Josiah McElheny

Through sculpture, writing, performance, and film, Josiah McElheny investigates the history of twentieth-century modernism in hopes of expanding on the dominant historical narratives of art, aesthetics, design, and architecture, and the criticality of our relationship to them. Recognized for his conceptually rigorous approach, and a physical mastery of materials, such as glass, McElheny explores vastly-ranging topics from astronomical cosmology and the infinite, to under-recognized artists or oeuvres, including the visionary abstraction of Hilma af Klint, Blinky Palermo’s wall paintings, and Robert Smithson’s crystalline sculptures. His practice mines the past to lay the groundwork for a path forward, giving a glimpse into not only what could have been, but visions for what might be.