Catarina Leitão: THICKET

October 13 – November 18, 2007

Number 35 is pleased to present new work by Catarina Leitão for its inaugural exhibition. In this exhibition, Leitão continues her exploration of human alienation from nature. Through intricate drawings of space suit-clad humans entangled in the foliage of creeping plants, Leitão depicts our relationship with nature to be estranged.

These series of drawings introduce a new concept in her environmental narrative: the thicket. “The thicket combines concepts of place, motion, habitat, ter- ritoriality and time in terms of continuous winding lines, segments and knots. It is materialism’s encyclopedia, devoted to touch, to interlacings and warping planes curving through the next space. The thicket’s lines vibrate in order to catch new pieces and latch onto other structures.” *

Throughout this series of drawings, Leitão weaves in images of defunct airplanes and helicopters, automobiles, humans and empty vessels. All are battling the ruins of a civilization and the thicket itself. In this post-apocalyptic imagery, Leitão conveys her compassion of the human experience in the detail of each piece. Her gures maneuver through the composition barefoot and barehanded, some with wing-like appendages lending them an unearthly ap- pearance. What is striking about these drawings alongside the care in their rendering is the open-ended metaphor. The thicket is a nameless quagmire, a situation created, yet not easily escaped.

Catarina Leitão is a Portuguese artist born in Stuttgart, Germany. She has exhibited in Lisbon, Japan and Spain and was included in the 2005 Greater New York exhibition at P.S. 1. She lives and works in New York.

Number 35 is proud to be a new member of the Lower East Side art community. For more information about the gallery and its artists, please visit www. numberthirtyfive.com.