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Robert Melee
Exhibition: a dozen Roses
Dates: 6/26 - 8/1/2014
Opening: Thursday, June 26, 6-8pm

Higher Pictures is pleased to announce a dozen Roses by Robert Melee. This exhibition features twelve images from staged shoots of the artist’s mother, Rose, made between 1993 and 2004. Shown in the past as an element in the artist’s multimedia installations, photo works and video sculptures, this marks the first exhibition focusing on the photographs as individual pieces.

The myth of the modern family is played with and ridiculed, ultimately giving way to dysfunction and beautiful catastrophe. Rose, the heroine and muse of Melee’s depravity is caught in seemingly absurd casual acts including romping naked in the snow, drinking in the bath tub and positioning herself on all fours with pots and pans on her back on the kitchen table, each time intoxicated.

The works featured represent freedom from taboos and a twisting of the human psyche. Unbridled and absurd, Melee’s depiction of domesticity and memory tampers with notions of real life versus theater. The traditional roles of mother and son in the familial bliss of calm are shattered as Melee constructs both punishing and affectionately sensational portraits.

Solo exhibitions include: Andrew Kreps Gallery, NYC, White Cube and Sutton Lane, London, Robert Melee’s UNIT, The Corcoran Gallery of Art, Washington, D.C., Currents 31: Robert Melee, The Milwaukee Art Museum, Milwaukee, WI, David Kordansky, LA, Robert Melee Sculpture, City Hall Park, NYC, Arena Mexico, Guadalajara, Mexico and Art Statements, Art 34 Basel, Switzerland.

His work has been included in numerous group exhibitions around the world, including Greater New York, PS1, NYC, Adaptive Behavior, New Museum of Contemporary Art, NYC, I am a Camera, The Saatchi Collection, London, Family, Aldrich Museum of Contemporary Art, CT, Make It Now, The Sculpture Center, NYC, Portugal Arte 10, Portugal Biennial, Lisbon, Wild Exaggeration, The Grotesque Body in Contemporary Art, Haifa Museum of Art,Israel and hue and cry, Sotheby’s S/2 Gallery, NYC.

Performances include Robert Melee’s Talent Show, 2005, 2010, The Kitchen, NYC and This Is For You, 2002, Judson Church, NYC.

For more information please contact the gallery at 212.249.6100.