FLIES

Press Release

Opening Thursday, November 20, 6-8pm

Nicelle Beauchene Gallery is pleased to present FLIES, a project space exhibition by Brooklyn-based artist, screenwriter and director Hampton Fancher, his first with the gallery. FLIES is curated by gallery artist Silas Borsos and will be accompanied by a limited edition portfolio from Tiny Cutlery.

FLIES re-presents selections from an archive of 22 narrative sketches, rendered in pen and ink on paper, that Fancher originally created in 1965. In each character study, Fancher employed the same inked stamp of a common housefly as a his point of departure. Over the course of the curated vignettes appearing in the exhibition, the fly takes on a life of its own as Fancher combines the form of the insect with hand-drawn limbs, props and animated features. The resulting set resembles an absurdist comic strip or series of film stills, parodying the human condition and our relationship with abstraction.

Best known for his work in film and television, this exhibition highlights a little known aspect of Fancher’s creative output while showcasing a more immediate engagement between the artist and modes of storytelling: pen, ink, and paper. Given that Fancher’s career has largely focussed on acting, screenwriting and directing for the screen, the series naturally possesses a quality of filmic progression. FLIES offers a unique opportunity to more deeply contextualize a groundbreaking figure in the narrative arts.

On the occasion of this exhibition, Borsos has collaborated with Emily Conklin, creative director of Tiny Cutlery, to publish a limited edition of 20 portfolios featuring texts by Fancher and facsimiles of the full suite of housefly drawings.

Hampton Fancher (b. 1938, East Los Angeles, CA) lives and works in Brooklyn, New York. He is a writer, artist, actor, and director whose career has touched each facet of the world of filmic arts. He wrote the first screenplay of Philip K. Dick's novel Do Android's Dream of Electric Sheep?, which eventually became the film Blade Runner. Two additional films followed: The Mighty Quinn (1989) and The Minus Man (1999), which he also directed. Most recently, he wrote the story for Blade Runner 2049 (2017). Hampton Fancher is the author of two books: a collection of short stories titled The Shape of the Final Dog (2012) and The Wall Will Tell You: The Forensics of Screenwriting (2019).

Silas Borsos (b. 1989, Toronto, Canada) lives and works in Brooklyn, New York. He received his MFA from the New York Studio School of Drawing, Painting, and Sculpture in 2020. He has been included in solo and group exhibitions at Nicelle Beauchene Gallery, New York; Steven Harvey Fine Arts Projects, New York (with Beaux Mendes); and Pamela Salisbury Gallery, Hudson. He is a 2023 recipient of the Elizabeth Greenshields Foundation Grant.

Tiny Cutlery is an editorial studio based in Manhattan that specializes in the intersection of architecture and literature. Tiny Cutlery is also the publisher of Starters, the magazine of new design storytelling.