Mondo Cane is pleased to present the first exhibition of work by Sue Ravitz, a New York based artist.

Ravitz has been doing handwork since childhood. Her hobby developed into a more serious study of color ten years ago when she began to obsessively make knitted squares, which she ultimately assembled into blankets. After endlessly, compulsively knitting and crocheting, Ravitz wanted to do something different. She found a book on hooked rugs and began another set of color studies in this medium. She then began photographing sections of her blankets, which she used as compositional models for rugs.

At the same time, Ravitz became intrigued with paint-by-numbers, transforming photos of friends and family into paintings, which she gave away as gifts. Unfortunately, they didn’t appeal to many people because they just weren’t “art.” But since she enjoyed the paint-by-number process so much, she decided to experiment by using her knit pieces and rugs as references. This way of painting was procedurally analogous to her textile making – repetitive, incremental steps leading to a highly specific but unpredictable outcome, images that became comprehensible only as she worked on them.

The current show consists of three unique rugs, all the same color and composition, each created with a different technique that forced Ravitz to modify her materials, resulting in related but dissimilar color tones and surfaces. The paintings are digitally mapped, flatly rendered representations of these transformations. The series is a meditation on process; on the way individuality emerges from painstaking focus on detail and repetition.

Mondo Cane Gallery
174 Duane St, Tribeca
New York (NY) 10013 United States
Tel. +1 (212) 2199244
info@mondocane.com
www.mondocane.com

Opening hours
Monday – Friday from 11am to 6pm
Saturday from 12pm to 6pm