Schlomer Haus Gallery presents James Cherry’s San Francisco debut exhibition Listening, featuring a collection of driftwood carvings and buoyant lamps.
Listening is a collection of driftwood carvings displayed alongside Cherry’s buoyant lamps, creating a juxtaposition of light and earthly materials that become innate symbols of the human experience. This solo exhibition tells the stories of driftwood Cherry has found along Highway 1 since he moved to the West Coast four years ago. Listeningis an organic amalgamation of representations of friends, relationships, and loneliness, each embedded in the wood.
Bending both physical elements and light to his will, Listening also features a collection of the lamps that Cherry has become widely known for. Cherry’s lamps are made of complex manipulations and recycled materials. With each piece exhibited in Listening, Cherry strikes a balance between the pristinely refined and delicately handmade – fragility and strength side by side. The lamps illuminate the driftwood sculptures and, in turn, the sculptures ground the lamps, drawing the light and the eye.
For Cherry, the juxtaposition of light and earthly materials act as metaphors for the human experience, while the driftwood represents an organic amalgamation of friends, relationships, and loneliness.
Cherry’s lamps created from recycled materials have garnered attention from art and design collectors and are created using salvaged fabric mesh stretched across bulbous, amorphous or angular shapes. His driftwood sculptures play on the idiosyncrasies of the organic forms, and the interplay with the light sculptures strikes a balance between the pristinely refined and delicately handmade, with the lamps illuminating the driftwood sculptures and, in turn, the sculptures grounding the lamps, drawing the light and the eye.
“Making this work has really been about listening to the driftwood. I try to respect the idiosyncrasies that originally drew me to each stick, while also trying to dig out a self-imposed or transmitted mystery.” James Cherry
James Cherry (B. 1996 Chicago, Illinois) received his BFA from Bard College and currently resides in Los Angeles. His work examines the relationship between personal and public information through material manipulation, while primarily practicing within sculpture and drawing. Meditative and repetitive processes are applied to both present and disguise intimate symbols of the human experience; transforming found objects to reveal private truths.
James Cherry ‘Listening’ is at Schlomer Haus Gallery until 27th April, 2024.
