Ryan Whittier Hale

Envoy Enterprises presents Caressing Form and Void, the first solo exhibition of Ryan Whittier Hale at the gallery. The exhibition shows an overview of the artist’s practice from 2010 until today, and includes animated video work and inkjet prints.

Hale manipulates photography and video through digital collage, 3D animation and computer game engines. After exhibiting extensively in national and international group shows and solo projects alike, this show brings together a great variety of the artistic output of Hale’s studio practice including brand new work built using game development platforms.

The artist’s work challenges our interest in fostering deeper connections to an ever advancing synthetic existence. He questions, how much are we willing to invest emotionally in these virtual worlds and beings? And, to what extent can they reciprocate intimacy and become a replacement for reality? Hale’s uncertainty is depicted through uncanny mannequin like beings inhabiting hollow, virtual landscapes that defy materiality and demystifying the illusion of space and form they present.

It seems inevitable that we will become more and more attached to using avatars, that serve as surrogate selves to simulate and mediate human interaction. Hale’s work questions if as a result we're becoming too comfortable in acclimating to a reduced intensity of human intimacy. Through a multidisciplinary approach Hale further develops these ideas as a way of testing the boundaries that exist between these two worlds.

Ryan Whittier Hale (San Francisco, CA, 1985. Lives and works in Brooklyn, NY) is a visual artist who manipulates photography and video through digital collage and 3D animation. He graduated from Parsons in 2010 with a BFA in Design and Technology. Solo exhibitions include Null Presence, NP Contemporary Art Center, New York, NY (2012) and Trick Mirrors, Untitled Gallery, Sausalito, CA (2010). Group projects include Aurora Festival, Dallas Texas (2015), new work by Ryan W Hale, Sedition, (Online. 2015), NURTUREart’s Annual Benefit, The Boiler, Brooklyn, NY (2014), The Shortest Distance Between Two Points, Syndicat Potentiel, Strasbourg, France (2014), Raving Disco Dolly On A Rock N’ Roll Trolley, envoy enterprises, New York, NY (2014), The New Romantics Collection, Sedition, (Online. 2014), The New Romantics, Eyebeam, New York, NY(2014), 2013 Uptown Downtown, Abrons Art Center, New York, NY (2013), PHATT-B, Pratt, Brooklyn, NY (2013), 6<<<>>>6, Interstate Projects, Brooklyn, NY (2013), #FUTUREMYTH, 319 Scholes, Brooklyn, NY (2013), Prosthetic Measures, Skopia Gallery, Geneva, Switzerland (2013), The Next Generation Party, New Museum, New York, NY (In collaboration with Teengirl) ( 2013), Aboveground Animation, New Museum, New York, NY (2012), Cerasite, Eyebeam, New York, NY (2012), Aboveground Animation: 3D-Form, New Museum, NY (With Online Component) (2012), Jou Le Jeu, Gaîté Lyrique, Paris, France (As Babycastles) (2012). Reviews, interviews and profiles appeared in Artnet, Aperture, Dis Magazine, V magazine, Hyperallergic, T magazine, Washington Post, and others.