NADA Miami 2020

LaMontagne Gallery and Samson Projects are pleased to present a five-person exhibition for NADA Miami 2020. This online exhibition features work by Andy Li, Steve Locke, Rosie Ranauro, Daniela Rivera, and Joe Wardwell.

Andy Li calls our attention to moments of greatness that can be found in the day to day mundane. His text banners illustrate relatable ponderings with a keen understanding of the value of time, patience, and mindfulness.

In this new series of paintings, Steve Locke reframes the work and philosophies of modernist painters around a central symbol of chattel slavery in the Americas: the auction block. Though this symbol appears as a simple geometric form, it carries the weight of the heartless transactions on which our country was built. Locke surrounds the blocks with flat, gridded color, contextualizing modernist tropes around the shape that made the movement itself possible.

Rosie Ranauro’s work is centered around the body. Through the act of painting and performance, she explores themes related to identity, chronic illness, unspoken communications and the complexities of moving through the world.

As we collectively grapple with the consequences of the COVID-19 pandemic, Daniela Rivera's body of work, STOP, is a candid reflection of the moment - an invitation to pause, be silent, to think, observe and process our vastly transformed reality. These gathered fragments, arranged into layered and multifaceted drawings, have served as a way to process a new way of connecting with others, expose our collective vulnerabilities, and reassess our ideas of societal progress and free will.

Joe Wardwell combines landscape, text, musical allusions, and abstraction to investigate myths about nature, politics, and how these elements shape our national identity in the United States, creating a
holistic American brand. All of these elements coalesce in a true genre hybrid, where legibility and chroma, and message and affect, are all of equal importance.