White Columns Online #13:
‘Private Behavior’
curated by Lauren Marinaro

June 18–September 12, 2020 Online
Two intertwined figures dressed in all black, their faces hidden. They sit on a wooden table against a backdrop of pink and blue floral wallpaper.

Karen Asher
Wallpaper, 2016.
C-Print
25 × 25 in.
Courtesy of the artist.

A person sitting in a bathtub as a pair of hands belonging to another person dyes their hair with black hair dye.

Karen Asher
Dye Job, 2015.
C-Print
25 × 25 in.
Courtesy of the artist

A person lying in bed wearing an oxygen mask holds a crying, diapered baby that is seated on their chest.

Karen Asher
Crying Baby, 2014.
C-Print
25 × 25 in.
Courtesy of the artist.

A drawing of a woman sitting on the edge of a couch with breasts exposed and lower half clad in lingerie. She wears evening gloves and gazes distantly at something out of frame.

Erica Eyres
Ursula, 2019.
Pencil on paper
78 × 67 cm.
Courtesy of the artist.

A drawing depicting an older woman sitting in a chair and applying lipstick in a small handheld mirror.

Erica Eyres
Lucy, 2019.
Pencil on paper
83 × 62 cm.
Courtesy of the artist.

A drawing of a woman wearing a bodysuit, fishnet stockings, heels and glasses. She looks at the viewer while seated on a desk with her legs crossed, bending a riding crop over her knee.

Erica Eyres
Untitled, 2019.
Courtesy of the artist.

A glass of red wine with a bee perched on its rim against a backdrop of blue sky. The glass is set on a stage and green and gold theatrical drapes frame the composition.

Kathleen Herlihy-Paoli
Mind the Edge, 2020.
Oil on canvas with shade pull
20 × 20 in.
Courtesy of the artist.

A quill and bottle of ink spotlit on a stage against a brick wall backdrop. The theater drapes to the sides are a warm yellow, and dark clouds fill the top of the composition.

Kathleen Herlihy-Paoli
The Pen and The Wall, 2019.
Oil on canvas
20 × 20 in.
Courtesy of the artist.

A seascape with a loaf of bread on a plate awkwardly superimposed over the water. A glass of water rests on a cloud in the sky, which seems to actually be painted theatrical drapes.

Kathleen Herlihy-Paoli
For an Old Soul, 2018.
Oil on canvas with beads
20 × 20 in.
Courtesy of the artist.

A white frisbee with the words “Act like you’re 5 years old.” printed on it in bold red lettering.

Aaron Krach
Indestructible Artifact # 30: Play, 2019.
Screen print on frisbee
7 × 7 in., Edition of 100
Courtesy of the artist.

A monthly calendar page for January 2019. Above the calendar is a cartoon sketch of a tire against a black background with the words “Imagining how you feel.” printed to the right.

Aaron Krach
Calendar, 2019.
Screenprint on vinyl sticker, 13 page-calendar
3 × 4 in.
Courtesy of the artist.

Two plush panda bear heads hanging on a wall side by side.

Aaron Krach
Pair
Panda Bear Heads
17 × 35 × 17 in., Unique
Courtesy of the artist.

A woman depicted from above lying on bedsheets with her knees drawn up to her shoulders and seemingly nude, as though photographed during sex.

Erin Leland
Book of Correspondences, 2007 – Ongoing.
Archive of digital files, pigment prints, autobiographical writings and letters
Courtesy of the artist.

Two nude figures, one crouching and one standing, both cropped and heavily obscured by shadows. Their held hands, caught in a beam of light, occupy the center of the frame.

Erin Leland
Book of Correspondences, 2007 – Ongoing.
Archive of digital files, pigment prints, autobiographical writings and letters
Courtesy of the artist.

A video camera with a microphone on a tripod in a bedroom setting. The camera faces the viewer and is positioned towards a bed.

Erin Leland
Book of Correspondences, 2007 – Ongoing.
Archive of digital files, pigment prints, autobiographical writings and letters
Courtesy of the artist.

Objects arranged on a shelf, including a rabbit figurine, clothing, a letter and a portrait of two women in 60’s style clothes and hair with the words “How will I learn who I am” superimposed.

Scott Northrup
The Prettier Sister Blues, 2017.
Polaroids, found objects, tape, text projection
30 × 54 × 6 in.
Courtesy of the artist

An assortment of zines about queer and gay topics, several incorporating vintage advertising iconography.

Scott Northrup
Zines, 2015-2019.
Collage, poetry, prose, photocopies/prints
Dimensions vary
Courtesy of the artist.

Objects arranged on a wall-mounted shelving unit including trophies, binoculars, a polaroid of someone’s eyes and a series of polaroids that spell out “PERFECT, PERFECT, PERVERT.”

Scott Northrup
Perfect Pervert, 2018.
Polaroids, found objects, latex rubber, tape
40 × 36 × 4 in.
Courtesy of the artist.

Participating Artists

Karen Asher
Erica Eyres
Kathleen Herlihy-Paoli
Aaron Krach
Erin Leland
Scott Northrup

Exhibition Description

I remember when I first learned about the idea of private behaviors.  I was youngish and the realization that not everyone acts the same or performs the same at home rituals became a fascination for me.  It continues to this day.  How do other people pluck their eye brows?  Do they sing to themselves?  How do they lay on the couch and flip through program options?  What do they do with their time when they’re not required to be anywhere?  Generally I categorize private behaviors as anything you would be uncomfortable doing while someone else is watching.  But being in the art world you understand that this boundary can be pushed and flipped.  Artists are often the great provocateur, pushing what is hidden to the forefront through music, literature and visual arts.

During the pandemic, spending more time at home has become the usual for the majority of the world.  I envision people creating new private behaviors and rituals and becoming both protective and exhausted of these moments that are their own.  The artists grouped here create works connected to the personal and private.  They evoke a certain uncomfortableness through their images and sculpture as the viewer is confronted with shared intimacy and an invitation into private moments.

Karen Asher’s photographs reference a long lineage of voyeuristic photographers looking at the lives of the everyday man, but Asher pushes her images to highlight the surreal oddities of everyday life.  A couple embrace, as if to become one, on a dining table; a pair of arms reach into the shot to aid in dyeing a woman’s hair blue; a screaming child sits a top a sleeping man hooked up to a CPAP machine.  Asher brings us in the the subject’s homes and reveals what happens behind closed doors.  The very nature of photography provokes us to ask what is authentic, but the movement and action in Asher’s images makes us feel as we’ve peeked into a fleeting moment.

Erica Eyres appropriates imagery from 1970s and 1980s text books and manuals in her drawings.  The voyeuristic results are uncomfortable and feel like the viewer is intruding.  When the subjects are looking at the viewer, it feels like we have interrupted them mid-action, when they are looking away, it feels like we are spying on their private moments from applying lipstick to taking part in a sexual escapade.

Kathleen Herlihy-Paoli  Personal events shape the direction of the series of theater paintings by Kathleen Herlihy-Paoli, as she uses the framework of the stage as a mechanism that holds up a mirror to our behaviors and lets us analyze them more clearly.  A glass of wine takes center stage, a baguette floats in the sea under stage curtains and a feather and quill loom prominently in front of a spotlight and brick stage wall.  Objects stand in for actions—drinking, eating, writing—and give a moment of reflection for our relationship to these behaviors, our consumption, and our output.

Aaron Krach finds, rearranges and combines objects that fill the world and our lives.  Using these objects as materials for his art, he isolates objects, remixes and reframes them and forces us to re-examine the everyday and banal.  A possibly found frisbee that encourages “Act like you’re 5 years old”  and a give-away calendar that states “Imagining how you feel” become existential questions for the viewer.  Two well worn stuffed panda heads mounted to the wall seem like they have been sadly separated from their owner emote a sadness of this loneliness stuck in time.  Objects that normally live in ones home are put on display and in the context of exhibition force us to re-evaluate our relationships with our possessions.

Erin Leland uses her own face and body and diaristic writings in her work.  As the subject of portraits in the space of her home, Leland documents what she refers to as a backstage—the daily grooming germane to the creation of a public appearance.  Other images appear to catch the artist in sexual situations that aren’t completely clear. The angle and intimacy of the photographs make the viewer feel as if they are in the room quietly observing as Leland performs her private behaviors, but tight cropping of the photographs prevents us from fully entering the artists world.

Scott Northrup is interested in the feelings that we secretly harbor for one another — love, lust, loss, desire. In his assemblage shrines we are given glimpses into personas, feelings and conflicts.  A work titled “The Prettier Sister Blues” puts out in public a sentiment that is usually only shared in whispers and “Perfect Pervert” beckons the viewer to come closer and examine each object, themselves becoming the voyeur.  Northrup also writes what he classifiers as “queer smut and sad boy poems” because “they feel honest, even when they’re not”.  Putting these words in the world makes public what the reader takes as private thought, even if it’s inauthentic.

Lauren Marinaro is the owner and director of Marinaro, a contemporary art gallery in Chinatown in Manhattan.

For more information visit https://www.marinaro.biz/

This exhibition is the thirteenth in a series of online exhibitions curated exclusively from White Columns’ Curated Artist Registry.

For more information: registry.whitecolumns.org

Two intertwined figures dressed in all black, their faces hidden. They sit on a wooden table against a backdrop of pink and blue floral wallpaper.
A person sitting in a bathtub as a pair of hands belonging to another person dyes their hair with black hair dye.
A person lying in bed wearing an oxygen mask holds a crying, diapered baby that is seated on their chest.
A drawing of a woman sitting on the edge of a couch with breasts exposed and lower half clad in lingerie. She wears evening gloves and gazes distantly at something out of frame.
A drawing depicting an older woman sitting in a chair and applying lipstick in a small handheld mirror.
A drawing of a woman wearing a bodysuit, fishnet stockings, heels and glasses. She looks at the viewer while seated on a desk with her legs crossed, bending a riding crop over her knee.
A glass of red wine with a bee perched on its rim against a backdrop of blue sky. The glass is set on a stage and green and gold theatrical drapes frame the composition.
A quill and bottle of ink spotlit on a stage against a brick wall backdrop. The theater drapes to the sides are a warm yellow, and dark clouds fill the top of the composition.
A seascape with a loaf of bread on a plate awkwardly superimposed over the water. A glass of water rests on a cloud in the sky, which seems to actually be painted theatrical drapes.
A white frisbee with the words “Act like you’re 5 years old.” printed on it in bold red lettering.
A monthly calendar page for January 2019. Above the calendar is a cartoon sketch of a tire against a black background with the words “Imagining how you feel.” printed to the right.
Two plush panda bear heads hanging on a wall side by side.
A woman depicted from above lying on bedsheets with her knees drawn up to her shoulders and seemingly nude, as though photographed during sex.
Two nude figures, one crouching and one standing, both cropped and heavily obscured by shadows. Their held hands, caught in a beam of light, occupy the center of the frame.
A video camera with a microphone on a tripod in a bedroom setting. The camera faces the viewer and is positioned towards a bed.
Objects arranged on a shelf, including a rabbit figurine, clothing, a letter and a portrait of two women in 60’s style clothes and hair with the words “How will I learn who I am” superimposed.
An assortment of zines about queer and gay topics, several incorporating vintage advertising iconography.
Objects arranged on a wall-mounted shelving unit including trophies, binoculars, a polaroid of someone’s eyes and a series of polaroids that spell out “PERFECT, PERFECT, PERVERT.”

Karen Asher
Wallpaper, 2016.
C-Print
25 × 25 in.
Courtesy of the artist. (Two intertwined figures dressed in all black, their faces hidden. They sit on a wooden table against a backdrop of pink and blue floral wallpaper.)

Karen Asher
Dye Job, 2015.
C-Print
25 × 25 in.
Courtesy of the artist. (A person sitting in a bathtub as a pair of hands belonging to another person dyes their hair with black hair dye.)

Karen Asher
Crying Baby, 2014.
C-Print
25 × 25 in.
Courtesy of the artist. (A person lying in bed wearing an oxygen mask holds a crying, diapered baby that is seated on their chest.)

Erica Eyres
Ursula, 2019.
Pencil on paper
78 × 67 cm.
Courtesy of the artist. (A drawing of a woman sitting on the edge of a couch with breasts exposed and lower half clad in lingerie. She wears evening gloves and gazes distantly at something out of frame.)

Erica Eyres
Lucy, 2019.
Pencil on paper
83 × 62 cm.
Courtesy of the artist. (A drawing depicting an older woman sitting in a chair and applying lipstick in a small handheld mirror.)

Erica Eyres
Untitled, 2019.
Courtesy of the artist. (A drawing of a woman wearing a bodysuit, fishnet stockings, heels and glasses. She looks at the viewer while seated on a desk with her legs crossed, bending a riding crop over her knee.)

Kathleen Herlihy-Paoli
Mind the Edge, 2020.
Oil on canvas with shade pull
20 × 20 in.
Courtesy of the artist. (A glass of red wine with a bee perched on its rim against a backdrop of blue sky. The glass is set on a stage and green and gold theatrical drapes frame the composition.)

Kathleen Herlihy-Paoli
The Pen and The Wall, 2019.
Oil on canvas
20 × 20 in.
Courtesy of the artist. (A quill and bottle of ink spotlit on a stage against a brick wall backdrop. The theater drapes to the sides are a warm yellow, and dark clouds fill the top of the composition.)

Kathleen Herlihy-Paoli
For an Old Soul, 2018.
Oil on canvas with beads
20 × 20 in.
Courtesy of the artist. (A seascape with a loaf of bread on a plate awkwardly superimposed over the water. A glass of water rests on a cloud in the sky, which seems to actually be painted theatrical drapes.)

Aaron Krach
Indestructible Artifact # 30: Play, 2019.
Screen print on frisbee
7 × 7 in., Edition of 100
Courtesy of the artist. (A white frisbee with the words “Act like you’re 5 years old.” printed on it in bold red lettering.)

Aaron Krach
Calendar, 2019.
Screenprint on vinyl sticker, 13 page-calendar
3 × 4 in.
Courtesy of the artist. (A monthly calendar page for January 2019. Above the calendar is a cartoon sketch of a tire against a black background with the words “Imagining how you feel.” printed to the right.)

Aaron Krach
Pair
Panda Bear Heads
17 × 35 × 17 in., Unique
Courtesy of the artist. (Two plush panda bear heads hanging on a wall side by side.)

Erin Leland
Book of Correspondences, 2007 – Ongoing.
Archive of digital files, pigment prints, autobiographical writings and letters
Courtesy of the artist. (A woman depicted from above lying on bedsheets with her knees drawn up to her shoulders and seemingly nude, as though photographed during sex.)

Erin Leland
Book of Correspondences, 2007 – Ongoing.
Archive of digital files, pigment prints, autobiographical writings and letters
Courtesy of the artist. (Two nude figures, one crouching and one standing, both cropped and heavily obscured by shadows. Their held hands, caught in a beam of light, occupy the center of the frame.)

Erin Leland
Book of Correspondences, 2007 – Ongoing.
Archive of digital files, pigment prints, autobiographical writings and letters
Courtesy of the artist. (A video camera with a microphone on a tripod in a bedroom setting. The camera faces the viewer and is positioned towards a bed.)

Scott Northrup
The Prettier Sister Blues, 2017.
Polaroids, found objects, tape, text projection
30 × 54 × 6 in.
Courtesy of the artist. (Objects arranged on a shelf, including a rabbit figurine, clothing, a letter and a portrait of two women in 60’s style clothes and hair with the words “How will I learn who I am” superimposed.)

Scott Northrup
Zines, 2015-2019.
Collage, poetry, prose, photocopies/prints
Dimensions vary
Courtesy of the artist. (An assortment of zines about queer and gay topics, several incorporating vintage advertising iconography.)

Scott Northrup
Perfect Pervert, 2018.
Polaroids, found objects, latex rubber, tape
40 × 36 × 4 in.
Courtesy of the artist. (Objects arranged on a wall-mounted shelving unit including trophies, binoculars, a polaroid of someone’s eyes and a series of polaroids that spell out “PERFECT, PERFECT, PERVERT.”)