Sarah Emerson’s work was first successfully shown at the gallery in Substatic, a three-person show in Jan/Feb 2002. Thomas Erben Gallery is now very pleased to present do the collapse, the artists first solo exhibition in New York. On view will be several paintings completed within the last year.

do the collapse refers to the artist’s interest in the vulnerability of still surfaces and the violent disintegration or crumbling of real emotional and literal landscapes. Her colorful, yet mutes paintings combine a variety of visual references ranging from dead bucks, barren trees, to pop inspired abstract elements. The images occupy the entire surface, which is rendered flatly, not unlike camouflage patterning. In many instances there are things trying to crash in from the outside, disrupting and sometimes threatening. Sparkling rhinestones, encrusting upon different parts of the surface, add a slight kinetic element to the viewing experience.

Emerson’s work indicates an awareness of mortality manifested through a language informed by a painterly discourse with artists such as Warhol, Wesley, Kilimnick and Althoff. Her reference to natural objects and landscape is used as a device to keep the conversation as close to the real as possible without completely relying on literal interpretations of the surface or space.

Charlotta Kotik, Brooklyn Museum, selected her work for the 2003 Northeast edition of New American Paintings where it also appears on the cover. She will show with Galerie Cosmic, Paris, in the 2003/04 season. A BFA graduate from the Atlanta College of Art, Sarah Emerson obtained her MA in Fine Art from Goldsmiths College in London. She lives and works in New York.