Contributed by Barbara A. MacAdam / In his solo show “Shiner” at Peter Freeman, Inc., Charles LeDray continues to frolic in his own past, fixing memories and cultural landmarks in tightly condensed, shrunken garments sewn up and assembled into sculptures, and in self-constructed objects turned on a potter’s wheel. He thus creates a home in which he is master and exercises total control over how the artifacts of his life are perceived. He draws our attention to miniscule objects, thereby empowering them. Welcome, then, to a Lilliputian jamboree, in which little people are at once quarries and intriguers.
Notwithstanding the small scale of his work, LeDray is eclectic and expansive. He incorporates allusion – and some resistance – to Carl Andre’s brick floors and Donald Judd’s building blocks, as well as homage to his mother’s personal collection, titled Hope Chest, whose contents range from thread to bells to printed paper. Ceramic pieces in cabinets of curiosities or irregularly laid out on display tables could be tokens of a Victorian heritage. By encasing mementos in vitrines, LeDray asserts ownership of his memories. Titles sometimes offer clues to his specific mindset and intentions. Ten Metal Jacks and One Lively Ball connotes a beloved children’s game. More dramatically, the ceramic installation Revolution depicts pots as if they were marching to war.
While he resists sentimentality, LeDray is by turns whimsical and philosophical. BRIEFS is a vitrine filled not with underpants but with 27 little cigar boxes containing replicas of newspaper clippings about and printed renditions of LeDray’s own work. S.A.M., a small but stately sculpture of a figure in a museum guard’s uniform, speaks to the period in the 1980s when the artist worked as a guard at the Seattle Museum of Art. Spool’n: How My Mother’s Embroidered Apron Unfolds in My Life, inspired by an Arshile Gorky painting, consists of painted wooden spools. Backward Suit is an exquisitely sculpted male figure standing against a crayon rubbing of bricks spelling out, in a herringbone pattern, MEN MAN WOMAN WOMEN. The figure has one leg positioned partially outside the pegboard, as if to examine who he is in that context.
2015–2023, acrylic paint, gesso, thread, wooden spools, glass, brass, 77 x 28 x 28 inches
Born in Seattle and based in New York City, LeDray has consistently worked by hand, seizing creative territory in counterpoint to technological advancement. The composition of the title piece Shiner seems to embody the thrust of his endeavor. A tiny wooden shoeshine kit sits on the floor, its miniature handmade tools – including pretzel bits, bubble gum, and pumice stone – arrayed around it in a loose tableau of American history. He exalts the past by painstakingly re-creating it, whether it is grand or shabby. Elephant Stew seems to convey his essential spirit. The piece consists of a sheet of handwritten scrawl metaphorically providing guidance for assembling a life: cook it over fire and stir before serving “to 3,800 people.” Ingredients include a medium-size elephant, two rabbits, and brown gravy. The recipe ends with a wry caveat: “If more are expected two rabbits may be added, but do so only if necessary as most people do not like to find hare in their stew.” As with Swift, in LeDray’s deadpan absurdity and wit there is subtle human warmth.
“Charles LeDray: Shiner,” Peter Freeman, Inc., 140 Grand Street, New York, NY. Through January 6, 2024.
About the author: Barbara A. MacAdam is a New York based arts writer.
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