Minus Space: Lead Pencil Studio

Annie Han and Daniel Mihalyo work together as Lead Pencil Studio, which they describe as “a new voice in the emerging field created from the interdisciplinary overlap of architecture and site specific art.” With an array of materials available at any hardware store, they have dramatically transformed the spaces in the center of the Henry Art Gallery. Frequent visitors, expecting the mezzanine level to provide a balcony view onto the East Gallery, instead confront “Regrade,” a solid topography. Most fully visible from the middle level of the building, “Regrade” restores the original earthen slope of this site, reminding us that the generous spaces of the museum’s 1997 expansion were provided by digging deep into the ground. From the lower level, the soaring spaces of the gallery have equally been altered by a dark, light-filtering ceiling that closes and contains it. “Footing,” at once another apparent solid and an effect of light, articulates and animates this new enclosed volume. Besides both practical and visionary architecture, these inventive artists produce site-specific installations, models and other sculptural objects, drawings and paintings, and extensive photographic series a subcategory they call the “Research Lab.” A micro-survey of the work of both departments comprises small works in diverse media and [insert number] “research” photographs in a continual slide show. Including architecture, sculpture, and photography — independent objects, major installations, and materials suggesting their conceptual working process — “Minus Space” is the first exhibition to include the full scope of Lead Pencil Studio’s creative output.