Nick Kline will mount an installation of photographs, artist’ publications and a neon text piece in the Printed Matter window, on view September 1-12. This presentation emerges out of two recent collaborative book projects – To Be Alive and Forget This and he – both of which engage themes around boyhood and loss. Join us for a launch of the two publications and installation on Thursday, September 4, 6-8 PM.

he brings together Kline’s abstract photographs Boys’ Shirts and the memory-based text men by Kegan McFadden, a writer, publisher, curator and artist, based in Manitoba, Canada. Kline’s horizontal striped shirts, presented in black and white, resonate with the optimism portrayed in 1950’s American television shows and advertisements. The artist uses this filmic and photographic history to appeal to the sense of the familiar, personal memory, and notions of masculinity and its development. McFadden’ disjointed text is similarly informed by the men who have failed him. Using only the pronoun “he,” the melancholy writing may also be considered an abstract self-portrait. he is published by Ampersand Editions, an imprint of As We Try and Sleep Press. Available here.

To Be Alive and Forget This is a double-sided collaboration between Kline and Jean-François Bérubé, a portrait photographer from Montreal. Both artists’ contribution were created in Causapscal, a small village in Quebec Province. While known for its world-class salmon fishing, the town has another distinction: historically high rates of self-inflicted death. Here, Kline’s photographs of textured rubber silicone castings taken from cut trees are united with Bérubé’s portraits of people. The book focuses on an award-winning youth hockey team from the town, many members of which subsequently took their own lives. Experiments with balance and centering examine the turbulent struggle of those who survive the loss of loved ones. To Be Alive and Forget This is published by Occurrence Gallery, Montreal, Canada. Available here.

The installation Boys’ Shirts is in conjunction with Kline’s solo exhibition of this series at R. Jampol Projects, NYC. September 5 - October 12.