Fridman Gallery is honored to present the first solo exhibition in New York by Nate Lewis. Combining elements of photography, sculpture, frottage, and ink and graphite drawing, Lewis’ intricately carved works on paper reflect his experience as a critical-care nurse and challenge perspectives on race and history. Treating the paper like an organism itself he sculpts patterns and textures akin to cellular tissue and uncovers anatomies of the photographed subjects. Latent Tapestries brings together Lewis’ application of medical diagnostics and its visual language, exploration of granularity of photographic images and paper, responses to the current political landscape, and appreciation of the critical role of sound and music, specifically jazz, as conduits to connecting shared histories and futures.

The exhibition includes early collages using strips of electrocardiograms of Lewis’ patients, street scenes from Trump’s campaign rallies and inauguration, new works in the ongoing series Signaling depicting Black figures in motion, and a new body of work Probing the Land, which deals with Confederate monuments. Throughout the gallery, commissioned sound pieces by critically acclaimed avant-Jazz musicians Melanie Charles, Ben Lamar Gay, Kassa Overall, Matana Roberts, and Luke Stewart will be in conversation with Lewis’ visual rhythms and textures. In the gallery’s media room, the artist will premiere a video applying his signature patterns to movement in time.

To make the new series Probing the Land, Lewis photographed American monuments, including equestrian statues of Confederate officers lining Monument Avenue in Richmond, Virginia, which have been at the center of controversial debate. The works attempt to garner the energy and attention the public has directed at the statues. In Lewis’ words: “Carving into images of the monuments, I destabilize the bronze, creating a soft anatomy within, and render the figures of the horse and the rider active, penetrable, porous and vulnerable. I think my sensibilities in caring for people and assessing patterns and rhythms from a diagnostic point of view leads to my wanting to capture the different energies and feelings towards these monuments: those who want them removed, those who revere them, those who think they should stay as a point to learn from our faults in history, as well as those who think they don’t matter. In addition, being in a mixed race family I have conversations with relatives whose views I oppose, I listen to them, and want to know how to navigate these conversations in a productive manner.”

“Output imagery of medical diagnostics is a unique language critical to understanding a patient’s condition, one of colors and patterns, depicting the invisible by the tones of blacks, grays and whites. Subtle distinctions in shapes, shifts, clarities, rhythms, and textures can indicate the potential for change. Likewise, diagnostic sounds, those of lungs, heart, pulse, intestines, and their subjective assessment, help complete the picture. These nuanced ways of looking at, and
listening to, a body profoundly influenced how I see, hear, and understand the world.”

The exhibition is accompanied by an illustrated catalogue with an introductory essay by cultural anthropologist and curator Niama Safia Sandy.