Elizabeth Colomba at Venus Over Manhattan

Elizabeth Colomba, The Magician, 2025. Oil and gold leaf on canvas; 60 x 48 in (152.4 x 121.9 cm)

Venus Over Manhattan
39 Great Jones Street
New York, NY 10012

Venus Over Manhattan is pleased to present Elizabeth Colomba, the artist’s debut solo exhibition with the gallery. The exhibition provides a comprehensive look at Colomba’s distinctive approach to figurative painting, featuring a selection of new and recent paintings and works on paper—most of which have never been shown publicly.

Opening on April 15th, the exhibition foregrounds Colomba’s engagement with historical, mythological, and allegorical subjects, centering Black women as protagonists in painterly traditions from which they have long been excluded. The show coincides with the ongoing installation of Colomba’s Armelle (1997) at the Metropolitan Museum of Art—one of several recent prominent showcases of her work, which also include a cover for The New Yorker and a permanent commission for the Park Avenue Armory’s entrance hall. In conjunction with the exhibition, Venus Over Manhattan will publish a richly illustrated catalogue featuring a new conversation between Colomba and the artist Wangechi Mutu.

For further information about the exhibition and availability, please contact the gallery at info@venusovermanhattan.com

 Press Contact
Dan Duray
+1 (203) 520-0619
dan@nothingobstacle.com

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EFA RBPMW Awarded Grants from Dedalus Foundation and DHPSNY

EFA Robert Blackburn Printmaking Workshop is a recipient of a Dedalus Foundation grant to support an Online Educational Platform for The Only Thing That Lasts: An Oral History of Robert Blackburn’s Printmaking Workshop, both an interactive and educational website that will be a source for greater access to the workshop’s rich history. This platform will launch in the fall of 2025, with its 20-Year Survey Exhibition, including free programming: screenings, discussions, and readings.

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EFA Robert Blackburn Printmaking Workshop has also received a Documentary Heritage and Preservation Services grant for New York’s First Phase: Assessment and Planning of The Printmaking Workshop’s Papers.

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Wafaa Bilal: Indulge Me at MCA Chicago

Wafaa Bilal (b. 1966, Najaf, Iraq; lives and works in New York), Rendering of Canto III, 2023. © Wafaa Bilal. Courtesy of the artist.

Museum of Contemporary Art Chicago
220 E Chicago Ave
Chicago IL 60611

Wafaa Bilal: Indulge Me is the first major survey of internationally renowned artist Wafaa Bilal (b. 1966, Najaf, Iraq; lives in New York, NY). Working in performance, sculpture, and with online and interactive technologies, Bilal’s interdisciplinary practice investigates the dynamic between international and interpersonal politics while highlighting the tension between his home in the United States, which he has deemed the “comfort zone,” and the “conflict zone” of Iraq. The exhibition covers the breadth of Bilal’s versatile career by exploring his performance practice, the use of power in Saddam Hussein’s regime, and Iraqi history and antiquity. It will feature archival displays of his iconic month-long performance Domestic Tension (2007) and year-long performance 3rdi (2010–11), as well as two new works including a sculptural commission for the MCA.

A theme running throughout the exhibition is cultural cannibalism—that is, how culture (in particular the culture of the other) can be used, disassembled, and consumed. Within each of Bilal’s works, one can find metaphorical and literal traces of this idea. Whether through the artist leveraging his own body to interrogate notions of power, or through his use of innovative technologies to rectify acts of cultural destruction, Bilal shows us what it means to consciously engage across cultures while highlighting the negative global implications of consumption, exploitation, and profiteering.

The exhibition is accompanied by a major publication, the first to survey multiple projects by the visionary artist.

Wafaa Bilal: Indulge Me is curated by Bana Kattan, Pamela Alper Associate Curator, with Iris Colburn, Curatorial Associate.

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Aoko—born away from home: ArteFuse

Installation view, Aoko—born away from home, curated by Klaudia Ofwona Draber, 2024. Photo by Argenis Apolinario.

Aoko—born away from home: Claiming and Creating Identity at EFA Project Space, NYC

“Aoko—born away from home is a powerful multimedia group show at EFA Project Space until November 16. The exhibition includes visual art, video, and writing from artists about the experience of being mixed race. This show was very personal to me, as I am a mixed-race person, and it touched on themes that people outside of this demographic often overlook. Oftentimes, mixed-race people feel like they are not enough of one thing to identify with any one identity because of the way their peers react to them. Aoko—born away from home touched on this feeling while fighting for our right to claim our heritage. Additionally, I have found community with other mixed-race people regardless of ethnic background, and the exhibition captured this solidarity by representing many different mixed-racial and ethnic identities.”

—Bash Ortega for ArteFuse

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