HESSE FLATOW is pleased to present the opening of a promise, a portal, possibility, a solo exhibition of new works by sonia louise davis, marking her second solo presentation with the gallery. A series of eight new tufted soft paintings, a steel sculptural instrument, a neon, and hand drawn wall text, will take over the ground level at 77 Franklin, enveloping the gallery in works that explore the tenor and boundaries of improvisation. Together, they establish a space in which presence becomes both material and measure. davis has been in dialogue with writer Sharifa Rhodes-Pitts in the months leading up to the show and invited her to contribute the text below.
You enter through a frame measured to contain the breadth of being: in a body, in space, in time. What follows are notations – varieties of presence, sometimes pinned closely to ground, other times whipped loose; a topography of tone and texture. A line is comprised of repetitions and informed by what is nearby, sometimes a wave is obscured or interrupted en route to its finality.