François Ghebaly New York is proud to current Rise above it, John Rivas’ second solo exhibition with the gallery and first time presenting on the Decrease East Aspect location.
Salvadoran-American artist John Rivas holds near ancestry and cultural identification in his work. In uncooked, expressive scenes of family members, home life, childhood recollections, and familial histories, Rivas goals his art-making via a deeply private lens, honoring the work and voices of these closest. His follow has lengthy been characterised by materials resourcefulness and a necessity-driven method that layers discovered materials, drygoods, heirlooms, embroidery, gifted supplies, family provides, and portray into earnest, delicate representations of the folks and locations round him. In his latest exhibition Rise above it, Rivas expands on his acquainted mixed-media vocabulary, venturing into hand-carved and painted picket sculpture as an extension of the assemblage-based language of his follow. Impressed by redwood carvings in Northern California and international traditions of polychrome picket sculpture, the eleven works that comprise the exhibition convey to life Rivas’s topics and his enduring painterly pursuits in labor and cultural celebration.
All through the exhibition, Rivas’s latest sculptures proceed to discover materials intimacy and collaborative processes, with a number of works produced alongside his father, a development employee who has appeared in Rivas’s work earlier than and whose tradecraft informs the artist’s hand. Labor-intensive and meticulously constructed, most of the works incorporate brushstroke-like carving and modelled cloth folds to create the impact of motion, recalling historic sculptural traditions whereas depicting scenes from Rivas’s personal life and reminiscence. One sculpture entitled La Patrona de los Cruzes (2026) references a picture taken on his grandmother’s birthday and captures her, a religious Christian girl, holding a big machete in a second of surprising levity and power. One other, La Remedia De La Vida es una Chela y Futbol (2026), reveals a reminiscence of the artist’s father taking part in soccer, beer and cigarette in hand, having fun with his single day of relaxation after working six days per week to assist a younger household. Alongside these intimate household portraits are works depicting Rivas’ life in each the US and El Salvador: road distributors, rural scenes, and quotidian recollections rendered at varied scales from portrait-like busts to full figures. In meditations on inheritance, group, and the shaping forces of household, the exhibition displays on Rivas’s personal expertise of fatherhood towards the backdrop of those that raised him.
