Jennifer Elster

Jennifer Elster’s The Latest Exhibition takes place in the 19th-century structure housing The Development Gallery in Tribeca, where everything is part of the show. Upon entering the four thousand square foot space, there is a maniacal collage of paintings orbiting Mad Face and scattered precisely on the sixteen-foot wall of probing mayhem. Walk further in, through assemblages of warnings and questions prompted by the artist, by means of anything, from paper towels to scraps of paper, to express her desperation to communicate. Text paintings of collective concerns make a comeback with a fiercer residence in their accumulation of both worry and rebellion, and apocalyptic predictions infused with the artists’ obstinate dark optimism crackle throughout. Every day new artifacts are added. Collaborations with Yoko Ono, David Bowie, Robert Foote, PhD, and Chief Perry of the Ramapough Nation are on display. The artist invites us in to explore her reminiscence, foresight, and thought provocations which lead us back to ourselves.

The Development Gallery is lauded for its multi-media exhibitions, dynamic performance artwork, talented musicianship, and special guests, which have run the gamut from the underground to public icons in all fields.

Elster is a native New Yorker, critical thinker, artist, writer, director, filmmaker, photographer, musician, and performer who offers a deep and direct awareness of the human condition and our current world crises. Elster grew up in the art scene in NYC, performing in her early youth. With street edge and sophistication, Elster approaches her art with an untrained, raw, and aggressive style all her own, often using sharp diction, visual art, and performances to convey our times and our struggles.

Fueled by an upbringing stricken with poverty, danger, and complexities, she applies her instinctual problem-solving skills and innovative thinking to shed new perspective on pressing issues, evident in her notable solo-exhibitions, including The Retrospective of an Extroverted Recluse, The Wake the F*ck Up Show, Take Heed, and QUITE A BITE. Each exhibition has interwoven various forms of media, such as photography, video, performance art, and painting, exploring the human experience and issues people don't want to face.

Beginning in childhood, her first obsessions were with writing and the workings of the mind, which led her to earn an honors degree in writing and psychology at NYU while styling cultural icons like David Bowie, Trent Reznor, and Chloe Sevigny. Elster then transitioned into filmmaking, where her written and directorial short and feature film work debuted at Village East, played on Sundance Channel and Netflix, premiered at Tribeca Film Festival and garnered recognition and awards. Her online audio visual excursion, ItW Pathway, featuring Will Shortz, Terrence Howard,Temple Grandin and the late Glenn O’Brien, was considered an innovation to online experiences. Her next filmmaking project, ...In the Woods (and Elsewhere), features such compelling subjects as Aimee Mullins, Jorgen Leth, and Rufus Wainwright, with vocalizations performed by Yoko Ono. The production has spanned over two decades and The Development Gallery will soon reveal some of this never-before-seen work from the project. Elster’s work has been featured in publications such as The Art Newspaper, Rolling Stone, and New York Magazine, as well as at venues such as The Development, New Museum, and Grand Central Station. Elster is the founder of The Development, a gallery, film, and art studio in New York City.