Two solo exhibitions currently on view at Last Rites Gallery in New York, Kelley Hensing’s “The Animal Within” and N.C. Winters’s “Overgrowth” examine humankind’s darker impulses through folkloric visuals and occult imagery. Winters’s sculptural paintings with hand-crafted float frames depict characters undergoing processes of decay, their faces being consumed by plants and fungi. The artist explores the idea of being overtaken by nature as a metaphor for the voraciousness of an untamed, unruly mind.
Hensing’s pieces, with their elaborately carved frames, take a similar approach to Winters’s work with their blending of 2D and 3D media. The artist’s narrative works explore two threads: the depiction of women in relation to the supernatural and the idea of the carnival as a place where injustices are cloaked under the guise of jest. The artist incorporates these themes into anachronistic scenes that often take place in secluded forests away from society.
N.C. Winters’s “Overgrowth” and Kelley Hensing’s “The Animal Within” will be on view through December 27 at Last Rites Gallery.
Kelley Hensing:
Kelley Hensing with friend Leanne who modeled for the painting, Haven, behind them.
Kelley Hensing and Last Rites artist Donato Giancola with friends
N.C. Winters, Kelley Hensing, and Erica Berkowitz
N.C. Winters: