embedded with a variety of influences ranging from cartoons, landscapes and artists, including Henry Darger, Matisse and Philip Guston.
Ho was born in Los Angeles, California, in 1990. He received his BFA from Art Center College of Design in Pasadena, California, in 2013 and lives and works in Los Angeles. He has had two solo exhibitions with Richard Heller Gallery, as well as numerous group shows and art fair exhibitions throughout the U.S.
Rebecca Ness presents specific moments from atypical viewpoints. Interactions are cast in ambiguity, forcing a focus on finer details for clarification.
In her recent paintings, Ness captures a certain moment in time of bodily interaction without the confines of a story. Her paintings are a slow discovery and inspection of all the little parts that make up an image. Ness’ ability to draw the viewer in for closer examination allows them to discover that this is a patterned shirt… that is a blanket… these are two hands crossed, etc. In this new series, Ness will present closely cropped images of hands tying tennis shoe laces.
Ness was born in 1992 in Salem, MA. She is graduating from Yale University, New Haven, CT, with an MFA in Painting/Printmaking, in 2019. This is her first exhibition with Richard Heller Gallery.
Working across painting, drawing, printmaking, collage, and digital media, Anna Valdez examines the relationship between material and cultural identity. Valdez incorporates articles found in domestic spaces such as plants, textiles, vessels and keepsakes into her work as a method of storytelling. Her colorful work invites the viewer to consider objects as emblematic of personal and collective experience, shifting between still life and portraiture.
Anna Valdez was born in 1985 received her MFA in painting from Boston University in 2013. Her work has recently been exhibited at the Crystal Bridges Museum of American Art, Masur Museum of Art, the Danforth Museum, and Boston University Art Galleries. This is her first exhibition with Richard Heller Gallery.
