We are talking abstraction – its beginnings are in the Continent, the Motherland. Having this come back around, introducing what I do as an abstractionist and going back to Africa and [abstraction’s] roots, it’s perfect – Leonardo Drew
Goodman Gallery is pleased to present the first solo exhibition on the African continent for American Abstractionist Leonardo Drew, presenting a major site-specific work as well as a new series of wall-based sculptures. The exhibition is organised in close collaboration with Galerie Lelong & Co.
Over the past three decades, Drew has honed a distinctive abstract language articulated through weathering raw materials (wood, scrap metal, cotton) to produce richly textured works that play on a tension between order and chaos. His surfaces approach a language of their own, embodying the laboured process of writing oneself into history. Drew’s practice builds on the lineage of abstraction, which was established and reworked by artists Melvin Edwards, Sam Gilliam, Pablo Picasso, Jackson Pollock and William T. Williams.
Artworks
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About
Leonardo Drew
Leonardo Drew (b. 1961, Tallahassee, Florida, USA) is known for his significant installations and sculptures which explore the tension between order and chaos. Drew transforms accumulations of raw materials such as wood, scrap metal and cotton to create works that play upon a tension between order and chaos. His surfaces often approach a language of their own, embodying the laboured process of writing oneself into history.
Drew’s work has been seen in major museums worldwide. He was commissioned for a new outdoor project City in the Grass for Madison Square Park in 2019, marking the Madison Square Park Conservancy’s 38th public commission and the artist’s first major public outdoor art project. City in the Grass was presented as a solo exhibition in three museums, the Wadsworth Atheneum Museum of Art, Hartford, Connecticut (2021); Mississippi Museum of Art, Jackson (2020); and North Carolina Museum of Art, Raleigh (2020). In 2022, Drew was elected as a National Academician by the National Academy of Design. Another major new commission featured at Yorkshire Sculpture Park, UK in 2023. Drew’s mid-career survey, Existed, premiered at the Blaffer Gallery at the University of Houston in 2009 and travelled to the Weatherspoon Art Museum in Greensboro, North Carolina, and the DeCordova Sculpture Park and Museum in Lincoln, Massachusetts.
Collections include: Tate, London; Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York; Museum of Modern Art, New York; The Museum of Contemporary Art, Los Angeles; The Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden, Washington, D.C.; and Baltimore Museum of Art, Baltimore, MD.
Drew currently lives and works in Brooklyn, New York.