Leah l, originally from the east coast of the United States, now lives and works outside Washington DC. Leah is a fellow at the Hamiltonian Gallery and Artists, of Washington, DC, which is a new fellowship program in DC in support of emerging artists. She participated in the Takt Residency in July 2009 and will attend Virginia Center for Creative Arts this spring.
Leah´s work focuses on two distinct topics: communication and the passage of time. She explores how these distinct bodies can influence each other., using natural materials to illustrate these concepts.
Her work regarding communication uses language to transform traditional vehicles for text into vehicles for aesthetic communication. In her Strip Installations, Leah takes the deconstructed booka and makes delicate strips whose formal qualities overtake the message in the text. In other works, other vehicles for text are transformed into ordered sets or environments, which also distract from the original text. These works reach people who speak any language, even when not the same as the text in the book or newspaper. These materials also reflect a history that contributes to the meaning of the work.
Leah chooses common materials such as earth, water, paper, wax, books, and language to be able to engage all types of potential viewers. She is interested in making work that is grounded and elemental, emphasizing the most common knowledge and experience that all people have.
Most important in Leah´s practice is that the work is accessible and understandable to viewers from all over the world, from all socio-economic classes, and from all races, cultures, backgrounds, experiences. Her goal is to make work potentially personal to anyone who views it. Everyone deals with communication and language to some extent on a daily basis, and everyone is affected by the passage of time. Leah am also interested in people seeing art presented in nonconventional venues and being exposed to art in new ways. This will ideally attract non-habitual viewers, as well as change their existing perceptions of these everyday materials and concepts.


Leah H Frankel Website