CONFETTI AND ASH

Rachel Hayden
On view: May 19- June 25, 2023
Opening Reception: May 20, 4 - 7pm

5-50 Gallery is proud to present CONFETTI AND ASH, a solo show of new and recent work by Rachel Hayden. She utilizes formal aspects such as symmetry, balance, and geometry to clearly communicate her interest in complex concepts such as interpersonal relationships, deep feelings, and her personal visual lexicon. The show will be on view from May 19th through June 25th, with an opening reception on May 20th from 4-7 pm.

When arranging a painting, Rachel Hayden removes clutter. The paintings are full, but everything is in its correct place. Objects float harmoniously in midair without touching, endowing her works with a flat quality. This flatness is complicated by the use of overlapping planes and the objects’ gradient tonal shifts. Hayden choses a handful of objects to paint, and depicts iterations of those motifs again and again in various sizes, colors, and contexts. She thinks of the objects in her paintings as prized possessions, somewhere between souvenirs and icons. Hayden paints objects whose existence mystifies her: lit candles, colorful fruits, vases, flowers, and iridescent butterflies populate her compositions.

Objects are often anthropomorphized, with sleepy, anxious, or mischievous human faces. They are inspired by the love and friendship Hayden feels for the people she is close to, and sometimes act as representatives of those individuals. The faces in her work exchange meaningful glances, alluding to their intimate relationships with one another. Their shared existence within her compositions bind them together in a set moment and limited space, ensuring their otherwise fleeting exchanges will last forever.

By using the same motifs over and over again, Hayden is able to anthropomorphize the objects not just by assigning them human faces with emotions, but also by demonstrating how those emotions can change just as ours do depending on how the objects interact with their environment. For example, the sunflowers in Two Sunflowers in a Mason Jar gaze at each other, making the audience feel as though they are glimpsing a moment of exchange that they are outside of, and whose meaning they cannot fully appreciate. This is of stark contrast to her representation of a sunflower in Flattened Sunflower in Wet Grass. In this image, the anthropomorphized flower looks straight out at the viewer, creating a moment of direct confrontation that contrasts with the feeling of intruding one experiences when looking at Two Sunflowers in a Mason Jar. This flexibility of the utilization of motifs reflects how the objects function like letters in Hayden’s visual lexicon, and can be rearranged and paired with others to create different meanings.

The title for this exhibition, CONFETTI AND ASH, reflects the celebratory and introspective qualities of the works presented. Hayden’s paintings present organized but densely populated explorations of her relationships with herself, others, and modes of communication.

Rachel Hayden is a Brooklyn-based artist who graduated with a BFA from Maryland Institute College of Art in 2015. Her works were recently featured in the group exhibitions paper at Beers London (London), LUSH at Hashimoto Contemporary (New York, NY), and Faceplant at Glass Rice, (San Francisco, CA). Recent solo exhibitions include Charm Bracelet at Headstone Gallery (New York, NY) and Mirror in the Sky at Andrew Rafacz Gallery (Chicago, IL). She was previously featured in 5-50 Gallery’s exhibition JUNGLE JINX and at our 2022 booth at Future Fair.