Layo Bright’s “Visions I” (2022), kiln-formed glass, in the group show “NXTHVN: Undercurrents” at Sean Kelly Gallery.
“Care, growth, abundance, rebirth, loss, dislocation, the forgotten” are what the sculptor Layo Bright says are the key concerns that undergird her work in the group show “Undercurrents.” These interests first strike me as particularly millennial, but then I look at “Double Standard” (2022), two coruscating, yet darkly foreboding rectangles of glass epoxied over nylon tote bags. Then listening to her discuss the 1983 forced deportation of Ghanaians from her native Nigeria I realize this is a profoundly purposeful reflection on the inequities of migration. All her work is also visually delectable, especially the “Visions” (2022) pieces, kiln-formed-glass visages combined with natural elements such as leaves to look like 21st-century building capitals. The curators, Marissa Del Toro and Jamillah Hinson, installed the work high on the walls so that it reads just this way.
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