HONG KONG.- Pace Gallery is now opening All Walks of Life, a group exhibition highlighting the work of seven young artists from the United States and Europe, at its Hong Kong gallery. The show will feature new and recent paintings by Anthony Cudahy, Katja Farin, Aubrey Levinthal, Laurent Proux, Daisy Sheff, Sarah Slappey, and Fabian Treiber.
Organized by independent curator William Zhao, All Walks of Life meditates on the nuances and subjectivities of daily life in the face of globalization. The vibrant works in the show—which range from figurations to landscapes to semi-abstract, lyrical tableaus—explore what it means to be an individual, both bodily and spiritually, in the present moment. Offering a focused look at contemporary painting, this exhibition centers on collisions of uncanniness and familiarity in experiences of people, places, and things.
Included in All Walks of Life are two new paintings by Farin in which bizarre details cut across everyday scenes. Exploring the ways that illusions of the self, of safety, prosperity, and community are sustained by our belief systems, Farin’s boldly colored, theatrically staged figurations are rife with mystery and ambiguity. Proux, meanwhile, depicts fragmented limbs and faces in his up-close figurations, with bodies intersecting and overlapping in carefully posed contortions—the artist has said that he aims to engage viewers of his work with “a visual and intellectual enigma running through the image.”
Slappey’s surreal depictions of intertwining body parts in Carpet of Needles (如坐針氈) (2023) and Emerald Strike (2023), both on view in All Walks of Life, are underpinned by a distinct sense of disquiet that the artist has characterized as "a kind of quiet violence." Mining the cruelty and pain baked into idealized notions of femininity, the artist is known for her opulent, dynamic figurations that belie the darkness of their content.
Drawing inspiration the varied images he collects as part of his practice, Cudahy creates intimate, deeply personal figurations that examine the present through the lens of the past, forging a portrait of intergenerational queer experience. In Treiber’s otherworldly landscapes, negotiations of space and enactments of interiority and exteriority speak to the shapeshifting nature of perception.
Levinthal’s paintings, on the other hand, often feel like film stills, with figures moving through the rhythms of their everyday lives. She imbues her depictions of characters in ordinary, seemingly mundane situations with emotional and poetic depth, hinting at larger narratives behind fleeting moments of movement and stasis. Meanwhile, Daisy Sheff constructs her bright, whimsical, sometimes fantastical canvases with multiple layers of paint, forging works that “offer glimpses into detailed, private narratives” through a unique visual language that blurs the boundary between figuration and abstraction.
Pace is a leading international art gallery representing some of the most influential contemporary artists and estates from the past century, holding decades-long relationships with Alexander Calder, Jean Dubuffet, Barbara Hepworth, Agnes Martin, Louise Nevelson, and Mark Rothko. Pace enjoys a unique U.S. heritage spanning East and West coasts through its early support of artists central to the Abstract Expressionist and Light and Space movements. Since its founding by Arne Glimcher in 1960, Pace has developed a distinguished legacy as an artist-first gallery that mounts seminal historical and contemporary exhibitions. Under the current leadership of CEO Marc Glimcher, Pace continues to support its artists and share their visionary work with audiences worldwide by remaining at the forefront of innovation. Now in its seventh decade, the gallery advances its mission through a robust global program—comprising exhibitions, artist projects, public installations, institutional collaborations, performances, and interdisciplinary projects. Pace has a legacy in art bookmaking and has published over five hundred titles in close collaboration with artists, with a focus on original scholarship and on introducing new voices to the art historical canon.
Today, Pace has seven locations worldwide, including European footholds in London and Geneva as well as Berlin, where the gallery established an office in 2023. Pace maintains two galleries in New York—its headquarters at 540 West 25th Street, which welcomed almost 120,000 visitors and programmed 20 shows in its first six months, and an adjacent 8,000 sq. ft. exhibition space at 510 West 25th Street. Pace’s long and pioneering history in California includes a gallery in Palo Alto, which was open from 2016 to 2022. Pace’s engagement with Silicon Valley’s technology industry has had a lasting impact on the gallery at a global level, accelerating its initiatives connecting art and technology as well as its work with experiential artists. Pace consolidated its West Coast activity through its flagship in Los Angeles, which opened in 2022. Pace was one of the first international galleries to establish outposts in Asia, where it operates permanent gallery spaces in Hong Kong and Seoul, along with an office and viewing room in Beijing. In spring 2024, Pace will open its first gallery space in Japan in Tokyo’s new Azabudai Hills development.
Pace Gallery
All Walks of Life
December 15th, 2023– January 18th
