Lisson Gallery is pleased to present a new body of work by Hugh Hayden that examines the American experience via agency, appearance, athletics and religion. In his second New York exhibition with the gallery, Hayden interweaves symbols of the institutions that play key roles in an American upbringing with equally ever-present fairy tales to produce a new series of sculptures in wicker, vine, and ebony.
Hugh Hayden has previously examined the concept of the American Dream as well as the role historical foodways and dining traditions have played in shaping American identity. For Huey, the Texas-born artist chronicles and remixes his upbringing in the American South. Church, sport, school and hair are highlighted as Hayden probes the ingrained nature of cultural expectations. The exhibition is split into a trinity of rooms: a barbershop cum sanctuary, a basketball chapel and an ebony crypt, all of which harbour Hayden's meticulously sculpted, sawed, sanded and woven objects.
The sanctuary features 'Good Hair,' a new body of bristled wooden works that explore expectations of appearance and refinement in obligatory adolescent participation in athletics, education and religion. For Hayden the bristles render a subject simultaneously desirable yet uncomfortable, creating order via an abrasive action that, like the American Dream, is challenging and difficult to inhabit.
In the second chapel-like space hang woven basketball hoops out of hair, rattan and vine. The works are a childhood reimagination of the iconic peacock chairs the artist grew up with as well as an homage to the 1967 portrait of Black Panthers co-founder Huey P. Newton seated in one. The braided and woven works conflate tedious domestic handwork with hypermasculine athletics to materialize a queerness at odds with the fairytale-like aspirations and reservations of becoming a professional athlete.
The final room of the exhibition is a meditation on agency, blackness and invisibility. Works sculpted from Gabon and Texas ebonies are presented in a daylight-lit, all-black room shifting in and out of visibility. Sculptures that reference the body, both moving fast as well as relaxing, offer an opportunity to reflect on the many hues of blackness.
Other upcoming projects for Hayden include a solo exhibition, Boogey Men, at the Institute of Contemporary Art, Miami, opening on November 30, 2021. A major project commissioned by Madison Square Park Conservancy, New York will open in January 2022. Hayden has conceived a group exhibition with Public Art Fund that will open in May 2022. Titled Black Atlantic, it will feature new commissions by six artists, including Hayden.
Hugh Hayden’s practice considers the anthropomorphisation of the natural world as a visceral lens for exploring the human condition. Hayden transforms familiar objects through a process of selection, carving and juxtaposition to challenge our perceptions of ourselves, others and the environment. Raised in Texas and trained as an architect, his work arises from a deep connection to nature and its organic materials. Hayden utilizes wood as his primary medium, frequently loaded with multi-layered histories in their origin, including objects as varied as discarded trunks, rare indigenous timbers, Christmas trees or souvenir African sculptures. From these he saws, sculpts and sands the wood, often combining disparate species, creating new composite forms that also reflect their complex cultural backgrounds. Crafting metaphors for human existence and past experience, Hayden’s work questions the stasis of social dynamics and asks the viewer to examine their place within an ever-shifting ecosystem.
Established in 1967 in London, Lisson Gallery is one of the most well-known galleries operating globally. Boasting an influential and continuing legacy, including playing a pivotal role in the careers of many pioneers of historically important art movements, the gallery works with some of the most significant contemporary artists today.
