Press Release
The installation and mixed media works by Deborah G. Nehmad, addresses two of the most disquieting issues confronting America today, the President’s verbal incontinence and gun violence.
The installation surrounds the viewer with over 300 of Trump’s divisive tweets, issued both before and after he became President, stamped on handmade orange/yellow paper. Contradictory twits will lock beaks. Tweets criticizing the previous President are amazingly prescient descriptors of Trump’s actions and behavior in office.
In the second 12 months following the massacre at Sandy Hook Elementary School, 137 children aged 10 and under either shot themselves or another child or were shot by an adult. The 12 visually compelling needlepoints comprising “what’s wrong with this country? – the next 12 months” break down these statistics on a monthly basis which can be read with a QR code reader downloaded to a smart phone.
In “old glory?”, Nehmad hand stitches the number of average yearly deaths from gun violence in America from 2014 – 2016 as the stripes of an American flag – 7 stripes comprised of black x’s representing suicides, 6 stripes of red crosses representing homicides. The 51 “ stars” are presented as black and white targets burned with holes representing the number of deaths in mass murders over the past 25 years for each individual state and the District of Columbia. While stunning from a distance, the patterns of holes and stitches convey a powerful, poignant symbolism, functioning as catalogues of tragedy.
This is Nehmad’s second solo exhibition at the Kim Foster Gallery.
artnet news Partner Content February 5, 2018
This Artist Collected 300 of Trump’s Most Egregious Tweets and Turned Them into a Party of Pecking Birds
link to artnet article
The individual tweets are arranged chronologically and grouped together in a form that resembles a migration pattern. Through it, a narrative emerges, painting a picture of the man behind the impetuous language. Adding to the visual metaphor are tweets that are positioned beak-to-beak for when the messages contradict each other..
WALL STREET INTERNATIONAL January 17, 2018 by Daniel Gauss
Trump’s Life without Art
link to WSI review
Deborah G. Nehmad has a show currently at Kim Foster Gallery in which she has collected and graphically represents numerous tweets from President Trump. Each tweet reflects what most of us who love art have aspired to overcome – human life at its most base, arbitrary and unexamined.
The tweets reveal Trump as someone with no capacity or desire for self-examination or self-control. This is a life without art and without the underlying impetus that drives many of us to art – to better understand ourselves and our world to ensure that we can rise above the random and arbitrary; to develop meaning and work toward humane change in ourselves, others and the world. His tweets displayed by Nehmad are works of art about a life devoid of art and what one is left with in its absence…
link to video of exhibition
artist website
Biography
Deborah Gottheil Nehmad is a Honolulu-based artist whose works on paper have been seen in museum, non-profit and gallery venues since 1998. She was born and raised on Long Island in New York and graduated from Smith College with her B.A. in 1974. In 1982, she received her JD from Georgetown University. After years as a practicing attorney and working in politics (including the Carter White House), her legal work brought her to Hawaii in 1984. In 1985, an accident precipitated a series of life altering events. By 1998, she had earned her MFA in printmaking from the University of Hawaii – Manoa.
Initially derived from personal pain, my artwork has evolved into an obsession with mark making and working the surface of the paper into a visual meditation. To me, paper is like skin, and by extension, the body itself. Both the processes I employ – I repetitively burn, etch, scrape, score, stamp, puncture, incise, type, apply pressure, write and draw – and materials I incorporate – heat, paper, gut, glass, ink, thread, soot and metal – offer a visual vocabulary that seems to parallel the way in which pain marks a body. My most recent work addresses anguish on a broader scale, incorporating obsessive mark making to translate visually what cannot be conveyed adequately through the abstraction of written language.
She has participated in numerous solo show and group exhibitions in Hawaii, on the “mainland”, and internationally. Her work can be found in many public and private collections including the New York Museum of Modern Art, the Fine Art Museums of San Francisco, Yale University Art Gallery, the Davis Museum and Cultural Center at Wellesley College, Smith College Museum of Art, Hood Museum at Dartmouth College, the Hammer Museum of UCLA, the Honolulu Museum of Art, the Hawaii State Art Museum, and the Contemporary Museum in Honolulu. She has received numerous awards, including purchases from funds provided by the Wallace Alexander Gerbode Foundation and was one of six Hawaii artists included in the Sixth Biennial of Hawaii Artists at The Contemporary Museum in 2003. More recently, she was awarded the Hawaii State Foundation for Culture and the Arts Individual Artist Award for Excellence in the Visual Arts.
EDUCATION:
1993 –1998 University of Hawaii at Manoa (MFA in Printmaking)
1978 –1982 Georgetown University Law Center, Washington, D.C. (J.D.)
1970 –1974 Smith College, Northampton, MA (B.A. in Government)
ONE-PERSON EXHIBITIONS:
2018 What’s Wrong With This Country?, Dairy Arts Center, Boulder, CO
2018 TWIT, Kim Foster Gallery, New York, NY
2017 Targeted Dissonance, Cindy Lisica Gallery, Houston Tx
2016 WASTED, Honolulu Museum of Art, Honolulu, HI
2015 WASTED, Kim Foster Gallery, NY
2013 A Common Sense, Gallery at Ward Center, Honolulu, HI
2006 iterations, Koa Gallery, Honolulu, HI
2006 Drawn Glass, Hui Noeau Visual Arts Center, Makawao, HI
2005 Variations on a Meditation, Academy Art Center, Honolulu, HI
2000 Marking Time, Academy Art Center, Honolulu Academy of Arts, HI
2000 Georgetown University Law Center, Washington, D.C.
1998 10,000, University of Hawai’i Commons Gallery, Honolulu, HI
SPECIAL AWARDS:
2011 Hawaii STATE FOUNDATION ON CULTURE AND THE ARTS Purchase Award
2008 Hawai’i STATE FOUNDATION ON CULTURE AND THE ARTS (SFCA) Individual Artist Fellowship
2007 SFCA Purchase Award
2003 SFCA Purchase Award
2003 Gift Print Artist – Honolulu Printmakers
2002 Purchase by The Fine Art Museums of San Francisco for the Achenbach Collection with funds provided by the Wallace Alexander GERBODE Foundation
2002 Purchase by The Contemporary Museum, Honolulu, HI with funds provided by the Wallace Alexander GERBODE Foundation
2002 Hawai’i SFCA Purchase Awards
2001 Hawai’i SFCA Purchase Award
2000 Hawai’i SFCA Purchase Award
1999 Hawai’i SFCA Purchase Award
INVITATIONAL GROUP EXHIBITIONS:
2014 Joomchi and Beyond, Jeju, Korea
2014 Works on Paper, Smith College Museum of Art, Northampton, MA
2014 Art=Text=Art: Works by Contemporary Artists, Anderson Gallery at University at Buffalo, New York
2013 Finding X, Honolulu Museum of Art Spalding House, Honolulu, HI
2012 Art=Text=Art: Works by Contemporary Artists,. Zimmerli Art Museum at Rutgers University, New Brunswick, NJ
2012 International Joomchi and Beyond, Atrium Gallery, Providence, RI and Warwick Museum of Art, Warwick, RI
2012 Hawaii Art Now, Honolulu Museum of Art, Honolulu, HI
2011 accession: Recent Acquisitions from the Art in Public Places Collection, Hawaii State Art Museum, Honolulu, HI
2011 Art=Text=Art: Works by Contemporary Artists, University of Richmond, VA
2011 In the News, The Contemporary Museum at First Hawaiian Center, Honolulu, HI
2011 Drawn, Taped/ Burned: Abstraction on Paper, Katonah Art Museum, Katonah, NY
2010-11 Group exhibition of Awardees of SFCA Visual Arts Fellowships at Hawaii State Art Museum, Honolulu, HI
2009 New York: Recent Avant-Gardes on Paper, Museo de Arte Contemporáneo Esteban Vicente, Segovia, Spain
2008 Benchmark, The Contemporary Museum, Honolulu, HI
2007 uncommon objects, Hawaii State Art Museum, Honolulu, HI
2006 Tenth Anniversary Exhibition, The Contemporary Museum at First Hawaiian Center, Honolulu, HI
2006 Hey-li Printmedia Festival-from paper to digital, Sung Shin Women’s University. Seoul, Korea
2006 West Toward the East: Contemporary Art from the Pacific Rim, City of Brea Art Gallery, Brea, CA
2006 Artists of Hawaii Revisited: Selected Acquisitions 1997–2005, Honolulu Academy of Arts, Honolulu, HI
2006 Honolulu Academy of Arts Showcase Exhibition, Honolulu, HI
2004 – 5 Proof Positive: New Prints from the Hui, Hui Noeau, Makawao, HI
2003 – 4 Fine Lines: from the collection of Wynn Kramarsky; Santa Barbara Contemporary Arts Forum, Santa Barbara, CA
2003 The Contemporary Museum’s Sixth Annual Biennial Exhibition of
2003 In the Making: Contemporary Drawings from a Private Collection,
2003 Fine Arts Center, University of Massachusetts, Amherst, MA
2002 -3 Inaugural exhibition, Hawaii State Art Museum, Honolulu, HI
2002 Miniature Exhibition, Koa Gallery, Honolulu, HI
2002 Honolulu Printmakers 75th Anniversary Exhibition, Honolulu Academy of Arts,
2002 Honolulu Academy of Arts Showcase Exhibition, Honolulu, HI
2001 Miniature Exhibition, Koa Gallery, Honolulu, HI
2001 Quality Hearts, The Contemporary Museum, Honolulu, HI
2001 Honolulu Academy of Arts Showcase Exhibition, Honolulu, HI
2001 Time After Time, Gallery at Ward Center, Honolulu, HI
2000 Stretching the Point, University of Hawai’i Art Gallery, Honolulu, HI
2000 Works on Paper, The Contemporary Museum at First Hawaiian Center, HI
2000 7th International Shoebox Sculpture Exhibition, traveling international exhibition
2000 Honolulu Academy of Arts Showcase Exhibition, Honolulu, HI
1999 Closing the Door: Mixed Media Exhibit, Koa Gallery, Honolulu, HI
1998 Image and the Word, Iolani Gallery, Honolulu, HI
SELECTED GROUP SHOWS:
2018 The World Reflected, Honolulu Museum of Art, Honolulu, HI
2009 comPress, The ARTS at Marks garage, Honolulu, HI
2008 kites, kites, kites, Hui Noeau, Makawao, HI
2006 War/Peace, Balcony Gallery, Kailua, HI
2005 Critique Group: 10 Years Later, Balcony Gallery, Kailua, HI
2005 Berkeley Art Center Assoc.’s 22nd Annual National Juried Exhibition, Berkeley, CA
2004 “art on paper,” Weatherspoon Art Museum, Greensboro, NC
2002 Common Sense, organized by the Honolulu Printmakers, exhibited at the Academy Art Center, Honolulu Academy of Arts and The Contemporary Museum Café, Honolulu, HI
2001 Through the Window, organized by the Honolulu Printmakers, exhibited at the Academy Art Center, Honolulu Academy of Arts
1999 Connective, Queen Emma Gallery, Honolulu, HI
1999 Birthmarks, Queen Emma Gallery, Honolulu, HI
COLLLECTIONS:
Museum of Modern Art, New York, NY
Achenbach Collection, Fine Art Museums of San Francisco
Honolulu Museum of Art Honolulu, HI
Hawai’i State Art Museum, Honolulu, HI
Yale University Gallery of Art, New Haven, Connecticut
Davis Museum and Cultural Center, Wellesley College, Wellesley, MA
UCLA Hammer Museum, Los Angeles, CA
Smith College Museum of Art, Northampton, MA
Hood Museum of Art, Dartmouth College, Hanover, NH
Pacific University, Forest Grove. OR
Private and Corporate Collections, including Werner Kramarsky, New York, NY
Four Seasons Hotel, Wailea Maui
SELECTED BIBLIOGRAPHY:
artnet news, February 5, 2018
Wall Street International, January, 2018
artefuse April 2015
FLUX Magazine, Spring 2011
New York Times, Sunday, February 20, 2011
Hawaiian Modern Luxury, Winter 2010
The Honolulu Advertiser, February 1, 2010
The Honolulu Advertiser, November 8, 2009
The Honolulu Weekly, November 4 – 10, 2009
The Honolulu Advertiser, February 15, 2009
Hawaiian Style Magazine, January – March 2009
ABCD, March 14 – 20, 2009 (weekly arts insert to ABC, daily Spanish newspaper)
Hawaii State Foundation on Culture and the Arts Newsletter, Spring 2008
Honolulu Star Bulletin, October 29, 2006
The Honolulu Advertiser, October 22, 2006
Maui News, July 2, 2006
Honolulu Star Bulletin, September 11, 2005
Artweek, May 2005
The Honolulu Advertiser, March 13, 2005
Calendar News, Honolulu Academy of Arts, January – February, 2005
The Honolulu Advertiser, April 4, 2004
Santa Barbara News-Press, artsScene, December 5-11, 2003
The Honolulu Advertiser, July 27, 2003
The Contemporary Museum News, Summer 2003
Hana Hou!, The Magazine of Hawaiian Airlines, February/March 2003
Contemporary Impressions, Journal of the American Print Alliance, March 2003
Honolulu Star Bulletin, March 16, 2003,
Honolulu Star Bulletin, The Honolulu Advertiser, April 28, 2002
The Honolulu Advertiser, October 14, 2001
The Honolulu Advertiser, July 1, 2001
The Austin Chronicle, November 26, 2000
The Honolulu Advertiser, September 17, 2000
Calendar News, Honolulu Academy of Arts, September-October, 2000
The Honolulu Advertiser, September 3, 2000
The Honolulu Weekly, August 31– September 5, 2000
The Contemporary Museum News: Summer 2000
The Contemporary Museum News: Spring 2000
Artweek, May 2000, pp 24-25
Ka Leo Hawai’i, January 13, 1998
PUBLICATIONS:
Targeted Dissonance, Cindy Lisica Gallery 2017
Art=Text=Art: Works by Contemporary Artists, on-line catalogue for exhibition at Zimmerli Art Museum, Rutgers University, 2012
Art=Text=Art: Works by Contemporary Artists, on-line catalogue for exhibition at University of Richmond Art Museum, 2011
Drawn, Taped/ Burned: Abstraction on Paper, on-line catalogue for exhibition at Katonah Art Museum, 2011
New York New Drawings 1946-2007, Museo de Arte Contemporáneo Esteban Vicente, Segovia, Spain, 2009
560 Broadway: A New York Drawing Collection at Work, 1991-2006, Yale University Press, 2008
Int’l Print Network by Korean Contemporary Printmakers Association in HEYRI, Hawai’i, Australia, 2006
“art on paper” 2004; Weatherspoon Art Museum, Greensboro, NC
New Prints 2004/Spring, ICPNY Curatorial Statement by Barry Walker
Fine Lines: from the collection of Wynn Kramarsky; Santa Barbara Contemporary Arts Forum,
Santa Barbara, CA, 2003
The Contemporary Museum VI Biennial of Hawaii Artists, The Contemporary Museum, Honolulu, Hawaii, 2003
Honolulu Printmakers 75th Anniversary: A Tradition of Gift Prints, Honolulu Academy of Arts, 2003
In the Making: Contemporary Drawings from a Private Collection, University of Massachusetts, Amherst, 2003
7th Shoebox Sculpture Exhibition, University of Hawaii Press, 2000
