it's crowded
my solo show opened last week in Greenpoint
Last week was the opening night of my new solo show “it’s crowded” at Yashar Gallery in Greenpoint. It was so much fun and I keep staring at all the pictures I have from the evening. I wanted to share the exhibit with y’all who can’t make it out here to NYC so… here we go!!!
The idea for this collection started last spring with a piece I did kind of off handedly while sitting on my deck with James and Sofia Warren. We were huddled together with wine and the dogs taking up every available space in sight. It was what one might say, crowded. (This piece sold at a group show at Nassau Gallery so it didn’t end up in the collection)
Later in the year while I was tabling at Williamsburg Artists & Fleas market, I started doodling a bunch of dancers at Honkytonkin in Queens, honestly just to entertain myself. The day was going a little slow and I thought if people saw me drawing, they might be more likely to hire me to do a portrait (one of the tricks of the trade!). I sat on the black and white version of it for a long time because I knew I wanted to paint it but I was so nervous about ruining it. Finally I committed to throwing down some color, red and yellow to be exact. And it worked. I was so excited with how that piece came out, and it got me thinking about what other crowds I could draw.
The honkytonk piece sold immediately online and I was like ok that’s very cool…perhaps I’m onto something here. A month after, I found out that I’d be having a solo show at Yashar, the gallery attached to my studio. Having a deadline is of course, the greatest gift. I figured I’d keep rolling with this whole “crowd” thing.
Since I had drawn dancing, eating seemed like the next obvious scene. And y’all know how I feel about a diner. Triple Decker on Manhattan Ave had to be my next model!! I moved a lot faster on this one since I had a better idea of how it was going to work the second time through. Rather than all that red, I wanted the diner to feel light and airy. So that’s how I ended up with yellow and blue.
The third version of this particular set was inside the place I’m essentially always drawing, Temkins. Over the weekend so many people were reflecting that the painting had a great feeling of wine drunk, which I honestly hadn’t thought about at all. The walls are literally red in that bar, so I wanted the painting to be red. But also like, duh, Hilary. The red clearly looks like alcohol. One woman asked me if I had painted with wine? I suppose I could have!!! Maybe next time.
I didn’t want the whole show to be exactly the same, so I after I finished these works, I moved mediums. I’ve done watercolor for years, but lately I’ve been trying to figure out gouache. Who is she? What is she? While I was on a training walk for The Great Saunter with my friend Dakota, I spotted a line of seagulls hanging out together in Bay Ridge. I squealed. They looked CROWDED!!! I got a video of it as fast as I could and decided to paint that. While working through all the layers, a love affair began with painting what cement looks like? There’s SO MUCH going on in cement, it’s insane. It simply is not just a bunch of gray.
This one took probably just under a month. When I finished it I realized I was really running out of time for prepping for this show. I could only do so much more. So I decided to make my life even harder. Enter, the pigeons.
Now I have to admit, I did not take the photo of these pigeons. I was so behind on things and “walk around Brooklyn to find the perfect crowd of pigeons” was just not going to fit into my schedule. But I am also very against just like googling “group of pigeons.” So much basic, homogenous crap would show up. I turned to my trusted group chat. The girls. Did they have a picture of like, a lot of pigeons, together? And of course, they delivered. Dakota (hero) had the greatest photo of pigeons from Red Hook. All hobbling around on cobble stones. So many different colors. Friggin IDEAL. But also SO HARD OH MY GOD. A third of the way into this piece I was whispering to myself, “What have I done?” I’d think I’d be getting close to finishing, then I would count, “ten more pigeons…”
While I was becoming manic over pigeon feathers, I took breaks to do this. Instead of a crowd of many, this was a crowd of one. I kinda kept running with this idea with these next two pieces as well. What does it even MEAN to be crowded anyway???
The last thing I did was the biggest one. I’ve been taking photos of the stressful L transfer at Metropolitan/Lorimer stop for awhile. Originally I thought I might capture a crowded G train, but the more I doodled about it, the transfer itself felt much more lively.
There’s also, of course, lots of cartoons in the collection. Some old, some brand new. All crowds in their own way. I think I’ll write about those in a different newsletter because we’ve already got a lot going on here.
If you’d like to stop by, the show is up until June 17th. Please make an appointment with me by messaging here or emailing. Also, I’m doing a pre-order of nice fancy prints of all these new pieces. Please click here to make your purchase! These will be made to order!
Thank you for reading! New posts every Friday!
Looking forward to: can someone take me to the Dixie Chicks??
On repeat: Cowboying by Haley Heynderickx and Max Garcia
Currently reading: nothing, i’m a bad person
Recently Watched: The Many Live of Benjamin Kyle
Buy even more shit from me on Etsy!
I love them all! Congratulations on an amazing show!!
Thanks for sharing all this. Love seeing your art drawings - pigeons are amazing.