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MAY STEVENS: ALICE/ROSA – 1882-2001

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NEW YORK CITY — Mary Ryan Gallery will present “May Stevens: Alice/Rosa — 1982–2001” from February 3 to March 12 with a reception on February 17, 5 to 7 pm.

A pioneer of the feminist movement and lifelong observer of social injustices, May Stevens (born 1924) has always striven to address these issues in her work. The earlier series, including “The Freedom Riders,” “Big Daddy,” “Ordinary/Extraordinary” are all political works (racism, antiwar, feminism) driven by her personal experiences during eras where these issues were at the forefront of American society. In this exhibition, “Alice/Rosa,” the drawings and paintings are based on a juxtaposition between her biological mother Alice Stevens and her spiritual mother, Rosa Luxemburg, a martyr assassinated for her socialist ideals.

Stevens’ sixth exhibition at Mary Ryan Gallery includes her monumental work, “Alice in the Garden” (84 by 434 inches), a series of six unstretched canvases from 1989 depicting Alice Stevens — “mother, housewife, ironer and washer, inmate of hospitals and nursing homes” — in her old age, painted larger than life, forcing the viewer to see an old woman, not idealized as an object of beauty, but as a subject of reality. She is situated in a garden, her favorite haunt, quietly posed in and yet withdrawn from the surroundings like garden statuary. “Green Fields,” an accompanying canvas, shows a ghostlike Alice wandering a sea of grass. It is a poignant image that evokes death as dignified and a part of life.

“Forming the Fifth International” (88 by 120 inches) from 1985 juxtaposes Alice and Rosa, two very important and very different women in the artist’s life.

Also on view is a series of never seen drawings and collages from 1981 to 2001. They are a homage to Rosa and her life, her idealism and her vicious death.

Mary Ryan Gallery is at 24 West 57th Street. For information, 212-397-0669 or www.MaryRyanGallery.com.