NICOLE REBER
Encore 2015
18” x 24” (46 x 61 cm) Vinyl, plastic, aluminum
Letters and numbers form the basis of all education. From these building blocks, I work to illuminate the artistic value in these basic tools, and disembody the meanings from their original versions. A letter board in its normal form might tell you the price of your meal at the diner, or the room in the office building to go to; these signs dispel confusion with fact. The sign paintings dismantle the definitive nature of signage, offering text that calls for multiple interpretations, imagination, and irony, emotions that are rarely conceived from signs in their original form. It is my goal that once you start to experience the sign paintings that the viewer will look at all letter signs in a different light as they come upon them in their daily life. Doing the "connect-the-dots" paintings was a way to illuminate the power of memory and numbers... how numbers function as personal passwords, how we have lucky numbers, favorite days, numbers that remind us of bad/good things. I think about that a lot when I'm painting these pieces... the mysticism of these symbols... trying to illuminate the meaning behind numbers in the same way that we put meaning into words. Eliminating the numbers we are left confused: where are we supposed to start, where is the finishing point. Left without these markers of beginning and success, the viewer must carve their own path, which may be the only way to true fulfillment after all.
Artist inspired by: Joseph Cornell, Anne Waldman, Henry Taylor, Ed Ruscha, Mark Gonzales, Joe Roberts, Weirdo Dave, Dorothy Iannone, Peter Ivers, Elio Fiorucci
Bio
Nicole Reber is a poet and artist born in Southern California, 1989. Recent exhibitions of her work have taken place at Chinatown Soup, Silent Barn, and BHQFU. She has spoken at MoMa PS1 and Printed Matter, and is a co-curator of Packet, a biweekly art publication that recently published its 65th issues.
Selected Exhibitions:
2015 Maybe I’m Amazed, Knockdown Center, Brooklyn, NY
2015 Naked Runaway, Middle Collegiate Church, New York, NY
2015 Pure Potentiality, Achter de Boom, New York, NY
2015 Island Time, Rabbit Hole Gallery, Brooklyn, NY
2015 All Valid, Chinatown Soup, New York, NY
2015 The Frivolous Now, Alon Zakaim Gallery, London, England
2015 Bloomsday, Knockdown Center, Brooklyn, NY
2015 Out of Line, BHQFU, New York, NY
2015 Say It With Flowers, Kimberly-Klark, Queens, NY
2015 We’ve Always Felt This Way, Solo Exhibition, Big Law Country Club at Silent Barn, Brooklyn, NY
2014 Bye Felicia, BHQFU, New York, NY
2014 #IHAITIBASEL, Art Basel Miami Beach, Miami, FL
2014 NY Art Book Fair, MOMA PS1, Long Island City, NY
2014 Business Casual, Solo Exhibition, AMO Studios, New York, NY
2014 99c Plus Art Shop, 99c Plus Gallery, Brooklyn, NY
2013 89Plus Colony Conference, MOMA PS1, Long Island City, NY
Artist's media includes some of or all: plastic, felt, aluminum, oil paint, text, canvas, collage, paper, fabric, digital print, 35mm, pen and paper
ARTIST PROFILE ON OUR BLOG: NICOLE REBER​