Persona

Taking its name from Ingmar Bergman’s Persona, this exhibition explores the fluid and fractured nature of identity as shaped by the presence of "the other." Through the work of 16 emerging and internationally recognized artists working in figuration, abstraction, and conceptual practices, Persona considers how selfhood is constructed, performed, and disrupted by relational dynamics, societal expectations, and the psychology of difference.

The works in the exhibition collectively navigate the tension between authenticity and artifice, interior and exterior selves. Marika Thunder’s fragmented machine parts and car crash imagery suggest a body in flux—both mechanical and organic, colliding with forces beyond its control. Mary Reid Kelley’s layered portrait of Camille Paglia fused with religious iconography transforms a historical figure into a hybrid identity, shaped by discourse and mythology. Sean Landers’ text-laden painting of a frog-like man exposes selfhood as an ongoing narrative, written and rewritten through personal history.

This instability extends into the physicality of the works themselves. Cristina de Miguel’s expressive, fluid figures seem to waver between emergence and dissolution, their forms breaking apart as if caught in the act of transformation. Caroline Absher’s self-portrait blends into atmospheric abstraction, where script-like markings suggest identity as something porous, shaped as much by language and memory as by the body. Amélie Peace, in turn, captures figures locked in an uneasy exchange—one grasping, the other pulling away—dramatizing the tension between intimacy and autonomy.

Jenna Gribbon and Xu Yang engage in complex acts of looking and being seen—Gribbon painting moments of intimacy, while Yang stages self-portraits that question gender, theatricality, and the power of presentation. The psychological depth of Ashley Bickerton’s sculptural Blue Man and Cristine Brache’s haunting portrait of Dorothy Stratten point to personas forged through violence, beauty, and myth.

Throughout the exhibition, doubling acts as both a formal and thematic device. The echoes of Edvard Munch layered with the artist’s own persona in JasperJohns’ Savarin find an unexpected counterpoint in Julia Maiuri’s layered portrait of cinematic icons, where faces collapse into one another. John Wesley’s signature flat composition offers a wry, enigmatic take on psychological “otherness” and recognition, while Anastasya Peña’s abstract pours, adorned with precise hand-painted embellishments, toy with the instability of form itself.

The exhibition also examines how identity is shaped by social structures, memory, and cultural narratives. Charlotte Fox’s dreamlike, intertwined figures juxtaposed with a set of Cinderella-style glass shoes allude to gendered myths of transformation, while Katelyn Ledford’s trompe-l’œil painting disorients perception, blurring illusion and reality.

Throughout the exhibition, identity is revealed as an ongoing negotiation rather than a fixed state. Whether through historical archetypes, self-referential gestures, or conceptual distortions, the works in Persona explore how we construct and perceive ourselves and each other in an increasingly hyper-connected world.

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Caroline Absher, Ashley Bickerton, Cristine Brache, Charlotte Fox, Jenna Gribbon, Jasper Johns, Mary Reid Kelley, Sean Landers, Katelyn Ledford, Julia Maiuri, Cristina de Miguel, Amélie Peace, Anastasya Peña, Marika Thunder, John Wesley, and Xu Yang

February 13 – March 15, 2025

Press Release

Persona in Elephant

The Very Best of Art in New York City This March by Sam Falb