On View: Nate Lewis’ Language of Bodies at Vielmetter

We started hearing the name Nate Lewis during the pandemic, and ironically, his distinctive visual lexicon is rooted in his background as a critical care nurse. His intricately sculpted paper works, largely monochromatic and defined by stark black-and-white contrasts, draw inspiration from medical imagery—anatomy, x-rays and ultrasounds—in which he recognized an underexplored aesthetic dimension in visual documents otherwise designed to reveal critical information about the body’s inner workings. The subtle shifts in shade, shape and pattern that are essential in diagnostic imaging are echoed in Lewis’s practice, translated into organic, fluid interventions that explore the body’s expressions and movements at both macro and microscopic levels. Ahead of the frenzied energy of Frieze L.A. and Los Angeles Art Week, Lewis opened his debut solo show with local power dealer Vielmetter, marking his first major presentation on the West Coast.

As Lewis walked us through the show, he pointed out that his latest body of work embraces a more experimental use of paint and color alongside his signature paper sculpting and carving techniques. Working over printed images with meticulous scalpel movements, he lifts edges and disrupts the surface’s regularity, creating an epidermal effect that pulses with vibrancy. By pushing the limits of what is typically expected from works on paper, Lewis reveals the medium’s unexpected painterly and sculptural qualities, transforming its surface into something tactile, almost skin-like—a field of layered textures that invite touch.

Lewis believes the integration of painting and hand-sculpting feels more fully resolved in these works. “It creates this kind of natural cellular element, evoking the human structure but also other patterns and visuals in the natural world, like gems and geodes,” he told Observer. His process suggests an attempt to bridge micro and macro phenomena, linking the intricate systems of the body to broader natural structures and extending his focus beyond the singular human form. His new works in Los Angeles capture dancers and capoeiristas in motion, their bodies animated by undulating and swinging patterns that translate muscular tension into dynamic visual energy. These rhythmic markings extend beyond the figures, radiating outward in waves of motion and sound. Set against a textured, swirling backdrop of thick, braided reddish-brown lines woven through the composition, the figures appear in constant flux, their movement amplified by the layered dimensionality of the surface. The interplay of form and motion creates a charged, hypnotic spectacle—one that transcends mere representation and invites viewers to experience the raw physicality, visceral power and syncopated cadence of the dance and the dancers.

The textures and patterns Lewis creates are in tune with the rhythms and sounds he listens to while working. Musicality runs through his entire practice, serving as a central motif that seeks to capture, record and amplify the internal beats of the body—the vital energies and intricate symphony of life resonating within each organism. That rhythm isn’t just suggested through his patterns and sculpted surfaces but is embedded directly into some of the works through the inclusion of actual musical scores. Lewis incorporates compositions by William Grant Still, who wrote Symphony No. 1 Afro-American Symphony, the first symphony by an African American composer. “William Grant was also the first African American to have a symphony played by a major orchestra in 1931, and capoeira was made legal just around 1934, as Brazil was one of the last to abolish Black slavery around that time,” Lewis said. “It’s interesting to think about these links which speak about the history of Black resistance and freedom, and look into it from a broader perspective, between U.S. and Brazil, and between cultural and political gestures.” From this perspective, the title of his exhibition, “Tuning The Signals,” comes into focus—Lewis’ work is a coded system of resistance and expression built through music and movement, bypassing linguistic and institutional constraints.

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Alongside his works on paper, Lewis presents a new video piece: A Clandestine Exchange, where Ben Lamar Gay’s Any Train We Can Catch sets the rhythm for a symbolic choreography of hand and body gestures. The video features miniature paper capoeiristas animated by Lewis’s friend and training partner, Professor Peixe Boi, who has studied capoeira for nearly two decades. At this scale, these figures become kinetic symbols, their movements and the music forming a code that reverberates throughout the space. Capoeira, an Afro-Brazilian martial art born out of resistance among enslaved Africans in Brazil, has always blurred the lines between combat, ritual and cultural expression. Its rhythmic, dance-like movements, accompanied by traditional instruments like the berimbau, create a performance that feels celebratory while concealing its martial origins. Blending acrobatics, music, ritual and self-defense, capoeira is already a perfect example of how movement within a ritualized framework can serve as a vehicle for cultural, political or spiritual messaging.

The video’s focus on hands and gestures is both a reflection and projection of bodily and psychological movement. “In many of my works, I’ve been focusing on hands and the gestures that they make and the role that they play in different disciplines, from boxing to conducting music, handshakes or even playing poker,” Lewis said, noting his interest in shadow movements—subtle actions that reveal an unconscious dimension beyond the physical gesture itself. In this way, his work moves toward an abstract symbolic language, one that exists within tangible, physical forms yet speaks to something deeper—much like the intricate textures and patterns he etches inside the figures of his paper works.

“Eventually, I’m interested in movement and choreography of the human being, but if I’m working on dance and a highly ritualistic one as capoeira, I’m also exploring the relationship humans have established through that with their surroundings, with the land and the others,” he said. At its core, Lewis’s work offers a poetic representation of the intricate web of interactions and responses that shape human experience. Bodies navigate their existential, relational and cultural landscapes in a constant state of negotiation, influenced by an interwoven system of internal and external micro and macro phenomena that define and reshape meaning.