albertz benda, new york city, 2017
to put on the edge, a table…
“The artist Ali Silverstein had never made the connection between her approach to painting and BDSM (bondage and discipline, domination and submission, Sadism and Masochism) before a discussion with a visitor to her solo booth at the untitled art fair in Miami Beach last year.
“‘I was talking about continually being present and feeling these genuine desires come up from a place that’s not in my mind, from a real body place, and then being brave enough to keep following those, and that’s when she [said] ‘This is exactly what I teach people,’’ Silverstein recalls. When she asked the visitor, Kasia Urbaniak, to elaborate, she replied, ‘Well, I’m the highest-paid dominatrix in the world,’ Silverstein says.
“‘The range of acceptable desires is very, very narrow,’ Silverstein says. ‘I think the easiest starting point is legitimizing desire — increasing the range of acceptable desires. Painting is a very immediate way to explore these things.’”
—Into the Frame: The Art of BDSM, The Art Newspaper November 14, 2016 on the occasion of To Put on the Edge, A Table at Albertz Benda Gallery, NYC
September 1, 2016 / Acrylic, Glue, Canvas
September 19, 2016 / Acrylic, Glue, Canvas / 83 x 64 3/4 inches
May 2, 2016 / Acrylic, Glue, Canvas / 72 x 84 x 1 1/2 inches
June 3, 2016 / Acrylic, Glue, Canvas
July 7, 2016 / Acrylic, Glue, Canvas / 78 1/4 x 81 1/2 x 2 inches
July 5, 2016 / Acrylic, Glue, Canvas
September 5, 2016 / Acrylic, Glue, Canvas / 67 1/2 x 62 inches
September 10, 2016 / Acrylic, Glue, Canvas / 71 1/4 x 57 1/2 inches
August 21, 2016 / Acrylic, Glue, Canvas / 83 x 68 1/2 inches
Installation View, To Put on the Edge, A Table, Albertz Benda Gallery, NYC
Installation View, To Put on the Edge, A Table, Albertz Benda Gallery, NYC
making of
press release
New York, NY, September 26, 2016 - Albertz Benda is pleased to present Ali Silverstein: To Put on the Edge, a Table, the Los Angeles-based artist’s first solo show in New York, on view in the project space from October 27
through December 17, 2016. For her inaugural exhibition at the gallery, Silverstein will show a vibrant new body of work that stems from her practice of gesture and reponse. Silverstein explores impulse and desire through a continuous process of painting, cutting, and layering canvas. Each work is the product of a session or a “happening” - a constant push and pull between control and freedom, hyperawareness and automatism. Reacting to the necessity of the moment, Silverstein’s work
recalls the spirit of abstract expressionism and action painting.
Silverstein has been mining the world of BDSM, utilizing the power dynamics of domination and submission in her creative process. Using the act of painting to address issues of vulnerability and shame, Silverstein’s ultimate goal is ever-expanding freedom - a legitimizing of desire and a searching-out of the places that we don’t allow ourselves to go.
In this latest body of work, Silverstein draws inspiration from the realm of domesticity to guide her gestures. The marks on the layered surfaces are improvisational yet influenced by decorative objects. The shapes and patterns in the work reference physical objects such as ceramic vases or textiles, however the abundance of colors and lines obliterates the boundaries of the figures, releasing the viewer from symbolic references.
Flirting with representation only to delve back into expressive abstraction, Silverstein transcends her personal comfort zone by embracing disorder and resisting her natural sensibility towards the tangible.