Bio
Resume
Reviews

Education

2000
University of California, Los Angeles. MFA
1997
California College of the Arts (California College of Arts and Crafts), Oakland CA. BFA
1987
Southeast Missouri State University, Cape Girardeau, MO. BA

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Selected One Person Exhibitions

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2007
Slices, 269 N. Beverly, Beverly Hills, CA. a PhantomGalleriesLA project curated by Liza Simone
2005
A Family Tree,Carl Berg Gallery, Los Angeles, CA
2004
Deep End, SolwayJones, Los Angeles, CA
2002
Inscaping, SolwayJones, Los Angeles, CA

Crop, Irvine Fine Arts Center, Irvine, CA
1997
Meniscus, Nexus Gallery, Oakland, CA
1996
DSM301.83 A21 Gallery, Oakland, CA
1994
Schweinfurth Art Center. Auburn, NY

15 Steps Gallery. Ithaca, NY

JAT Gallery. Ithaca, NY

Artspace Gallery. Owego, NY
1993
Cornell University, Olin Library. Ithaca, NY

Willard Straight Gallery. Ithaca, NY

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Selected Group Exhibitions

2007
Abstraction II, Carl Berg Gallery, Los Angeles, CA

Alumni at the Centennial, California College of the Arts, Oliver Arts Center, Oakland, CA. Curator: Julie Joyce and Jo Lauria

Haus Guests, Haus Gallery at the Brewery Projects, Los Angeles, CA. Curator: Bill Rabe and Nena Amsler

Pillow Talk: Small Comforts in Hard Times, Ruth Bachofner Gallery, Santa Monica, CA. Curator: Mery Lynn McCorkle
2006
Sundown Salon #29: The Young Ones, Fritz Haeg's Sundown Salon, Los Angeles, CA. Curator: Iris Regn and Joyce Campbell

Chain Letter, High Energy Constructs, Chinatown, CA. Curator: Doug Harvey and Christian Cummings

Work Space at FAR--The Foundation for Art Resources website, www.farsited.org
2005
Touch Me, Gallery C, Hermosa Beach, CA. curator: Nancy Silverman-Miles

Little Things, Blue 7 Gallery, Santa Monica, CA. curator: Heather Brown
2004
The Political Landscape, Los Angeles Municipal Gallery at Barnsdall Art Park. curator: Noel Korten

Paperworks II, Mirta Demare International Visual Art, Rotterdam, Netherlands

Where We Live:Outside and In, Overtones Gallery, Los Angeles, CA. curator: Kristina Newhouse

Fantasticism, Carl Berg Gallery, Los Angeles, CA

Miniature Worlds, The Brewery Project, Los Angeles, CA. curator: Carolie Parker-Lopez

American Gothic: Talent for the Dark Ages, Gallery C, Hermosa Beach, CA. curator: Tyler Stallings
2002
Irvine Fine Arts Center, Irvine, CA

White Box Gallery, NYC
2001
Irvine Fine Arts Center, Irvine, CA
2000
Fahrenheit 2000, Cypress College, Los Angeles, CA. Curator: Carl Berg and Paul Paiement
1999
Cerritos College, Los Angeles, CA. Curator: Geoff Allen
1998
Miller Fine Art, Los Angeles, CA
1997
Toki Gallery, Berkeley, CA
1996
In the Hot Box, California College of Arts and Crafts
1995
171 Cedar Arts Center. Corning, NY

Martin Schweig Gallery. St. Louis, MO
1995,94
Faculty Exhibition, Community School of Music and Arts. Ithaca, NY
1994
30th Anniversary Blowout, Craft Alliance. St. Louis

Arnot Art Musuem. Elmira, NY
1989
Martin Schweig Gallery. St. Louis, MO
1988
The Gallery at Forest Park Community College. St. Louis

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Bibliography

2005
Myers, Holly Drive of the Human Spirit. Los Angeles Times, December 2, 2005

Art Scene: Recommended Exhibitions: American Gothic: Talent for the Dark Ages January 2005

Wyszpolski, Bondo Touch Me Hermosa Beach Easy Reader April 7, 2005
2004
Frank, Peter, Recommended: Fantasticism. LA Weekly. July 2-9, 2004

Wyszpolski, Bondo American Gothic: Talent for the Dark Ages Hermosa Beach Easy Reader December 16, 2004

Cunningham, Mark, Decay and Decrepitude. Rarified Air December 9, 2004

DuTan, Stephanie, Rebecca Niederlander: The Deep End of Intellegence. Coagula Art Journal Aug. 2004, p. 24

Frank, Peter Elizabeth Bryant and Rebecca Niederlander at SolwayJones, ArtWeek p.22

Frank, Peter, Recommended: Where We Live: Inside and Out. LA Weekly. June 4-10, 2004

Art Scene: Recommended Exhibitions: Where We Live: Inside and Out June 2004

Frank, Peter, Recommended: Deep End. LA Weekly. May 14-20, 2004, p. 148

art.blogging.la Mixed Media @Overtones May 7, 2004

Tang, Beverly, Deep End. BTang Phlog. April 26, 2004

Frank, Peter, Art Pick of the Week: The Political Landscape. LA Weekly, April 9-15, 2004

Pagel, David, Our Place in the World. Los Angeles Times, March 25, 2004

Korten, Noel The Political Landscape Catalog, Los Angeles Municipal Gallery at Barnsdall Art Park, 2004
2002
Art Scene: Recommended Exhibitions: Crop. October 2002

Ohlman, Leah, Sculptor Finds the Mystery in Reality. Los Angeles Times, Aug. 2, 2002, p. F28-29

Frank, Peter, Recommended: Inscaping. LA Weekly, August 2-8, 2002, p. 126
2000
Anderson, Michael, Fahrenheit 2000 Catalogue, Cypress College, Los Angeles, CA
1999
Speight, Charlotte and John Toki Hands in Clay Mayfield Publishing
1997
Speight, Charlotte and John Toki Make It With Clay Mayfield Publishing
1994
Shepley, Carol Fering St. Louis Post Dispatch, Sept. 7, 1994

Soltys, Jacqueline Ithaca Journal, March 10, 1994

Lockmer, Kelly Rebecca Niederlander Ithaca Times, May 15, 1994

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Publications/Curatorial

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2007
Catalog essay for Carrie Ungerman in the 2007 City of Los Angeles Department of Cultural Affairs Individual Artist Fellowship Exhibition (COLA) at the Los Angeles Municipal Gallery at Barnsdall Art Park
2005
Secrets and Light catalog essay for Donnie Molls exhibit at Carl Berg Gallery, Los Angeles, CA

2, 4, 6, 8...Time to Transsubstantiate! for catalog of Paul Paiement exhibit at Laguna Art Museum/Laguna Wilderness Press

Catalog for terra firma: part 1 exhibit at Manhattan Beach Art Center, Manhattan Beach, CA
2004
Review of Peter Shire Exhibit. American Ceramics. Vol. 14, issue 4, Fall 2004. p. 62

Eelcmwo ot hte wlodr fo nseert vdieral* (welcome to the world of ernest velardi) catalog essay for Cypress College exhibit

Curate Hieronymus Slept Here Irvine Fine Arts Center, Irvine, CA.
2001
SuperPhat: Big-Time Innovation at Remba Gallery and Mixografia Workshop catalog essay for Superphat at Cypress College, Cypress, CA.

The Ambassadors of Ulipio (Why It is Okay to Feel Again) in Scripps College 57th Ceramic Annual Catalogue, Claremont CA, Scripps College/Perpetua Press
2000
Better Living through Tea: Contemporary Artists Investigate Two Forms in Color and Fire: Defining Moments in Studio Ceramics, 1950-2000 Los Angeles County Museum of Art/Rizzoli International Publications

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Grants and Honors

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2007
ARC Grant. The Durfee Foundation, Los Angeles, CA
2003
Artist's Residency. Stichting Kaus Australis, Rotterdam, Netherlands
1999
Graduate Fellowship. University of California-Los Angeles
1998
Graduate Fellowship. University of California-Los Angeles
1996
President's Recognition Award. California College of the Arts, Oakland, CA
1992
Individual Grant. Council of Creative and Performing Arts, Cornell University

Reviews

Los Angeles Times

August 2, 2002

Rebecca Niederlander:
Inscaping

Gallery 2211_SolwayJones
2211 N. Broadway, Los Angeles

Dorothy closes her eyes on the familiar domesticity of Aunt Em's farm, only to open them to the radiance of Oz. Stepping into their grandfather's wardrobe, the children in C.S. Lewis' classic tales suddenly find themselves in another, more marvelous world. Is it possible that these characters were transported to alternate worlds, or did they simply tap into new ways of regarding existing reality, recognizing its inherent enchantment, drama, intrigue?

Rebecca Niederlander's creepily seductive work at 2211 Solway Jones spurs a similar train of thought. Her sculptures bridge pedestrian reality and its wondrous underbelly of fear and fantasy. Working in plastic, porcelain, foam, cardboard and various forms of lighting, she rubs the magical up against the mundane. Sparks don't always fly, but the work generates a consistent, low-level buzz of curiousness.

"Treehouse," for instance, hangs from the ceiling like a Frisbee-style light fixture, common enough in a modern home or office. But instead of hosting a bulb that illuminates a given space, the fixture disgorges a mass of pale roots, thick, gnarly knobs and long, dangling strands shaped of modeling compound. A spray of fiber optic lights twinkles kitschily within, while LEDs tucked inside the tangle lend the roots a more evocative, burnished glow. It's an odd,subterranean vision brought to eye level.

"Nitelite," a group of 10 tabletop sculptures, presents a similar disjunction. The nightlight's primary task is to eliminate mystery. These amplify it. Each blue plastic dome houses a miniature landscape of spores and blossoms, tendrils, tresses and fine, curling cilia. A small aperture atop each dome allows us to peer into these tableaux (again made of modeling compound), and the lights within make the shapes visible also as haunting shadows on the domes' exterior walls. There's a childlike charm to the forms, which look as if they were shaped from Play-Doh, but that innocence competes with a more threatening, nightmarish quality. "The wood is full of shining eyes / The wood is full of creeping feet / The wood is full of tiny cries / You must not go to the wood at night," reads the Henry Treece poem upon which this work is based.

We can never see things purely, but only as filtered through our hopes and anxieties. Niederlander reinforces this notion of perception as tempered and limited by letting us see the microcosmic realms in her work only incompletely, from a distance, through tiny viewing holes or distorting lenses. Where our senses leave off, though, our imagination is more than happy to take over.

--LEAH OLLMAN, Special to The Times

ABETH BRYANT AND REBECCA NIEDERLANDER AT SOLWAYJONES

Although both installational, and both referencing natural phenomena, the two one-woman exhibitions couldn't have been more different. Elizabeth Bryant filled the walls between the evenly spaced wall pillars of the front gallery with expansive photo-murals of water scenes (mostly waterfalls). Upon these she set framed collages, kaleidoscopic arrangements mostly of birds, one large collage per photo-mural. The arrangements were in fact based on the tracery windows associated with the interior classical gardens in Suzhou, China. Rebecca Niederlander darkened the smaller back gallery, and therein hung a cloud-a flat-topped, burgeoning-bottom plastic mass lit from within by winking, rotating lights. On the floor directly beneath the nimbus lay three small circular mirrors, reflecting the light(ning) show from below. Thus, the viewer moved from light to dark, from earthbound water to a conjuration of atmospheric moisture, from physical (if not pictorial) stasis to a kind of perpetual-motion machine.

Still, the two installations harmonized in their effect on the viewer, co-operating to provide a kind of optical and spiritual transport. The hosting gallery occupies a narrow storefront space on an especially urban stretch of Wilshire Boulevard. No vegetation provides shade; under the blandly relentless Los Angeles sun the concrete sidewalks and whitewashed building facades conspire to bake one's eyeballs, limbs, soles, and soul. The delirious environment can be blistering. Bryant's imagery may have been elaborate, decorative (even decorous) and overtly ersatz, but it was also visually cooling, its aqueous tenor affording immediate relief from the asphalt jungle outside. Niederlander's microclimate stepped up the refrigerating effect, enveloping the visitor in a not-too-close darkness and relieving the visual purple with a little cold-front meteorology. (Given the bulbous form taken by the cloud-thing's nether protrusions, you could well call the work a tempest in a D-cup.)

Ryant and Niederlander are local veterans, their clever and affecting work familiar enough to scene-watchers. But both artists are known as much for their unstinting intellectual restlessness and formal evolution as for the technical and material strategies on which they usually rely. Here Not Here and deep End bear enough native characteristics to appear to "belong" to each artist, but in these cases, Bryant has decided on something new---a more physically articulated installational wall, a visually and ideationally more complex relationship between image and sign---and Niederlander has decided on something that logically extends the dialectic she has set up between object and space, thing and atmosphere. Everything is new but familiar--and ironic and dry but also welcoming and liquid.
---Peter Frank

Art Scene
October, 2002
http://artscenecal.com/ArticlesFile/Archive/Articles2002/Articles1002/CR1002.html

Based on the lost art of visually entering a hidden realm through a small aperture, in The Peep Show the big person becomes the small person wandering through 6-inch doors, windows, landscapes and illusions created by Doug Buis, Neil Korten, Keith Lord, and Michael McMillan. In Lord's night-lit buildings, if you stare long enough, the silent city comes alive; its sounds are heard from within; and your eye begins to unfold a story that is more in the mind than in the artists' construction. Buis adds humor to illusion, and why not? Trees, cows, and trains appear to be a few feet (inches really) off the ground in his rural "handcrafted cyberspace." Korten recreates the atmospheric experience of being, ironically, on a vast, secluded mountain; while McMillan’s The Museum of Distraction is a surreal arrangement of video and dislocated objects. Exhibition curator Carl Berg unveils the illusion by placing Korten's and Lord's work behind the gallery's glass walls, instead, as in the other pieces, of building walls to hide them. Outside in the courtyard the guts of the ingenious illusions are exposed, which does not lessen, but actually enhances, their delight. Two installations on either side of the exhibition echo the theme of illusion and its magical effects. Allen Tombello's camera obscura translates real people gyrating alongside a large, bouncy, constellation-like mobile in one area into reverse wall illusions in the darkened next room.
Rebecca Niederlander’s a crop deals solely with background. The viewer gropes through a pitch-black space to encounter a semi-illuminated landscape of snow-covered trees. Eliminating the protagonist, the artist focuses on an overlooked aspect of vision, the scene behind the action, that which our mind crops out. A closer look reveals that what you see is not always real. The silent black mountain is built from household mixing bowls (Irvine Fine Arts Center, Orange County).