Independent New York

Galerie Lelong & Co., New York is pleased to participate in the 2024 edition of Independent New York with a solo presentation by Ficre Ghebreyesus featuring works created in 2004 in anticipation of and response to that year’s presidential election in the United States, as well as a selection of works that engage concurrent global headlines. Mirroring the news media that inspired them, these paintings are notable for their prominent incorporation of text. This presentation marks the public debut of most of the works on view, twenty years after their creation and in the midst of another election cycle in the U.S. A selection of works prominently feature numbers that invoke anxious anticipation and the countdown to Election Day. Recurring depictions of open mouths convey frenetic chatter, while references to children’s laughter seem to serve as a reminder that electoral decisions will craft the world for future generations. The motifs that emerge in this body of work convey a tense yet hopeful vision of democracy that remains poignant two decades later.

Works on view prompt an inquiry into the circulation of news, referencing methods of disseminating information. In one such work, September 1, 1939 (2001), Ghebreyesus renders an excerpt from W.H. Auden’s 1939 poem of the same name in black block letters. Set against a white and gray background, the painting’s composition is reminiscent of newsprint. Written as a response to the German invasion of Poland and the start of World War II, Auden’s poem experienced a resurgence in popularity following the September 11 attacks, beginning with a reading of the poem on National Public Radio in the subsequent days. Ghebreyesus often listened to the radio in his studio, painting to the sound of both the news and music—references to which appear throughout the works on view. In a painting entitled 48 h (c. 2004), the number forty-eight appears on a television screen, with the number forty-one repeating across the top of the canvas as a ticker tape would. Taking on a largely monochromatic palette of shades of blue, Ghebreyesus uses color-blocking to create portals in the arches of abstracted letter-Hs. These window-like passages are a recurring motif in Ghebreyesus’s oeuvre, serving as reminders of the movement in the artist’s life caused by war and displacement.

Ghebreyesus’s distinct experience as a person from an international background living in the United States influenced his processing of current events, and throughout the works on view