Handwerker Gallery is pleased to present 10:51, a new solo exhibition by the Brooklyn based artist Robert Hickerson. We will host an opening reception on October 23, from 5 - 6:30 p.m. and an artist talk om November 18, at 5:30 p.m.
Through both new and previously unexhibited studio still lifes, constructions, and abstract self-portraiture, 10:51 examines how one makes sense of the American Dream when it may have never been accessible. Through photography and installation, Hickerson nods to the suburban house at night - a trope found in many of the genre films that inspire his practice.
Popular genre films, especially horror and slashers from the late 1970s and early 1980’s, often situated their stories within a middle-class suburbia where status is emphasized through the houses on display. These communities served as aspirational; idealized as a means of making it more horrific when eventually they become sites of violence and transgression. Aesthetically these sites become uncanny through a use of unreal lighting - shocking reds, dark blues, and otherworldly greens.
The suburban home, both as a site of personal history and as idealized in media, has long been a point of interest for Hickerson because of his upbringing in suburban Connecticut. It’s a symbol of status and exclusion, and for a long time was a cornerstone to The American Dream. However that is changing due to a volatile housing market, and a growing consensus that The American Dream was never made to fit everyone.
Robert Hickerson (b. New Haven, Connecticut) is a Brooklyn based artist working in photography, video, performance, and installation. Hickerson’s solo shows include Target Audience (Brooklyn Fire Proof, Brooklyn, NY, 2023), Spreading Lights (Vox Populi Gallery, Philadelphia, PA, 2022), The Mother of Sighs (Ortega y Gasset Projects, Brooklyn, NY, 2021), Backyard Stud (Synesthesia Gallery, Brooklyn, NY, 2019), Antigone curated by Ann Liv Young (Brooklyn, NY, 2019), and Say It With Power (Fleurotica Flower Shop, New York City, 2018). His work has also been included in various group shows internationally including Nightmare Logic (Candy Digital, Online, 2023), From Another Source (Study Hall Gallery, Utica, NY, 2023), Lavender Scare (SPRING/BREAK Art Show, New York, 2023), the horror (SEIS Gallery, Los Angeles, CA, 2023), On Death curated by Jon Feinstein (Humble Arts Foundation, online), When Darkness Loves Us curated by Kelsey and Rémy Bennett (Spring/Break Art Fair, New York City). Hickerson’s work has been published in The New York Times, TIME Magazine, The New Yorker, Musée Magazine, VICE Magazine, Refinery29 and PIX Magazine. He is an aquarius, rising leo, moon gemini.
The Handwerker Gallery and all of our events are free and open to the public.