Fridman Gallery is honored to announce Hana Yima Godine’s third solo exhibition with the gallery, presenting new works created over the past three months at the gallery’s artist residency in Beacon, NY.

Godine’s use of flattened perspective, elongated figures, and evenly distributed light recalls Ethiopian iconography which underscores the divinity of biblical subjects by rejecting rules of earthly representation. At the same time, Godine’s works are firmly grounded in reality – she paints on traditional Ethiopian fabrics which women typically source at the local market and turn into affordable dresses. Godine weaves her brushstrokes in and around the fabric print, at times leaving the flowery patterns untouched, at times letting them glimmer through the painted layers.

Combining traditional materials with bold compositions and color schemes, the paintings appear to time-travel, offering a futuristic worldview based in spirit, community, care, and hope.

Selam (Australopithecus afarensis) is a female who lived 3.3 million years ago, the earliest human ancestral fossil found in Dikika, Ethiopia in 2000. Thus, Ethiopia is the likely place of origin of the human race and of the body. In my paintings, fabric as a material is a metaphor for the fabric of life, reflecting the multiple fashions, languages, religions, and celebrations in Ethiopia.

Experimenting with the body as a substance creates a connection that nature, weather, environmental phenomenon, and culture have with love embodied in us.

– Hana Yilma Godine