NEW YORK, NY.- Hionas Gallery is presenting Anguillid Theory of Gender, the first solo exhibition from artist Lou Eberhard. The show features a selection of new and recent drawings that explore, in the artist’s words, “bodies and forms that are simultaneously familiar and foreign.” Eberhard’s muse on this journey is the American and European eel, a creature with a complex and often ambiguous lifecycle whose very form organically lends itself to the artist’s sinuous freehand linework.

As a transgender artist, Eberhard endeavors to portray the trans experience in an engaged and positive light, with a focus on “gender euphoria” rather than a “voyeuristic exploitation of pain.” Indeed, his subjects are anything but demure. They are present and sturdy within the frame, fixated on either a task or a fleeting thought, which appear more contemplative than somber. With a deft hand, Eberhard casts precise and continuous lines that blur the boundary between contour and internal form, like topographical maps of bodies in motion, both physically and metaphysically. The resulting effect is as sculptural as it is illustrative.

The streamlined nature of Eberhard’s work suggests a stream-of-consciousness at play, and yet, his use of composition reveals a mind filled with clear intent and resolve, even joy.

Eberhard’s various portrayals of the Anguillidae (eels that live in fresh water as adults but return to the sea to spawn) are revelatory. Born sexually undifferentiated, eels develop their sex late in life, a stage that is dictated by environmental conditions and not genetic pre-assignment. This zoological anomaly, as it were, embodies the ideal avatar for Eberhard. “I feel a kinship with these genderless creatures. Their very existence seems to defy all expectations for how the natural world behaves, or should behave.”

Lou Eberhard is a transgender artist whose work reflects and investigates the complex nature of gender identity as it relates to his body and presentation. He received his BS in Studio Art from Marist College and his MFA in Drawing from New York Academy of Art. His work has been included in exhibitions throughout the U.S. and Europe, including at the 2015 Venice Biennale. He divides his time between Princeton, New Jersey, and New York City.