440 Gallery is pleased to present Mending Fragments: Hide & Seek, a two-person exhibition featuring the photography of Leigh Blanchard and the mixed media paintings of Amy Weil.

Leigh Blanchard uses photography to consistently push the definition of what a photograph is. By digitally stripping away information present in old photographs, Leigh allows fragments of images to appear, hinting at what used to be, while revealing a new perspective. This rebirth of the image grants it fluidity and a paintlike organicism that isn’t typically seen in traditional photography.

Amy Weil uses an additive and subtractive technique to build up layers of pigmented wax. Weil scrapes down and inscribes the surface of the wax; collaged materials incorporated into the surface become buried in the layers of the piece. This process of scraping and collaging—a dichotomy between order and chaos—reveals fragmented images like an old memory.

Blanchard and Weil have a similar conceptual approach to creating their art even though they employ different processes; both explore the philosophical while maintaining a playful curiosity. The artists both embrace the thought behind the Japanese pottery technique Kintsugi—they visualize fragments as positive, additive elements as opposed to something that is missing.

Mending Fragments: Hide & Seek opens Thursday, January 5 at 440 Gallery Sixth Avenue in Brooklyn, and runs through February 5. An artists reception will be from 6-9pm on Thursday, January 5th, 2016.

In the Project Space: Jambalaya 3X3

Susan Greenstein's printmaking is a subtractive process. It involves inking up a printing plate and then removing some ink to expose the white of the paper or the color from an earlier inking layer. Greenstein uses Chine Collé in her work, a technique that allows fields of color to be revealed through the patterns that have been printed previously in the process. Greenstein is attracted to the meditative quality of working with highly-patterned images. "As a pattern stays the same and repeats itself," says Susan, "it changes slightly and steadily, all while revealing the artist's hand. Often you can feel the artist breathing in and out as the patterns change slightly and reveal their very human quality."

Richard Barnet's terra cottas are inspired by two forms: the shapes of boats, especially sailboats; and the shapes of curved walls and towers. "I love to sail, and find beauty in sailboats that are creatures of both water and air. I hope that from this jumble of interests, coherent sculptures result. There is no other message in them."

Gail Flanery's art alludes to landscape. "My technique is a combination of monotype printing, collage and hand work. I use simplified forms and planes with expressive color to create an atmospheric mood."