Untitled New York

UNTITLED is touched to present N. Dash’s first solo show, in which she will exhibit a group of new works consisting of wall pieces and photographs.
The wall pieces, substantially emptied of artificial color, are constructed of the oft-hidden elements of paintings—stretcher, jute, linen, rabbit skin glue—and in most instances dirt has been mixed with water to create adobe grounds. At the same time, their varied structures have more in common with sculpture. The folds and edges of the linen and gravity’s pull on it are as much at the center of the work as the earthiness of the adobe that has been applied and rubbed into the support. The results combine both bodily associations with cloth and time-worn imprint of dirt itself.
The photographs concentrate on some of the same materials—namely dirt and cloth—but in a significantly different way. The images in the photographs are close-ups of small, sculpted masses of factory-made white cotton that Dash keeps with her at all times, handling, manipulating and wearing them down to an ultimate stage of abject fragility. At that point these very small objects are imaged in larger scale, close-up and in a moment by the camera. To the extent that the fabric pieces are sculptures, the photos are stand-ins for them. In Dash’s vocabulary, they do not in fact become sculptures until rendered and imaged. It is through this process that the extended and complex interactions of time and touch with and within the material are finally distilled.
This haptic quirk informs much of her work and illustrates her continued exploration of the means by which information and bodily expression can be embedded into the material elements upon which painting and sculpture are built.
A 2010 graduate of the MFA program at Columbia, N. Dash lives and works in New York and New Mexico. Recent exhibitions include: Drawing a Line in the Sand at Peter Blum Gallery, New York (2012), Joshua Neustein, Sergej Jensen, N. Dash at UNTITLED, New York (2011), N. Dash/ William Anastasi at Nicole Klagsbrun Gallery, New York (2011), Painting Expanded at Tanya Bonakdar, New York (2011), In Absentia curated by Gillian Sneed at Pace University Gallery, Westchester, NY (2011). In 2012 Dash will be included in Notations: Contemporary Drawing as Idea and Process at the Kemper Art Museum, Washington University, St. Louis, MO, Ghosts Before Breakfast at White Flag Projects, St. Louis, MO and Abstract Everyday, Everyday Abstract curated by Matthew Higgs at James Cohan Gallery, New York.