BEING STILL/STILL BEING

Etta B. Ehrlich, Ph.D.

In her first exhibition with Carter Burden Gallery Dr. Etta B. Ehrlich presents antique glass bottles enriched with stenciled text in BEING STILL/STILL BEING. Ehrlich fills these vessels with meaning by adding text such as, “I am a small strange expression of eternity” and “I want to live without regrets”. As a Psychologist and Meditation Teacher, she presents each phrase as an intention. The bottles are symbolic impression of the viewer, who imbues each sculpture with their own experience. In her book “Meditation Art” Elrich explains, “...these compelling works of art provide tools for reflection, insight and spiritual development. They are an invitation to awareness, asking us if we are truly who we appear to be to ourselves.”

Etta B. Ehrlich, PhD., was born in 1930 in New York City. After studying abroad she received a degree in Psychology from The City College of New York and her doctorate from Yeshiva University. Ehrlich is an outsider artist who specializes in text-based works. She combines a lifelong study of Eastern spirituality with Western psychology, and creates original text-based sculptures on antique bottles, window frames and other artifacts and found objects. She has been practicing Sensory Awareness Meditation for over 40 years. Her work has been shown in galleries and museums including Andrew Edlin Gallery in New York City and Lambert Castle Museum in New Jersey. Her work is also in the permanent collection of the Magnus Museum, Berkley, CA.

Alan Neider

Artist Alan Neider presents selections from his series’ Bag Paintings, Loops, and For EM in his first exhibition with Carter Burden Gallery BEING STILL/STILL BEING. Wildly energetic and radiating with color, his large scale, sculptural paintings are sewn, painted, sprayed, stained, cut and constructed. The Bag Paintings examine and are inspired by fashion and glamor, while For EM is a tribute to artist Elizabeth Murray; all commanding the white walls of the gallery with diverse surfaces. Neider says, “My work has always been about painting. I built out from the surface of my first paintings because the forms needed to come out into space... I create/build difficult and challenging surfaces to paint. I believe these surfaces in conjunction with the inherent textures wood, fabric, ceramics lead to a richer, complex experience.”

Alan Neider was born in Norfolk, VA and received a BA from El Camino Jr. College, a BA in Ceramics from California State University at Long Beach, and an MFA in Sculpture from Washington University in St. Louis, MO. While in graduate school he received a Robert Rauschenberg Work Grant and was accepted into the MacDowell Artists Colony. Neider’s solo shows include those at Gallery L, Montclair, Nancy Lurie Gallery, and Henri Gallery, among others. He has been in numerous group exhibitions including Galerie Kremers in Berlin, the 490 Gallery in Brooklyn, the Overlook Gallery in Chicago, IL, Litchenfire Gallery, NYC, Equity Gallery, NYC, University of WI, and the Lowe Museum, FL. His work has been in articles and reviewed by Art in America, Washington Post, Chicago Tribune, Artforum, Art New England, The New Art Examiner, Hyperallergic, among others.