L-Ruler
2017
Graphite
12.0 x 7.0 x ³/₃₂ inches
Edition: 10, signed and numbered on boxes (2 APs)

L-Ruler is an edition consisting of a representation of a 12-inch L-ruler machined in graphite, a signature material of McEwen’s practice. The ruler exists at the intersection of drawing, art, and architecture. The context of Storefront’s role and position, grounded in architecture and experimentation, suggests the right angle of an L-ruler, as opposed to a plain straight edge.

In theory, the edition is a technically accurate ruler and could be used as such. But the soft materiality of graphite and its willingness to roll off of itself means that with use, the ruler would soon grow distorted—dented, imperceptibly curved, worn down, made out-of-true—rendering it increasingly unreliable, deceptive, and ultimately useless.

Adam McEwen (b. 1965, London) works between the celebratory and funereal. After writing obituaries for the Daily Telegraph in London, he began producing obituaries of living subjects such as Bill Clinton and Jeff Koons, blurring the lines between history and fiction. As a meditation on the many lives and deaths of art, he has created a space that conflates a beleaguered present with the afterlife of a potent and contentious moment in art history, in much the same way as his obituaries narrate the future-perfect of the rich, the famous, the beautiful, and the notorious. McEwen’s relics confront us with the distasteful origins of past and present.

McEwen’s work has been shown in major exhibitions at P.S.1 Contemporary Art Center, New York; Rubell Family Collection, Miami; Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, New York; New Museum of Contemporary Art, New York; Whitney Museum of American Art, New York; The Modern Institute, Glasgow; and Aspen Art Museum, Colorado. McEwen’s works are also in public collections such as the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, New York; the Whitney Museum of American Art, New York; the Jumex Collection, Mexico City; and the Arts Council Collection, England.