Art Gallery

Speedy Gallery: Action! Paintings by Billy Zane on View

Curator and Gallerist Yiwei Lu and Actor Billy Zane at Speedy Gallery, Santa Monica

The Pomonan
Published November 16, 2023 6:30am PST

If you haven't already, you should visit Speedy Gallery. Action! is currently on display at Santa Monica's Speedy Gallery until Saturday, November 26. The exhibition is brimming with vitality! Paintings, mixed media, and sculpture are accompanied by a brilliant abundance of sculptural material that contextualizes them. Visitors are encouraged to interact with the award-winning actor's works. The title, ‘Action!’ alludes to the connection between his action painting and his cinematic roots.

Concept

ACTION!
Paintings by Billy Zane

Concept by Billy Zane
– Since the now-legendary Hollywood verb was barked on a film set 100 years ago, ACTION! became the starter pistol for the collective, creative process used in cinema to this day.
A concert of diverse elements, talents and toolsets are primed, and at its utterance, unleashed before the lens, in a shining moment, to be captured forever.
Regardless of all the preparation, once off the starter blocks, what follows is controlled chaos, an improvisation, a sequence of events that effect the following ones uniquely with every TAKE.

In art, ACTION painting, is not dissimilar. Just as the artist informs the canvas with a gesture, the canvas informs artist as to what their next act, or stroke may be as a result.
It’s a conversation in as much like the term for the very words spoken by characters in a film script or improvised by actors on set, “It’s dialogue Jake.”

I am a grateful child of both parents.
31 years an actor, 25 so far as a painter… I happily inhabit both the film and art worlds and each informs the other, so much so, that most of my paintings are made on location; sometimes on set, in the long waits between shots.

I only use materials I can source in field. The more remote and exotic the location the better, as it reduces the number of variables and, for me at least, increases my creative hunger and desire for expression, as access to colors, canvas and brushes become limited. The search for materials, in fact, has become part of my “process”.

This pressing need to create excellence with “what ya got“, be it on film, memory card or on canvas, adds to this addictive urgency, and air of danger. It demands commitment and bold choices, while being responsive and in the moment. Like an Army medic or EMT, I feel like I’m
doing triage; anointing, wrapping, and bandaging a deep blue cut, tending to a fresh crimson gash. And crazy part is I’m the guy that causes the happy accidents!

Annnnnd…Action! -BZ

Curated by Yiwei Lu


ARTIST BIO
Billy Zane is an American artist most often associated with his celebrated work in cinema as an actor, starring in some of the highest-grossing films and tv shows of all time, such as Titanic and Twin Peaks. However, the raw authenticity of his paintings, drawings, and photography has garnered him nearly as much recognition and critical praise. Most of his artwork is created outdoors while working on film sets and with mostly found and recycled materials in remote locations.

Speedy Gallery
2525 Michigan Ave. B5B. Santa Monica, CA, 90404

Hours of Operation
Saturdays : 12 – 7 pm
Tuesday to Friday : 12 – 5pm
Please Call for Appointment (213)248-4712

Holiday Closing:
From December 19, 2021 to January 5, 2022

Please check our Instagram for updates or changes in hours of operation.

Jeffrey Deitch Gallery Los Angeles - Wonder Women, Curated by Kathy Huang

Image: Susan Chen, Chinatown Blockwatch, 2022.
Photo by Genevieve Hanson

Wonder Women, Curated by Kathy Huang
September 3–October 22, 2022
925 N. Orange Drive

I look at them and wonder if
They are a part of me
I look in their eyes and wonder if
They share my dreams

  • Excerpt from “Wonder Woman” by Genny Lim

Genny Lim’s poem “Wonder Woman,” first published in 1981, follows the reflections of a narrator who observes the everyday lives of Asian women—across generations, countries, and socioeconomic backgrounds—wondering if their experiences reflect her own. The poem centers Asian women as its protagonists and ponders what commonalities exist between these women.

First exhibited at Jeffrey Deitch’s New York gallery in May 2022, Wonder Women, curated by Kathy Huang, presents Asian American and diasporic women and non-binary artists responding to themes of wonder, self, and identity through figuration. Described by Hyperallergic writer Jasmine Liu as a “landmark show,” the exhibition underscores a commitment to keeping “the field of Asian American figuration an open-ended one without a coherent narrative for as long as possible, to preserve its historical contingency and arbitrariness.” While some artists explore wonder as it relates to mythology and legend, others depict the heroines in their lives, offering works that highlight family, community, and history. Several of the works in Wonder Women address colonial and patriarchal structures in the West.

In September, an expanded version of Wonder Women will be presented at Jeffrey Deitch’s Los Angeles gallery, featuring forty Asian American, Pacific Islander, and diasporic women and non-binary artists. “The increasing violence against Asian Americans, particularly against Asian women and the elderly, emphasizes the need to tell our own stories. Figuration allows the artists to present themselves, their communities, and their histories on their own terms,” says Huang. The resulting works offer a cross-section of experience that celebrates difference and points of connection at the same time.

Several of the artists in Wonder Women are friends and collaborators across cities such as New York, Los Angeles, Austin, Detroit, and Montréal.

Curator Kathy Huang is Managing Director, Art Advisory & Special Projects at Jeffrey Deitch.

The artists participating in the Los Angeles iteration of Wonder Women are:

Joeun Kim Aatchim
Amanda Ba
Bhasha Chakrabarti
Susan Chen
Daieny Chin
HyeGyeong Choi
Milano Chow
Dominique Fung
Chitra Ganesh
Bambou Gili
Shyama Golden
Sasha Gordon
Sally J. Han
stephanie mei huang
Jeanne Jalandoni
Melissa Joseph
Cindy Ji Hye Kim
Hannah Lee
Tidawhitney Lek
Zoé Blue M.
Gisela McDaniel
Nina Molloy
Tammy Nguyen
Catalina Ouyang
Maia Cruz Palileo
Anna Park
GaHee Park
Rajni Perera
Jiab Prachakul
Sahana Ramakrishnan
Anjuli Rathod
Hiba Schahbaz
Kyungmi Shin
Su Su
Mai Ta
Nadia Waheed
Chelsea Ryoko Wong
Lily Wong
Zadie Xa
Livien Yin

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Jeffrey Deitch Gallery Los Angeles - Nadia Lee Cohen: HELLO, My Name Is

Image: Nadia Lee Cohen, Violet, Hollywood (2020).

May 22– August 13, 2022
925 N Orange Drive, Los Angeles

HELLO, My Name Is opens at Jeffrey Deitch, Los Angeles on May 22, and will mark British photographer Nadia Lee Cohen's first major solo exhibition in the United States.

The gallery will present a thematic showcase of Cohen's photographic works from both of her sold-out monographs (Women and the recently published HELLO, My Name Is), in addition to an immersive installation featuring never-before-seen video works.

The one hundred works presented under the title Women were created between 2014 and 2020; a six-year-long project made in secret, self-funded through Cohen’s commercial work in music video and fashion photography. The photographs are narrative works, and Cohen is a storyteller with the eye of a cinematographer. In each image there is a tangible sense of events before and after the moment captured in the pictures. Jeffrey Deitch will show, for the first time, the accompanying film works in which the subjects of the photographs inhabit the scenarios of the pictures. They are presented as a triptych with three clocks above the screens; London, New York, and Los Angeles. The geo-tags remind us that Cohen is not creating a fantasy world or parallel universe - hers is a heightened, magical, fictionalized realism, but the world depicted is most definitely one we all live in.

Cohen creates the characters of her subjects before she makes portraits of them. She is drawn to models who can take on roles and play their parts, as well as subjects who have developed and created their own identities. Cohen works in much the same way with her own image. In the photographic works, everything and everyone is a creation of Nadia’s, or of themselves, or both in collaboration. And it is all true, what you see in the pictures - only it takes all the tools of cinematic, fictional creation: lighting, make-up, costume, and even prosthetics; to reveal that truth.

The photographs in Women are successful in creating an aspirational form of a relatively down-to-earth reality through their mise-en-scènes. There is a dramatic tension to the pictures; the characters have depth and the scenes have meaning. How Cohen sees and understands the world through her cinematic eye, masterfully aligns with how her subjects want to be seen and understood through their own form of self-expression.

Any evidence of struggle, suffering, boredom, alienation, desperation is dignified by Cohen’s lens and made cinematic - as if worthy of being filmed. Every setup appears to be a part of a story, and every individual could be a character in a film. These people are important, Cohen is telling us, and the lives they lead are significant.

On the surface, Cohen's second monograph HELLO, My Name Is can be considered a collection of self-portraits. But while it is remarkable that she herself is portraying each and every one of them in their varying genders, size, and age, these are not intended as portraits of the artist. She is not exploring herself. She is using herself as a tool alongside the hair and make-up, costume, and prosthetics to create them. When they exist, they are photographed alongside the still-lives of their imagined belongings. They are fictional characters further populating Cohen’s world. And in sharp contrast to the Facetune, filters, and Photoshop self-portraits of social media, Cohen adds lines and shadows, and double-chins and love handles to her subjects; coloring in the pain and loss and heartbreak of their lives. You need not be considered shallow or superficial to hold fiction as valid as fact, or to think of oneself and others as characters in a film, Cohen tells us, you just want to make sure that the film you are in is a great one.

"I say this with irony: there's more than a hint of obsession in what she does," says Paul Reubens (aka Pee-Wee Herman). "A lot of thought has gone into the creation of these people...when I look at every one of these portraits, I want to know what drew her to each of these characters. You and I can read lots of things into these people, but what does the artist know about them that she's keeping secret? Besides what she's shown us, how much more does she know that she's not telling? What isn't she giving away?"

The answer to this question can be found in the dark theater featured in the back of the gallery. Here guests will bear witness to several television monitors showcasing never-before-seen footage of Cohen in various character from HELLO, My Name Is, sharing the intimate stories and truths behind each character.

Nadia Lee Cohen (b. 1992, London) attended the London College of Fashion, where she received the highest honors in BA and MA fashion photography. Cohen's photographs and films, heavily inspired by Americana and Britain in the 1950's, 60's and 70's, are veritable visions of saturated, surreal dreamscapes. Drawing upon the duality of the female form, Cohen explores the paradoxical standoff between strength and fragility with a forceful body of work that sees strong characters shot through an otherworldly lens. As a film director Cohen has worked with Tyler the Creator, Kali Uchis, and A$AP Rocky amongst others. Commercially, she has worked in fashion with some of the world's most exciting brands: Balenciaga, Gucci, MAC Cosmetics, Maison Margiela, Miu Miu, Playboy, Schiaparelli and Valentino. She has been interviewed by Vogue and Interview Magazine, and had her work featured in AnOther Magazine, i-D, Dazed & Confused, and New York Magazine.

The exhibition space for HELLO, My Name Is was designed in collaboration with Nadia Lee Cohen’s Art Director Brittany Porter, to create an immersive world where elements from Cohen's films and photographs become three dimensional objects that inhabit and breathe life into the space.

Image: Nadia Lee Cohen, Violet, Hollywood (2020).

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Jeffrey Deitch Gallery New York - Sasha Gordon: Hands Of Others

Image: My Friend Will Be Me, 2022
Photo by Genevieve Hanson.

May 7–June 25, 2022
76 Grand Street, New York
Opening reception on May 7th from 6-8pm

In Hands Of Others, Sasha Gordon’s new paintings depict surreal scenes that explore a cross-over between dreams and hyperawareness. As if representing an out-of-body experience or a lucid dream, the artist paints versions of her persona to contend with the sense of unease that can occur when observing one’s own image, behaviors, and actions.

Gordon populates her paintings with doppelgängers who embody different facets of her personality and often interact with each other. She carefully constructs the figures with both naturalistic details and caricatured features such as endearing enlarged eyes. This childlike trait renders the figures hyper-communicative and vulnerable at the same time.

In Hands Of Others, the artist’s fascination with hand gestures as vehicles to describe relationships and interactions takes a central role. While her characters have autonomy, a “hand” exists to monitor and influence their actions and decisions. In the painting Almost A Very Rare Thing (2022), two figures sit across from each other on a boat. One offers the other a bouquet of pulled-out hair—revealing a bald spot on her head—while the other looks on in hesitation. This curious and intimate gesture references Gordon’s past experience with trichotillomania, a condition that involves impulsively pulling out one’s own hair. In this painting, Gordon confronts both her judgment and acceptance of normative behaviors and physical appearances.

In her recent work, Gordon uses color to articulate feelings that the figures’ facial expressions can sometimes only hint at. Artificial gradient skin tones, otherworldly landscapes and dreamlike scenarios create a realm where the artist can move freely and articulate the internalized pressures to conform to society.

Gordon’s surreal yet introspective paintings touch on the complexity of her upbringing as a young biracial Asian woman in a predominantly white and heteronormative environment. This experience led the artist to have a disorienting grasp on her identity, body image, and reality as perceived by herself and others. By portraying different versions of her persona as both the subject and the observer carrying out her own judgments and self-expectations, Gordon’s work addresses internal conflicts and the psychological conditioning of cultural representation.

Sasha Gordon (b. 1998, Somers, NY) lives and works in Brooklyn, NY. She studied painting at the Rhode Island School of Design (RISD). Hands Of Others is the artist’s first solo show in New York and is presented in collaboration with Matthew Brown, Los Angeles. Recent exhibitions include Women of Now: Dialogues of Memory, Place & Identity, Green Family Art Foundation, Dallas (2022); TAILS AND HEADS, C L E A R I N G, New York (2021); and Enters Thief, Matthew Brown, Los Angeles (2021, solo). Gordon’s work is also included in Wonder Women, curated by Kathy Huang, opening at Jeffrey Deitch’s 18 Wooster Street location in May 2022.

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