Artist Profile
Ivy Haldeman
probes our consumerist desire
Portrait of artist by Mara Corsino
Shortly after beginning our call, I tell Ivy Haldeman about the first few minutes in Severance, an episode from the last season of Mad Men. It is a famously misleading scene where a female character goes from a narrative of victimhood to one of empowerment, as it is revealed the cringe-inducing dialogue is a script for a part she's auditioning for. In much the same way, Ivy's sexy hot dog is as spellbinding as it is equivocal, prompting us to question the associations typically made with the commodified image of a woman. It is a brave viewer who attempts an interpretation - the nonchalant elusiveness of the work tricks us into undressing for the semi-naked edible avatar by verbally projecting things that mostly colour our individual worldview.
Ivy's gestural fluency evokes Kitagawa Utamaro's ukiyo-e prints: the subtle eroticism of ample robes framing the suddenness of a nape, the courtesans' alluring tenderness as they engage in self-indulgent activities suggestive of interiority or camaraderie... Confusingly, the prints document labour - the courtesans are performing a persona for an audience - and serve as advertising deliverables for the Edo pleasure industry. These layers of contradictory facts exemplify the Gordian knot of duality that pervades Ivy's oeuvre.
The smooth surface of Ivy's work betrays no sign of the labour that takes place both on- and off-canvas, further mirroring the studied languor of her characters. Airy washes of pigment on layers upon layers of sanded gesso recreate the behaviour of RGB colour on a backlit digital display, while also echoing ukiyo-e techniques. In this way, image consumption on a screen becomes a modern parallel for ukiyo-e-based marketing.
The genesis of the hot dog avatar goes like this: a young, carefree Ivy chances upon a hand-painted billboard on the façade of a bodega in La Boca. In it, a cartoon hot dog breezily struts in heels. It is 2011, the early days of a newly found earnestness in abstract art (later derisively called 'zombie formalism'), and the billboard's protagonist hardly seems a suitable subject for the contemporary palate. A sketch is drawn to document this first encounter, then tucked away. Back in NYC, Ivy balances a forbidding urban lifestyle with a practice consisting of 'very black' paintings. "You couldn't see what was going on in them" - she quips. Upon moving studios in 2015, a second encounter with the sketch ushers a breakthrough: when it comes to big city pressures the aspirationally indolent hot dog is both satire and antidote.
Ivy's gestural fluency evokes Kitagawa Utamaro's ukiyo-e prints: the subtle eroticism of ample robes framing the suddenness of a nape, the courtesans' alluring tenderness as they engage in self-indulgent activities suggestive of interiority or camaraderie... Confusingly, the prints document labour - the courtesans are performing a persona for an audience - and serve as advertising deliverables for the Edo pleasure industry. These layers of contradictory facts exemplify the Gordian knot of duality that pervades Ivy's oeuvre.
The smooth surface of Ivy's work betrays no sign of the labour that takes place both on- and off-canvas, further mirroring the studied languor of her characters. Airy washes of pigment on layers upon layers of sanded gesso recreate the behaviour of RGB colour on a backlit digital display, while also echoing ukiyo-e techniques. In this way, image consumption on a screen becomes a modern parallel for ukiyo-e-based marketing.
The genesis of the hot dog avatar goes like this: a young, carefree Ivy chances upon a hand-painted billboard on the façade of a bodega in La Boca. In it, a cartoon hot dog breezily struts in heels. It is 2011, the early days of a newly found earnestness in abstract art (later derisively called 'zombie formalism'), and the billboard's protagonist hardly seems a suitable subject for the contemporary palate. A sketch is drawn to document this first encounter, then tucked away. Back in NYC, Ivy balances a forbidding urban lifestyle with a practice consisting of 'very black' paintings. "You couldn't see what was going on in them" - she quips. Upon moving studios in 2015, a second encounter with the sketch ushers a breakthrough: when it comes to big city pressures the aspirationally indolent hot dog is both satire and antidote.
Ivy's burnt-white canvases demand nothing. They are non-spaces of play and lustful repose where the discrete units of visual meaning are mere props: a shoe against an ear becomes a phone, a bun wraps itself fluffily around an anthropomorphised hot dog - now a sofa, now a fur coat. Gender is no more than an attitude codified through body language and key symbolisers, and there is a strong suggestion that identity is performative.
The deconstruction of geometries is the throughline of Ivy's work. She favours images which are capacious, self-contained, self-contradictory - ouroboroi of meaning. Consider power suits - bulky shoulder pads project power above a fragile waist, or bikinis - innocuous swimwear essentials named after a test site for nuclear heads and inextricably tied to hyper-masculine imagery like girl-and-car calendars. Finally, take the all-American hot dog - a smooth surface conceals messily chopped meat. Might it not be analogous to how diverse cultural identities try to present as one folksy bloc in the US context?
Ivy’s Hand, sitting, index crossed over middle and Untitled are part of MEDIANOCHE0’s collection. View artworks ︎︎︎
Ivy Haldeman lives and works in New York City. She received a BFA from the Cooper Union in 2008, and has had solo exhibitions at Nanzuka Underground, François Ghebaly and Tara Downs. Her work has also been exhibited in group exhibitions at Petzel, Hauser and Wirth, and Paul Kasmin Gallery as well as in institutions such as the Frans Hals Museum. Her work can be found in prominent collections including those of the Dallas Museum of Art, the Denver Museum of Art, ICA Miami and Yuz Museum.
The deconstruction of geometries is the throughline of Ivy's work. She favours images which are capacious, self-contained, self-contradictory - ouroboroi of meaning. Consider power suits - bulky shoulder pads project power above a fragile waist, or bikinis - innocuous swimwear essentials named after a test site for nuclear heads and inextricably tied to hyper-masculine imagery like girl-and-car calendars. Finally, take the all-American hot dog - a smooth surface conceals messily chopped meat. Might it not be analogous to how diverse cultural identities try to present as one folksy bloc in the US context?
Ivy’s Hand, sitting, index crossed over middle and Untitled are part of MEDIANOCHE0’s collection. View artworks ︎︎︎
Ivy Haldeman lives and works in New York City. She received a BFA from the Cooper Union in 2008, and has had solo exhibitions at Nanzuka Underground, François Ghebaly and Tara Downs. Her work has also been exhibited in group exhibitions at Petzel, Hauser and Wirth, and Paul Kasmin Gallery as well as in institutions such as the Frans Hals Museum. Her work can be found in prominent collections including those of the Dallas Museum of Art, the Denver Museum of Art, ICA Miami and Yuz Museum.