Sarah Faux's '11am Mirror Hole' at Cuevas Tilleard explores painting as bodily experience

Sarah Faux's exhibition '11am Mirror Hole' runs through February 25 at Cuevas Tilleard (Tilleard Projects) at 291 Grand Street on New York's Lower East Side. In a May 2017 conversation with artist Elena Sisto, Faux discussed her earlier show 'Seether' at Thierry Goldberg Gallery, revealing her artistic approach. She views the canvas as analogous to a body, with surfaces that are rough, smooth, oily, and waxy like skin. Faux employs varied techniques, shifting between narrative and abstract elements while avoiding consecutive narrative steps. Her work deliberately maintains an unstable quality, deferring image closure to prolong the moment between perception and recognition. Color dominates over gesture in most paintings, with Faux drawn to a pop palette of pigments suggesting nail polish or commercial packaging. She connects painting to childhood sexuality and play, influenced by D.W. Winnicott's theories, while identifying as a third-generation feminist. Faux cites influences including Willem de Kooning, Philip Guston, Helen Frankenthaler, Lee Krasner, Joan Semmel, Nicole Eisenman, Amy Sillman, Charlene von Heyl, and Dona Nelson. She references reading Maggie Nelson's 'Bluets' and Pipilotti Rist's video work. The paintings address tenderness, joy, desire, touch, friction, and estrangement, with compositions organized from a first-person perspective to engage viewers bodily.