Opening Reception: Friday, June 5, 6–8 pm
Derek Eller Gallery is pleased to present a two-person exhibition featuring ceramic sculpture by Zachary Leener and paintings by Lachlan Hinwood. Like a reliquary of curious specimens, the works in this show share a meditative quality, an intimacy in scale, and a curvilinear, biomorphic vocabulary.
Zachary Leener continues his ongoing search for new archetypal three-dimensional forms, presenting a suite of ceramics with diorama-like arrangements. The recurring typological shape — evoking bassinet, bed, sofa or coffin — becomes a central stage on which the drama unfolds and wherein individuated personalities emerge. It is within these prosceniums that a range of abstract elements are fused in, stuck on, cordoned off and otherwise embedded.
The shapes that populate the interior (and in some cases exterior) spaces of the sculptures are both found and newly formed, as Leener mines for his embellishments in an intuitively personal archaeology. Present in this arrangement are freshly glazed fragments of previously abandoned artworks, unaltered chunks fished from the clay recycle at the school where Leener teaches, pieces of street glass collected during walks through his neighborhood and the oddly detached hollow of a child’s metal spoon.
Zachary Leener (b. 1981) lives and works in Los Angeles, CA. Solo and two-person exhibitions include Parker Gallery, Los Angeles (2025, 2021); Klaus von Nichtssagend, New York, NY (2020); Cooper Cole, Toronto, Canada (2019); and Manetti Shrem Museum of Art, Davis, CA (2019). Select group exhibitions include Portals with Ken Tisa: Organized by Mindy Shapero, Megan Mulrooney, Los Angeles, CA (2025); Undertones: Biomorphic Art in Los Angeles, University Art Gallery, Cal Poly SLO, CA (2019); Soft Corners, Richard Telles Fine Art, Los Angeles, CA (2018); Softcore, South Willard, Los Angeles, CA (2018); Of a well-sucked apricot pit, Tif Sigfrids, Los Angeles, CA (2017); and Build Your Own House, Dio Horia, Mykonos, Greece (2017). He received his MFA from University of California, Riverside and his BFA from the Maryland Institute College of Art. This will be his second exhibition with the Gallery.
Lachlan Hinwood prefers the objectness of small paintings and the intimacy of holding while working. Evoking deep sea creatures, fossils, or spiritual beings, Hinwood extrapolates his imagined subjects from real experiences in nature, including a seashell collection he keeps at home; his paintings are both observational and ambiguous. Bathed in atmospheric areas of color, these organisms are in motion, swimming, or suspended, perfectly still. In one work, a combination mollusk/jellyfish/stingray emblazoned with pink and purple hues floats in a lavender haze.
Hinwood likens the making of paintings to happening upon an unusual rock at the beach or a beautiful leaf in the woods and contemplating the multiple lives these mysterious objects have lived. Like Charles Burchfield or Georgia O’Keefe, Hinwood is interested in developing a personal symbolic vernacular born out of emotional and sensory experiences with nature.
Lachlan Hinwood (b.1995) lives and works in Portland, OR. Recent shows include Residual Terrain, Chandler Gallery, Mill Valley, CA (2025); Spirit Ditch, Care of Gallery, Chicago, IL (2024); Curtains, My Pet Ram, New York, NY (2022). Hinwood received a BA in Geography and Art from Macalester College (2017), and a MFA in Painting and Drawing from the University of Iowa (2022). This will be his first exhibition with the Gallery.