Selling Exhibition • 18–27 September • New York

S panning three-decades of creation, John Chamberlain: The Energy of Form is a celebration of the breadth of Chamberlain’s practice and his inimitable ability to harness the unadulterated power of medium, color and form. The exhibition will feature 19 works from the John Chamberlain Estate, all of which were held in the artist’s personal collection. From the three-dimensional to the two-dimensional, the exhibition stands testament to an artist who constantly re-conceived the relationship between material and form and transformed the minutiae of the everyday - from aluminium foil to discarded automobile parts - into a visual language entirely his own.

Among the curated selection are included a group of photographs that see the artist bend the world around him through his camera lens the same way he does the materials of our world in his sculpture. The Foils and drawings on view similarly give color to his ingenuity in describing physical space. Perhaps most ubiquitous from within his prolific body of work are his sculptures. Beautifully composed from automotive scrap metal and ranging in scale from floor to table top, the 8 sculptures on display are odes to the variation which Chamberlain so deftly achieves through his chosen medium. Within these sculptures, the artist’s materials become wrought with paradox - painted and stainless steel, otherwise impervious to human touch, become malleable at the direction of Chamberlain’s hand.

Fluctuating between abrupt, uneven edges and smooth, rounded forms, the nature of their construction imbues each work with a potential energy that belies their stationary form. In an extension of this practice, Chamberlain likewise created a limited series of 30 masks from the same found and recycled metals, two enigmatic examples of which are here on view. The gallery will also play host to a couch, on loan from the artist’s Shelter Island studio-turned-exhibition space, which, alongside the masks, works on paper, and photos, demonstrates Chamberlain’s unwavering exploration into new materials. The Estate has utilized the couch as the centerpiece of their podcast series, where it welcomes artists, creatives and cultural figures to continue in the conversations which Chamberlain instigated through his work. As temporary custodian, the Breuer will serve as the backdrop for these interviews through the exhibition’s run.

On view in the Lobby Gallery from September 18th-27th, this retrospective presentation will coincide with the Independent 20th Century's inaugural takeover of the Breuer building from September 24th-27th, placing Chamberlain’s work in fitting dialogue with the contemporaries whom he created alongside during his lifetime, and with the new generation for whose practices Chamberlain’s work remains an indelible touchstone.