Elemental Rhythms – Laura Berger, Lisa Farris, Ivan Montoya, Sabrina Piersol, and Corrine Slade

Exhibition

Elemental Rhythms
Laura Berger, Lisa Farris, Ivan Montoya, Sabrina Piersol, & Corrine Slade

March 15 — May 15, 2025

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Louis Buhl & Co. is pleased to present a group exhibition featuring Laura Berger, Lisa Farris, Ivan Montoya, Sabrina Piersol, and Corrine Slade, titled Elemental Rhythms, opening March 15, 2025. Through painting and sculpture, the artists examine the intricate connections between nature, identity, and transformation, exploring cycles of growth and decay, the interplay between the natural and constructed worlds, and the ways personal and cultural histories are embedded in the landscapes we inhabit.

Farris’s ceramic sculptures exist at the threshold between flora, fauna, and the human form, evoking the seamless entanglement of bodies and ecosystems. Rooted in a desire to reconnect with childhood instincts of creativity and joy, her Nectary series blurs the boundaries between organic forms, reflecting her fascination with contrast and hybridity. Similarly, Slade’s layered paintings merge floral imagery with fluid, abstracted shapes to evoke the emotional labor of self-care and the transience of life. Her subjects become metaphors for personal renewal, inviting reflection on the necessity of release in order to foster change. Piersol, meanwhile, translates the rhythms of the Mojave Desert into abstract landscapes, capturing the passage of time through shifting color and form. Her works meditate on nature’s enduring presence and the role of memory in shaping our understanding of it.

Berger and Montoya likewise engage with natural elements as both subject matter and sources of power. Montoya’s paintings reflect on selfhood and cultural transformation through the lens of his Mexican-American heritage, navigating the tension between past and present. His figures, intertwined with fire, symbolize the passion and creative energy that shape our coexistence with nature and with each other. Berger, in turn, looks to rivers, sunbeams, and heat, as examples, to express emotional states, suggesting the fluid exchange between internal experiences and external forces. Her focus on connection—whether to oneself, others, or the land—explores the tension between the physical and the metaphysical, and more specifically, the body and the soul.

Together, the five artists present nature as an active force in shaping identity and experience, rather than visualizing it as a passive backdrop upon which mankind thrives. The exhibition examines the ways in which we move through the world—physically, emotionally, and historically—revealing transformation as a reciprocal process between self and environment. Through various distinct yet interwoven approaches, Elemental Rhythms proposes that nature is not simply something we live alongside, but something we participate in—moving through one another, shaping and being shaped in return.

Elemental Rhythms is on view from March 15—May 15, 2025 at Louis Buhl & Co.