EJ Hauser | Arthur L. and Sheila Prensky Island Press Visiting Artist Lecture

EJ Hauser (they/them) lives and works in both Brooklyn and Upstate NY, and is represented by Derek Eller Gallery in New York City and Haverkampf & Leistenschneider in Berlin.

Hauser’s paintings are both graphic and open to interpretation, teetering between iconography and something familiar but abstract. This imagery shifts between omnivorous references both ancient and current — the paintings are mysterious talismans, employing buzzing pallets and marks that dance. Stuttering lines form a visual code like musical notes, which coalesce with atmospheric layers to create ineffable messages.

Hauser’s source library draws from the natural world, imagery that is cross-pollinated with the formal qualities found in craftwork like rugs, fabrics, wallpapers, and mosaics, as well as digital visual characteristics, which they interpret through drawing and then transliterate onto canvas. Each piece is composed of multiple layers of color.

They have shown extensively throughout the United States and Europe, including Anton Kern Gallery, New York, NY; Haverkampf Leistenschneider, Berlin, DE; Brigitte Mulholland Paris, FR; Parrasch Heijnen, Los Angeles, CA; Sperone Westwater, New York, NY; White Columns, New York, NY; Participant Inc., New York, NY; Gavin Brown’s Enterprise, New York, NY; Cheim & Read, New York, NY; The Journal Gallery, New York, NY; AWHRHWAR, Los Angeles, CA; KARST, Brighton, UK; The Breeder, Athens, GR.

Hauser ‘s work has been featured in The New York Times, The New Yorker, Frieze, The Brooklyn Rail, BOMB Magazine, and Turps Banana, among others. Hauser received a BFA from University of Pennsylvania, Philadelphia, PA and an MFA from University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill, NC. They are a recipient of the 2021 American Academy of Arts and Letters Purchase Prize. In the Fall of 2023, Hauser was the Teiger Mentor in the Arts at Cornell University, Ithaca, NY.