Low-Beer, Leif | Critical Distance Centre for Curators

Leif Low-Beer

Leif Low-Beer is an artist who engages in a playful reordering of ideas, images, and expectations through the use of constructed, multipart, and/or recombined compositions of drawings, collages, assemblages, and sculptural tableaux.

Evincing a keen interest in the mark of the hand, the relationships between objects in space, and the active engagement of the viewer, Low-Beer’s work is an exploration of psycho-spatial potential, graphing social tensions and internal enigmas that often exist as an underlying narrative layer. However, the artist seeks to transcend fixed ideas or story lines in his work, preferring to create opportunities for meaning that can evolve and expand over time.

Currently based in Brooklyn, NY, Leif Low-Beer grew up in Toronto and attended Guelph University (ON), then the School of Visual Art (NY), garnering degrees in philosophy, visual art, and design. His sculptures and drawings have been shown in solo shows at Buffalo Arts Studio (Buffalo, NY), Beginnings (Brooklyn, NY), Okay Mountain (Austin, TX), and Wild Project (New York, NY). A large-scale installation at Socrates Sculpture Park (Queens, NY) was part of the VISTA exhibition in 2011. THE ORDER OF THINGS is Low-Beer’s first solo show in Canada.

Image: Leif Low-Beer, artist’s sketch for One way method (notes to notes), 2014. Digital print on matte poster paper, 18 x 24 inches, open edition.

Links

Artist's Website

EXHIBITION: The Order of Things

April 24, 2014 - May 31, 2014

The Order of Things features new and recent work by Leif Low-Beer (Toronto/Brooklyn), an artist who engages in a playful reordering of ideas, images, and expectations through the use of constructed, multi-part, and/or recombined compositions of drawings, collages, assemblages, and sculptural tableaux. The Order of Things is Low-Beer’s first solo exhibition in Canada.

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Gallery

THE ORDER OF THINGS or, The Second Conference of the International Network of Personal Relationships (INPR) | LEIF-LOW-BEER, April 24 – May 31, 2014. Curated by Shani K Parsons.

Leif Low-Beer. THE ORDER OF THINGS or, The Second Conference of the International Network of Personal Relationships (INPR), installation view, 2014.

Leif Low-Beer, The consummation is postponed but never happens (installation view), from the exhibition The First Conference of the International Network of Personal Relationships (INPR), 2013. Mixed media. Dimensions variable.

Leif Low-Beer. A peach viewed at the just right angle sits perfectly sandwiched between the sill and the horizon, touching the shed on one side and a tree on the other (installation views and details from Socrates Sculpture Park), 2011. Cement, foam, wood, and metal. 35 x 8 feet.

Leif Low-Beer. Thuja plicata 2, 2013. Mixed media. Part of an ongoing series of outdoor installations.

Leif Low-Beer. All the kings armies, 2013. Mixed media. Part of an ongoing series of outdoor installations.

Leif Low-Beer. Olive Pit Pedestal (installation views), 2011. Mixed media including wood, clay, stone, plastic, papier-mâché, paper, foam and found objects. Dimensions variable. From the Totems series.

Leif Low-Beer. Selections from the Totems series, 2011. Unmanipulated photographs of mixed media installations. Dimensions variable.

Leif Low-Beer. Selections from the Totems series (process shots), 2011.

Leif Low-Beer, The spruce sat on the circle of the pond and the sun was perched perfectly on the tip of the spruce with the horizon balancing in between, 2010. Unmanipulated photograph of mixed media installation. 16.5 x 15 inches (photograph), 20 x 25 feet (installation).

Leif Low-Beer. Studio install, 2012. Mixed media. 16 x 13 inches.

Leif Low Beer. Selections from a series of imagined sculptures, 2008. Mixed media on found reproduction. Dimensions variable.

Leif Low-Beer, Heap Gives Up (installation views), 2013. Mixed media. Dimensions variable.

Leif Low-Beer. Selected sculptural units for use in larger installations, 2013–ongoing. Mixed media.

Leif Low-Beer. Sub (meaning”under”) and urbs. Mixed media.

Leif Low-Beer. Tall drink of water. Mixed media.

Leif Low-Beer, An ideal figure, used when aiming for an impression of nobility or grace, is drawn at 8 heads tall (body). Mixed media.

Leif Low-Beer, EAD (event anxiety disorder). Mixed media.

Leif Low-Beer. Installations (photographed, printed, and altered). Mixed media.