VALISE Gallery Presents “Pedaling Visions”

September 5th - 27th

Some of the topics explored in my work are: desire, abuse of power, and the weight of memory. Pleasure is found in a heap of trash or comes with stings. A hand reaches out for help from overpowering memories.  Serpent-like red ties of tyranny threaten us.  Ritualized brutality is celebrated.  Flowers that are symbolic of the expression of identity are suppressed or denied.
Through color, form, and composition, I investigate the tension between visibility and concealment, freedom and constraint, intimacy and authority. My paintings become landscapes of emotion and power, where memory, desire, and oppression collide—leaving behind traces that are fragile, haunting, and unmistakably human.

Robert Passig


Holding on and letting go. There is a quiet roar of doubt and faith when I approach the beginnings of any painting. I lean on process to reinvent foregone tactics. Inquiry and reflection become part of the exploration, a patient willingness to listen and let the dialogue develop. These recent paintings have helped me look at what I was searching for in color and stroke: a balance point where there is both tension and resolution, seen and unseen, intention and accident, struggle and surrender, abrupt and gradual, lost moments and found time. As Einstein once said, “life is like riding a bicycle, to keep your balance, you must keep moving.”

Lenard Yen

Gallery hours are 1-6pm Sat. & Sun. and 1-9pm on First Friday September 5th.