IRA JOEL HABER
Biography
Ira Joel Haber was born and lives in Brooklyn. He is a sculptor, painter, writer, book dealer, photographer and teacher. His work has been seen in numerous group shows both in the USA and Europe and he has had nine solo exhibitions including several retrospectives of his sculpture. His work is in the collections of The Whitney Museum of American Art; New York University; The Guggenheim Museum; The Hirshhorn Museum; The Albright-Knox Art Gallery and The Allen Memorial Art Museum. Since 2006, his paintings, drawings, photographs and collages have been published in over 300 online and print magazines. He has received three National Endowment for the Arts Fellowships, two Creative Artists Public Service Grant (CAPS), two Pollock-Krasner grants, two Adolph Gottlieb Foundation grants and, in 2010, he received a grant from Artists' Fellowship Inc. and in 2017 and 2018, he received the Brooklyn Arts Council SU-CASA artist-in-residence grant.
www.instagram.com/irajoel123/
Project Proposal
What I Have Been Doing For The Last 56 Years
The first box I did was in 1969 and was made of cardboard which was completely covered with a photographic reproduction of a landscape. Inside the box I placed a cardboard backed cut-out photograph of the artist Toulouse-Lautrec as a child surrounded by his family. Unfortunately part of this box was destroyed. This box was not complicated enough for me and my feelings for the figure were not very strong.
The first landscape boxes I did were also done in 1969 and were a series of "New York boxes." They were small with diorama backgrounds of the city skyline in the 1900s along with loose material, usually gravel or sawdust dyed to represent earth. At the same time I started my pieces involving architecture both in boxes and pieces placed on the floor. My boxes from 1969-1971, usually had neutral landscape photographs as backgrounds. Using these backgrounds allowed me to confuse the perspectives of my landscapes and employ contradictory scale systems both in my boxes and floor pieces. It was also during this period that I actually burned many of the miniature buildings I was using. The interpretations and connotations of this element of my work were usually psychological and secondary to what I was actually doing. Simply put, I was altering, changing and manipulating my found materials as modern artists have done since Cubism. The action was just as important to me as the outcome of the work and the reactions the work would invoke. I think nature has a tendency to reproduce itself in miniature. A twig, a small stone or a puddle of water when separated from its natural environment and isolated can resemble a tree, a boulder or a lake.
I find it a little difficult to summarize in this short piece all my feelings and ideas about what I have been doing for the last 56 years. I want my art to go through slow constant changes, but at the same time I want vast abrupt changes. Nature does the same. Since 1969 I have been making small scale sculptures and miniature environments that have been boxed, floored and walled. Within these small spaces a wide range of images have been constant and consistent—houses, mountains, trees, bodies of water and land masses. My work over the years has changed, as I'm always experimenting with my language. I am very pleased with the many directions my work has taken over time and still is taking.
Since 2021, I have been doing among other things sculptures that are still small and still strange. The environments are now in ready made boxes that I buy. They come with covers, and when removed they will hopefully reward the viewer with surprise. They are still concerned with what has held my interest since 1969 when I first started to make small scale sculptures involving nature, architecture and landscapes.
My art history is long and has undergone dramatic changes throughout the 56 years of my making art. A grant from Tree of Life at this time in my life would be useful for me to have funds to buy supplies, and enable me to pay my expenses. My project would be to continue to explore what I have been doing so far for 56 years. I live and work in a small space, so I will continue to make small pieces.
I would also use some of the grant to pay for storage of my early work from the late 60s and early 70s which needs to be placed in storage to save the pieces from destruction. This is weighing on me a lot, especially at my age. I don't work on specific projects, I simply continue to make my art, to paint my pictures, to draw my drawings, to collage my collages and to make my small scale sculptures. I am a loner and I like it like that although I want my work to be recognized on a larger scale than it has been, of late. I know that this might not happen in my lifetime. I can't give you any specific details on "projects" other than to say that I would use the grant to continue my journey in being an artist and to make my sculptures and other pieces as I see fit.
Biography
Ira Joel Haber was born and lives in Brooklyn. He is a sculptor, painter, writer, book dealer, photographer and teacher. His work has been seen in numerous group shows both in the USA and Europe and he has had nine solo exhibitions including several retrospectives of his sculpture. His work is in the collections of The Whitney Museum of American Art; New York University; The Guggenheim Museum; The Hirshhorn Museum; The Albright-Knox Art Gallery and The Allen Memorial Art Museum. Since 2006, his paintings, drawings, photographs and collages have been published in over 300 online and print magazines. He has received three National Endowment for the Arts Fellowships, two Creative Artists Public Service Grant (CAPS), two Pollock-Krasner grants, two Adolph Gottlieb Foundation grants and, in 2010, he received a grant from Artists' Fellowship Inc. and in 2017 and 2018, he received the Brooklyn Arts Council SU-CASA artist-in-residence grant.
www.instagram.com/irajoel123/
Project Proposal
What I Have Been Doing For The Last 56 Years
The first box I did was in 1969 and was made of cardboard which was completely covered with a photographic reproduction of a landscape. Inside the box I placed a cardboard backed cut-out photograph of the artist Toulouse-Lautrec as a child surrounded by his family. Unfortunately part of this box was destroyed. This box was not complicated enough for me and my feelings for the figure were not very strong.
The first landscape boxes I did were also done in 1969 and were a series of "New York boxes." They were small with diorama backgrounds of the city skyline in the 1900s along with loose material, usually gravel or sawdust dyed to represent earth. At the same time I started my pieces involving architecture both in boxes and pieces placed on the floor. My boxes from 1969-1971, usually had neutral landscape photographs as backgrounds. Using these backgrounds allowed me to confuse the perspectives of my landscapes and employ contradictory scale systems both in my boxes and floor pieces. It was also during this period that I actually burned many of the miniature buildings I was using. The interpretations and connotations of this element of my work were usually psychological and secondary to what I was actually doing. Simply put, I was altering, changing and manipulating my found materials as modern artists have done since Cubism. The action was just as important to me as the outcome of the work and the reactions the work would invoke. I think nature has a tendency to reproduce itself in miniature. A twig, a small stone or a puddle of water when separated from its natural environment and isolated can resemble a tree, a boulder or a lake.
I find it a little difficult to summarize in this short piece all my feelings and ideas about what I have been doing for the last 56 years. I want my art to go through slow constant changes, but at the same time I want vast abrupt changes. Nature does the same. Since 1969 I have been making small scale sculptures and miniature environments that have been boxed, floored and walled. Within these small spaces a wide range of images have been constant and consistent—houses, mountains, trees, bodies of water and land masses. My work over the years has changed, as I'm always experimenting with my language. I am very pleased with the many directions my work has taken over time and still is taking.
Since 2021, I have been doing among other things sculptures that are still small and still strange. The environments are now in ready made boxes that I buy. They come with covers, and when removed they will hopefully reward the viewer with surprise. They are still concerned with what has held my interest since 1969 when I first started to make small scale sculptures involving nature, architecture and landscapes.
My art history is long and has undergone dramatic changes throughout the 56 years of my making art. A grant from Tree of Life at this time in my life would be useful for me to have funds to buy supplies, and enable me to pay my expenses. My project would be to continue to explore what I have been doing so far for 56 years. I live and work in a small space, so I will continue to make small pieces.
I would also use some of the grant to pay for storage of my early work from the late 60s and early 70s which needs to be placed in storage to save the pieces from destruction. This is weighing on me a lot, especially at my age. I don't work on specific projects, I simply continue to make my art, to paint my pictures, to draw my drawings, to collage my collages and to make my small scale sculptures. I am a loner and I like it like that although I want my work to be recognized on a larger scale than it has been, of late. I know that this might not happen in my lifetime. I can't give you any specific details on "projects" other than to say that I would use the grant to continue my journey in being an artist and to make my sculptures and other pieces as I see fit.