b. 1983, United States

Sam Moyer Biography

Using a diverse selection of materials, from salvaged fabrics and canvas to marble slabs and metal, Brooklyn-based artist Sam Moyer creates wall-based works that straddle the boundary between painting and sculpture.

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Education

Sam Moyer holds a BFA from the Corcoran College of Art and Design, Washington, D.C. (2005) and an MFA from Yale School of Art (2007).

Artworks

Moyer's early works foreshadow her longstanding concern with materiality, labour, and the production of painting. In her first solo exhibition Night Moves, held at Brooklyn's Cleopatra's in 2008, the artist showed sculptural paintings made from stretcher bars wrapped in mover's blankets. Moyer had come to notice the physical quality of the furniture coverings while helping fellow artist Mika Tajima with her installations of paintings in wooden storage racks.

Experimentation with Materials

Over the years, Sam Moyer has departed from mover's blankets to incorporate slabs of stone and metal sheets into sculptural, wall-hung works that resemble paintings. In works such as Untitled (2012), she used ink and bleach on canvas to create various markings—wrinkled, straight, and rippling—shifting in colour from soft to dark grey. Pieces of marble are cut into irregular and geometric shapes in the large-scale MDF panel work Cherry blossoms fall on half eaten bun (2017), which also features a slanted corner, disrupting the conventional, rectangular shape of a painting.

Tone, Moyer's 2021 solo exhibition at Sean Kelly Gallery, New York, saw the artist introduce plaster-coated canvas to her more intimately sized paintings. Daisy Chain juxtaposes a vertical arrangement of marble pieces on canvas, which has been painted over with wide sweeps of white-grey in horizontal and vertical directions, while an abstracted Pea Pod rests on a background of blue (both 2021). The works in Tone were in part inspired by the seawall near Moyer's home in Long Island Sound, which she finds to be 'a beautiful time capsule of the specific place' as she told Document in 2021.

Public Work

Doors for Doris (2021), a sculpture commissioned by New York's Public Art Fund and named after its founder Doris C. Freedman, continues Moyer's exploration of form and materiality. For the tall monoliths reminiscent of her paintings, the artist sourced stone and marble from both New York and elsewhere, mirroring the city's vibrant and diverse culture.

Exhibitions

Selected solo exhibitions include Tone, Sean Kelly, New York (2021); Sam Moyer: Doors for Doris, Public Art Fund, Doris C. Freedman Plaza, New York (2020); Flowers, Kayne Griffin Corcoran, Los Angeles (2019); Sam Moyer: Many Moons, rodolphe janssen, Brussels (2018); and Brick Window, 56 Henry Gallery, New York (2017).

Selected group exhibitions include Shapes, Alexander Berggruen, New York (2021); Artist for New York, Hauser & Wirth, New York (2020); Hiato, SIM Galeria São Paulo (2019); Inherent Structure, Wexner Center for the Arts, Columbus (2018); Crooked Bazaar, PROYECTOS MONCLOVA, Mexico City (2017); ASSISTED, Kavi Gupta, Chicago (2015); and Thread Lines, The Drawing Center, New York (2014).

Ocula | 2021

Sam Moyer
featured artworks

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Large Payne 27 by Sam Moyer contemporary artwork painting
Sam Moyer Large Payne 27, 2023 Oil on panel, walnut frame
60 x 48 x 2 inches
Sean Kelly Request Price & Availability
Spell Fragment by Sam Moyer contemporary artwork painting
Sam Moyer Spell Fragment, 2022 Marble, acrylic on plaster-coated canvas mounted to MDF
30 x 24 x 1 inches
Sean Kelly Request Price & Availability
My heart is like a wheel by Sam Moyer contemporary artwork painting
Sam Moyer My heart is like a wheel, 2022 Marble, acrylic on plaster-coated canvas mounted to MDF
39.75 x 30.12 x 1 inches
Sean Kelly Request Price & Availability
Bluestone Dependent 3 by Sam Moyer contemporary artwork sculpture
Sam Moyer Bluestone Dependent 3, 2021 Belgian Bluestone and concrete with stone aggregate
70.25 x 48 x 30 cm
Sean Kelly Request Price & Availability
Payne 94 (c-19) by Sam Moyer contemporary artwork painting, works on paper
Sam Moyer Payne 94 (c-19), 2020 Oil on Bristol
24 x 19 inches
Sean Kelly Request Price & Availability
This Year by Sam Moyer contemporary artwork painting
Sam Moyer This Year, 2019 Stone, painted canvas mounted to MDF panel
49 x 35 x 1.5 inches
Sean Kelly Request Price & Availability
Small Bond No. XXXVIII by Sam Moyer contemporary artwork sculpture
Sam Moyer Small Bond No. XXXVIII, 2018 Fused glass
13.38 x 11.25 inches
Sean Kelly Request Price & Availability
Small Bond No. LII by Sam Moyer contemporary artwork sculpture
Sam Moyer Small Bond No. LII, 2019 Fused glass
17.38 x 17.12 inches
Sean Kelly Request Price & Availability
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Sam Moyer
recent exhibitions

Represented by this
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Sean Kelly contemporary art gallery in New York, United States
Sean Kelly Los Angeles, New York, Taipei
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