Summer Wheat: Catch and Release

Shulamit Nazarian is pleased to present Catch and Release, a solo exhibition by Brooklyn-based artist Summer Wheat. This will be the artist’s first solo exhibition in Los Angeles.

Wheat’s paintings present a tradition in which women were the original hunters, technologists, and artists, and Catch and Release continues her exploration of this archetype and its many variations. The series depicts women catching and releasing fish as a symbol of fertility, creation, and transformation. In connecting to water and its creatures, the subjects demonstrate an inherent link to natural elements and to the intricate depths of the unconscious.

Summer Wheat’s works arise from an effort to harness paint as a three-dimensional object. From a distance, the paintings appear to be tapestries with a woven or beaded surface, but upon closer inspection the materials are revealed: Paint is pushed through the small openings of aluminum mesh, creating a soft, textile-like form that also evokes the pixilation of digital images.

The women in the paintings are connected by dense geometric patterns that explore psychological spaces, and the many narratives within each painting coalesce into one. Drawing on numerous rich art historical traditions—from Egyptian relief sculptures to Modernist painting—Wheat’s work destabilizes material boundaries and monumentalizes quotidian life through scale and movement.

Summer Wheat (b. 1977, Oklahoma City, Oklahoma) received a BA from University of Central Oklahoma and an MFA from Savannah College of Art and Design. Recent solo exhibitions include Smack Mellon, New York (2018); Andrew Edlin Gallery, New York (2018); Henry Art Gallery, University of Washington, Seattle (2017); Braverman Gallery, Tel Aviv (2017); and Oklahoma Contemporary, Oklahoma City (2016). Her work has been featured in recent museum exhibitions, including ICA Collection: Expanding the Field of Painting, Institute of Contemporary Art, Boston (2013–14); Paint Things: Beyond the Stretcher, deCordova Museum and Sculpture Park (2013); and Paradox Maintenance Technicians: A Comprehensive Manual to Contemporary Painting from Los Angeles and Beyond, Torrance Art Museum (2013). She is the recipient of the 2016 New York NADA Artadia Award, given to one artist exhibiting at NADA New York.

Visit the exhibition on Shulamit’s Nazarian website