Anat Ebgi is pleased to present Tropical Disease, featuring new drawings by Sarah Ann Weber, her first show with the gallery. The exhibition will be on view in AE2 from March 16 – April 20th. An opening reception will take place on Saturday March 16th from 6-8pm.
Combing through a deep fog, intricate flowers blanket dense landscapes. A gossamer of scribbles and other gestural markings dissolve into biomorphic abstraction, a whorl of yellows, pinks and greens as much whole petals, as simply lines. Sarah Ann Weber’s compositions are of un-specific locales, influenced in part by memory, family archives and the California terrain. A vivarium of simultaneous growth and decay, these exterior scenes unleash a feral interiority. Entwined vines abound, shoots and stalks sway in tune, while wilting leaves whisper softly amidst the posy, bathed in the soft moonlight peaking through the forest canopy. Weber’s surreal patterning blends flora with figure, suspending natural geometry and the artist’s hand. Think of the nightshade, the Atropa belladonna, poison begets enchantment through furtive ritual, Weber’s teeming compositions are the sun-kissed mirage of delirious hallucination.
Weber embraces the femininity and androgynous potential of her subjects. Working primarily with colored pencils on paper, alongside watercolor, each is imbued with a delicate materiality, hinting at the impermanence of these otherwise dazzling blossoms. Each landscape is made from the steady accretion of pigment. The importance of rot and decay is furthered through a saccharine color palette, combining sentimentality with the unavoidable entropy of organic matter and life processes.
Sarah Ann Weber (b. 1988, Chicago, IL) lives and works in Los Angeles. She received her BFA from the School of the Art Institute, Chicago and her MFA from the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts. She has had solo exhibitions at venues including Club Pro, Los Angeles; Some Time Salon, San Francisco; The Franklin, Chicago and Rena Sternberg Gallery, Glencoe, IL. Selected group exhibitions include Minnesota Street Project, San Francisco; Brand Library & Art Center, Glendale; MAUVE Gallery, Vienna, Austria; Green Gallery, Milwaukee, WI; Greenpoint Terminal Gallery, Brooklyn; Hunter Shaw Fine Art, Los Angeles; Galerie Nord/Kunstverein Tiergarten. Berlin; Locust Projects, Miami and Andrew Rafacz Gallery, Chicago.
