and acrylic, 14 × 23.75 × 8 inches
Contributed by Ben Godward / Mark Greenwold, the painter, once told me, “The best art is dumb.” He said that I always understood that. I took it as a compliment. I think what he meant was that effective art appeals to our most basic needs, desires, and senses. Christopher K. Ho’s current sculpture exhibition “Waterloo!” at Ellie Rines Gallery – formerly known as 56 Henry but now on 46 Walker Street – fits that humble formulation and does it ever work.
Walking into the partially dimmed gallery, you encounter an unusual warm glow. Actual fire is emerging from candles in sculptures doubling as exotic candelabras. Perhaps transfixed by their seductive appeal, you may stumble on one of several children’s objects placed on the floor – a ball, an Air Pod case, jumbo Lego blocks strewn in the space between the entrance and the rug, which is set cattywampus to the gallery rectangle and packed tight with sculptures on pedestals. The candelabras-cum-sculptures are metal, roughly molded initially in clay to produce a whimsical Giacometti-esque feel in counterpoint to the Brutalist bases. Vaguely geometric forms are occasionally suspended along delicate lines of stainless steel. Upon closer inspection, their correspondence with the tripping hazards on the floor becomes evident. They elevate and illuminate the stuff of everyday life.
21.5 × 15.25 × 18 inches
17.5 × 16.25 × 18.25 inches
metal leaf, and oil, 16.75 × 20.25 × 15 inches
and color pencil, 14 × 18.75 × 11 inches
wax oil pastel, and color pencil, 13.75 × 10.75 × 12.5 inches
The patinas on the candelabras are exquisite, from blackened bronze, to silver and palladium leaf, to hand painted. This energetic mixing of gold leaf with wax oil pastels saves the works from mere design-object status, giving each a personality. The candles – simple long white tapers – homogenize the disparate forms and finishes. Anchoring them are pedestals graced with photographs to scale of period antique tables. Each side shot, from a different angle, expands our notions of spatial and functional continuity.
and color pencil, 20 × 32.4 × 44.5 inches
With this elegant yet unruly modernism, Ho seems to have found his sweet spot. Scarce are the more narrative, Sophie-Calle-like threads of his earlier work, now replaced by immediate objects. The fulsome press release isn’t quite the novella Ho wrote to accompany his previous paintings. But it is full of ideas and cites a slew of academic frameworks and historical references, and the title of the show and the rug do suggest warfare and revolution. For some, they may well evoke “authority, censorship, and domestic retreat,” “a collapsed social order,” and “a private sphere under siege.” But the work’s beauty lies in the superbly simple and playful moments of experience it captures.
“Christopher K. Ho: Waterloo!,” Ellie Rines Gallery, 46 Walker Street, New York, NY. Through October 23, 2026.
About the author: Ben Godward is a Brooklyn-based sculptor.
