Please join Elijah Wheat at Future Fair in NYC 13-16 May, 2026. We are titillated   to present a solo booth: Strapped with works by  Dave Tavacol.

Intimacy, sexuality, ecstatic beauty, and the exploration of otherness are central to Tavacol’s art. Growing up as a gay, Iranian-American teenager in the tumultuous 1980s left the artist with a lasting sense of separateness. In the aftermath of the hostage crisis, the rise of Christian fundamentalism, and the early days of the AIDS epidemic, Tavacol’s experienced a profound sense of existential alienation. He notes that the “ability to pass as a straight, white, cisgender kid in a hostile, heteronormative world kept [him] with a feeling of living undercover.”

Tavacol’s work often employs the use leather and porcelain. Leather is an organic and sensual material. Its incorporation conveys the theme of sacrifice, echoing the profound role of redemption within the Judeo-Christian tradition, which is a focal point of his practice. He juxtaposes materials like jockstraps, gag-balls, bathroom drains, bondage gear and shower/locker-room/pool tiles to express his point of view: Hiding, strapped, ‘masque,’ down-low of athletes being undercover amongst their jocular peers. The homo-phobia and the sometimes toxic male stigma of athletic teams, or ‘jocks’ can take a toll on the divine masculine of MLM (Man-loving-Man), gay—or not.

This 'clean' presentation from Elijah Wheat & Tavacol is entitled: Strapped, again, offering the play of words by which it would entail multiple meanings in the materials used by way of the English language, as well as gay-slang. Further, excerpts from Tavacol’s poetic writing acknowledging accounts of his early sexual experiences with other men, while ‘out of the closet’ will be hanging from racks on the wall. There are four separate phrases (editions of eight), embroidered on towelettes hanging from the wall and for purchase.

It was the first time  for both of us

This is who I am inside

Are you wearing an athletic supporter

He was the hottest man I had ever seen

There will be catalogues available for sale alongside the solo-booth with images of the works in-situ with Tavacol’s poetic accounts of moments from his childhood in the 70s/80s entitled: Reflections on Youth.

Dave Tavacol (B. Washington DC , 1968) Raised in Northern Virginia, he earned his Bachelors degree in Business Administration with a concentration in Marketing and a Minor in Studio Art from the College of William and Mary in Williamsburg, Virginia in 1992. He attended the San Francisco Art Institute where received a Master of Fine Arts degree in New Genres in 1997. He has participated in short-term programs at the Rhode Island School of Design, the University of Georgia: Cortona, Italy and the Vermont Studio Center.  He currently maintains an active studio practice in Philadelphia, PA and  shares his life with Claire, a freckle-faced pit mix.

Elijah Wheat Showroom (est. 2015) is a New York-based artist-run gallery and nomadic curatorial experience founded by Carolina Wheat & Liz Nielsen. Currently positioned in Newburgh, NY on the Hudson River. The gallery is named after their late son, Elijah, whose creative insight, righteous vision, perceptive being and stylistic voice for trendsetting embody the spirit that the Showroom honors.