Still, I’m looking at and past the surface for things that may not be there. So much so, that they become one and the same. Family I thought I knew, family I used to know, and family I have never known… The people in these images occupy space in a photographic facade that ages, rips, and tears.
Roach uses scratches, markings, and adornments not only as a way to create a more full and complex view of his family and their internal relationships but also to reconstruct his own memory and connection with the past. “While I constantly gather more and more images of the people I’m most familiar with, from times that I remember and times I don’t, I see so much yet so little. Several of the artist’s grandfather’s paintings can be found throughout the exhibition. Standing in the center of the gallery is a functional portrait studio Roach has constructed using his grandfather’s painting as the scene for the backdrop. To Roach, the past is not just a place full of questions and ambiguity, but also a driving force for creation and examination of his present-day relationships. On display are forty-eight unique collage works made from a single portrait of the artist as a child. Through his repeated, unrelenting exploration of alternative and unconventional techniques, Roach seeks to complicate or reconcile his relationship with who is in the image and his present day self. The exhibition contains a series of collaged kindergarten-grade school portraits of the artist, a functional portrait backdrop, and a range of altered, archival images of his own or his families.
Roach maneuvers within photography, collage, and installation creating from an archive of family photographs, memories, or stories told to him by relatives. The exhibition which contains all new work will be the artist’s first solo show. I have been fighting to✨ glow up✨ out here so please take a look and if you are in NYC GO TO THE GALLERY!ĭeli Gallery is pleased to announce King Within A King by Kalen Na’il Roach. I know its been a long time tumblr but I promise I am gonna be back but my first solo show is UP RIGHT NOW at Deli Gallery.