Leslie Levings, "Reading Reversals"

Haven Gallery is pleased to present California based sculptor Leslie Levings for her first solo show “Reading Reversals” at the gallery. “ Reading Reversals” features eighteen ceramic works depicting animals in varying postures as they interpret reversals of the Tarot Card deck. “Reading Reversals” uses the iconic imagery of this esoteric card set, with an emphasis on the upturned, forcing the viewer to expand their perspective of the other side. Visual ambiguities of existence are explored through posture, texture, color, finish and expression, avoiding direct answers and explanations. ABOUT LESLIE LEVINGS Leslie Levings explores natural history, myth-making, and the human emotional experience through her creature sculpture. Leslie is also the creator of The Beastlies™️: an ongoing line of small but expressive monsters collected by fans around the world and currently in development with Bad Robot and Mattel. When not sculpting, Leslie is a writer and producer in animation. She also founded and helps runs the Wayward Retreat, an annual retreat for creatives pursuing their artistic calling. Over the past few years, Leslie Levings has discovered that tarot cards can be a wonderful tool for artists. A visual language made up of pieces that are familiar in ways both universal and personal, when shuffled and dealt, present infinite combinations suggesting as many variations on the human narrative. Artist Statement: The myths and stories we tell through these symbols are deepened and complicated when we choose to read the reversals as well — cards that are dealt upside down. Far from meaning the simple opposite of a right side up card, these pulls invite us to consider the shadow side of our story, or a flipped point of view. We’re invited to remember that our greatest strength is the same as our weakest point and that destruction can contain the seed of rebirth, like a pine cone opened by forest fire. With this collection, the artist is hoping to investigate reversals, unexpected perspectives, and the point where fortune and misfortune change places. Through creatures and symbols, snapshots of fables emerge, unknown but familiar in the way an illustration in a book of myths might be. Or a tarot card from a strange deck.