Shipped Bench by Hendl H Mirra

An essay about Hendl H Mirra’s solo exhibition at The Whitney Museum of American Art describes her as “not merely a materialist . . . [Mirra] treats materials as if they had intimately observed and idiosyncratic personalities that she seeks to explicate.” For Shipped Bench, Mirra has taken the traditional and simple design of a common bench and treated the material with such reverence and care that it evokes a materiality that goes beyond its form into the elegiac and thoughtful realm of her art.

Shipped Bench is made from planks of reclaimed pallet wood that are methodically painted with an opaque deep grey milk paint and then sanded and painted again and again to achieve an unusual depth of color and an exquisitely silken surface texture. The minimal bench is solidly built but elegant in effect; and adorned with three, unattached square cushions made from Army surplus blankets.

Limited to 25 hand-made examples, each bench is branded with the artist’s signature and edition number and varies slightly in length and width as determined by the found pieces of wood.