Elijah Wheat Showroom is proud to present 'Channeling', an exhibit of Lauren Gregory’s expressive animated oil portraits and stop-frame animations at Satellite fair during the 14th installment of the whirlwind that is Miami Basel.

Humans have been engaging in the act of channeling for millennia, for as long as there has been mark making. Springing from this primordial well, energies intermingle to actuate a spirit onto a wall of a cave, a canvas, or a panel. Often, when watching an artist in the midst of capturing their subject, the arm, body and overall performance becomes channeled. The expressions of Ms. Gregory’s work portray otherworldly, inspired creatures and figures. Her thoughtful portraits epitomize a ‘channeled’ experience inside both her still canvases as well as her videos.

The EWS booth presents four video ‘channels’ on monitors with varying animations ranging from Gifs to two-minute loops that Lauren has created mostly in 2016. These works demonstrate thousands of strokes painted with her fingers and thousands of frames shot and assembled. All are combined to create the motion that breathtakingly brings these scenic paintings to life. The lowered atmospheric light and movement beckons the viewer. As they’re drawn into a trance Lauren’s paintings reveal a dark humor while exposing an unusual portrayal of everyday life, celebrities and pop culture.

The still portraits, some on non-traditional canvases are lit with bright spots hung at an unusually high centerline above the video. Each of the elevated peering eyes follows the viewer as they enter the space. Works of thickly painted oil often have sculpted eyes that follow the viewer as they are in their presence. Further, these still subjects are Lauren and the Showroom’s Bushwick queer artistic community, all painted from seated moments, when the artist channels their looming creative energy. Elijah Wheat is also present, depicted in wolf fur, holding his cat.

These hauntingly realistic and penetrating interactions will induce a space where individual viewers become entranced by the animated paintings’ movement; each participant mesmerized and still, watching, staring and being stared at, channeling into spirited objects.