Oct 16 – Nov 22, 2025
Opening Reception Thurs Oct 16, 2025 6pm – 8pm

Paula Cooper Gallery
521 West 21st St
New York, NY 10011

Link: Paula Cooper Gallery

Opening on October 16th, Paula Cooper Gallery will present an important historical installation by Veronica Ryan, Archaeology of the Black Sun 1956–2002 (2003), alongside new works. The exhibition follows the artist’s first survey, Veronica Ryan: Unruly Objects, organized by the Pulitzer Arts Foundation, St. Louis, Missouri, and currently on view at the Wexner Center for the Arts in Columbus, Ohio. In the spring of 2026, Ryan will have a one-person exhibition at the Whitechapel Gallery, London, UK.

Ryan’s sculpture initiates an intimate and expansive dialogue around loss and retrieval, inviting inquiry into cultural, social and environmental concerns. Everyday items are transformed through hand-stitching, crocheting, or casting in bronze and ceramic, imbuing them with both personal narratives and universal psychological associations. Ryan arranges and groups objects with care during installation, provoking new conversations: ornate sculptures inhabit round lace doilies; ceramic, glass, and found objects are staged on industrial metal cabinets; plants cast in bronze hang on the wall. Foregoing plinths, Ryan challenges preconceived notions of sculptural display, deliberately presenting the works in an unconventional yet familiar manner.

– Paula Cooper Gallery