Inman Gallery is pleased to present the solo exhibition, Emily Joyce: Under The Garden, on view January 14, 2023–February 25, 2023. Please join us Saturday, January 14 for the opening festivities, beginning with a conversation between Emily Joyce and Brown Lethem at 1pm, moderated by author Jonathan Lethem. After the talk, we will host an artists’ reception from 2–4 pm.
Former Core Artist in Residence Emily Joyce (b. 1976) returns to Houston for her seventh solo exhibition with the gallery. In Joyce’s recent symmetrical paintings, she explores hidden systems of nature, the built world, and the cosmos. The paintings are composed of modular and interlocking hexagons, triangles, and concentric circles with special surprise guest appearances by the occasional lily or a bit of gilded text. While in her twenties and fresh out of art school, Joyce worked as a decorative painter, embellishing the walls of mansions and vacation homes. Now, a few decades later, that early training has seeped into her new paintings.
In this recent body of work, you’ll find combinations of faux-bois, gold leafing, spatter painting, stenciling, rag-rolling, marbelizing etc.–sometimes all in one composition. By assigning each technique to its own specific shape on the canvas, Joyce creates an unfolding pattern and off-beat rhythm. The decorative finishes function as sophisticated painting solutions, rather than tromp-l’oeil trickery. Joyce’s presentation includes a site-specific painting onto which other works are hung, a self-referential work that cleverly–and playfully–exemplifies these conceptual underpinnings.
This exhibition is on view concurrently with Roots, Stones and Baggage, a selection of new paintings by artist Richard Brown Lethem (b. 1932). The two artists met in Claremont, CA, when Lethem moved at beginning of the pandemic to be closer to family. Upon seeing Lethem’s first show in Claremont, Joyce knew she had found a kindred spirit. They quickly became “art family,” with a mutual affinity for getting deep into seemingly simple things, everyday objects, basic shapes, flat color–painting at its most elemental
Joyce explains by sharing a Barbara Pym quote:
“The small things of life were often so much bigger than the great things . . . the trivial pleasures like cooking, one's home, little poems especially sad ones, solitary walks, funny things seen and overheard.”
SPECIAL GALLERY EVENT
Saturday, January 14, 1:00pm. Conversation between Emily Joyce and Brown Lethem, moderated by author Jonathan Lethem.
Jonathan Lethem is the author of twelve novels including The Fortress of Solitude and Chronic City. His thirteenth, Brooklyn Crime Novel, will be published in October. He writes frequently about music, art, film and other cultural subjects for The New Yorker, Harper’s, Bookforum, Medium and elsewhere. He lives in Brooklyn and Maine.
