There is fire in the sky in all of Loren Erdrich’s newest paintings. Candles hover in acid-hued sunsets, and constellations of stars and planets burn bright. In the artist’s personal cosmology, the divide between material and incorporeal worlds is softened, allowing figures and disembodied heads to float in flames or exist surrounded by orbs in the sky while slowly coming undone. Conceived as a love story exceeding the bounds of the human body, Little Stars is poetic and clearly full of hope, but a sense of loss is also creeping into focus; an acknowledgment of fraught times.

Metamorphosis is the key element in Erdrich’s practice as nothing is truly static in her paintings. Human-like entities burst into light, faces transform into flying birds and moons become eyes. All of her figures appear cosmic and omniscient, like deities, and they are usually presented aflame or shifting into whatever form they will take on next; always appearing to be part of a greater whole. During these transitions, contradicting forces lead the way– love and loss, hope and despair, and strength melded to submission. This counterbalanced structure lends an instantly emotive response to Erdrich’s paintings, which feel relatable even if otherworldly.

Like most artists, Loren Erdrich is bound to, and constantly pushing against, her medium of choice. She utilizes a unique process of infusing raw dyes and pigments into muslin using copious amounts of water (a highly unpredictable collaborator), forcing her to relinquish full control of expected outcomes. Colors bleed together unpredictably or return to the surface even when painted over many times, yielding compositions that lay somewhere between abstraction and representation. This dance with her materials is also a collaboration with the forces of Nature, and many paintings must be scrapped when either party pulls too hard. But when it does land well, an aura of magic and transcendent calm unfolds to provide a glimpse of respite and peace.

Loren Erdrich (b. 1978) lives and works in New York City. Little Stars is her second solo exhibition with SHRINE, and she has also exhibited at Harper’s (East Hampton, NY), Nicodim Gallery (Los Angeles, CA), Primary (Miami, FL), Guts Gallery (London, UK), Wasserman Projects (Detroit, MI) and Herrero de Tejada (Madrid, SP). Erdrich has been awarded residencies at Yaddo, the Elizabeth Murray Artist Residency Jentel Foundation, Santa Fe Art Institute, Sculpture Space, Vermont Studio Center and at Art Farm Nebraska.