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LESLEY HELLER GALLERY WILL PRESENT GRACE KNOWLTON WORK JAN. 5

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NEW YORK CITY — Lesley Keller Gallery will present an exhibition of work by Grace Knowlton, on view January 5–February 9. An opening reception will be January 5, 5 to 7 pm.

Knowlton will exhibit sculpture, drawings and photography. She is widely known for her spherical, boulderlike sculptures, a form she began working with in the 1950s, when she allowed her wheel-thrown ceramics to close into ball forms.

In the 1960s, after studying with painter Kenneth Noland, Knowlton began her career and since then has had more than 30 solo exhibitions and dozens of group exhibitions nationally and internationally. In her three-dimensional work, Knowlton continues to explore the spherical form, working in a variety of media, including clay, concrete, copper, aluminum, paper, Styrofoam, stainless steel, and most recently, styrene and bronze.

When placed outdoors and exposed to the elements, Knowlton says, the changes in their surfaces become a part of the works themselves. This layering of a weathered patina is a witness to the passing of time. When placed indoors, the spheres take on slightly different anthropologic or geologic references, looking somewhat like a child’s collection of river rocks, a prehistoric altar or a scaled model of a solar system.

In her works on paper, Knowlton displays her understanding of the shape and form of the human body, and her ability to express these forms in the simplest way. She makes full use of each line, committing herself to the most true and basic expression of the human figure. These older, charcoal on paper drawings offer an informative examples of the artist’s eye that reappears in her latest photographs of strips of wicker peeled off an old chair. The drawings and the photographs finished years apart and without any intended similarity are remarkable alike.

The gallery is at 30 East 92nd Street, 3rd floor. For information, 212-410-6120.