Tiger Strikes Asteroid New York is proud to present Carousel, a solo exhibition by Henri Paul Broyard, curated by Yael Eban. For over a decade, Broyard’s practice has examined domestic spaces and the perception and history of mark making. He uses a range of imagery to create his work, often using his own images, collected snapshot photographs, and his personal memories as source material. The artist’s interest in the vernacular is also apparent in the show’s title—Carousel references a slide projector of photos, as well as the colorful, kitschy opulence of an amusement park.

Carousel marks the first occasion the artist will reveal a glimpse behind the studio curtain by presenting a collection of canvas palettes alongside two of his signature interior paintings. Broyard uses handheld canvases as palettes while working on multiple paintings at once. He uses the palettes not only to mix colors, but to test brushes, marks, and textures that are eventually applied to the larger paintings. When a palette is nearly finished, he turns his attention towards it, perhaps adding a final mark before retiring it. At this point the palette is signed and dated with a location on the verso and stored away. When this occurs, the palette transforms from an object of utility into a record of experimentation. In a way Broyard is creating a diaristic archive of palettes that mirrors the extensive archive of photos and objects he has collected for inspiration.  

While his signature paintings flirt with abstraction within a restrained, matter-of-fact framework, in the palettes Broyard is allowing himself the freedom to push each canvas to its limit. Given how integral mark making is to his work—either his own marks or those he encounters in the world—this is a unique and added layer in understanding his art practice as a whole. 

Broyard will simultaneously present a solo exhibition, Piebald, at Grant Wahlquist Gallery in Portland, Maine, from September 8 – October 28. 

Henri Paul Broyard (b. Los Angeles, California) received a B.F.A. in Drawing and Painting from the California College of the Arts in 2013. He attended the Klasse Peter Doig at the Kunstakademie, Dusseldorf, in 2014. Broyard has had solo exhibitions at Grant Wahlquist Gallery in Portland, Maine and Foreland in Catskill, New York. Broyard’s work has been included in group exhibitions at venues including: Deli Gallery, New York; Alexander Gray Gallery, New York and Germantown; Essex Flowers, New York; Cindy Rucker Gallery, New York; SOLA Art Gallery, Los Angeles; the School of Painting Hangzhou, China; Tom Dick or Harry, Dusseldorf; 41 Cooper Square Gallery, New York; Haphazard Gallery, Los Angeles; and 119 Essex Street, New York, amongst others. His work has been the subject of reviews and publications in ArtNews, the Portland Press Herald, and The Rib. Broyard lives and works in Brooklyn and Canaan, New York.