”Muscle Memory”: Ally Rosenberg at Dio Horia Acropolis

Dio Horia Gallery presents Ally Rosenberg’s ”Muscle Memory”, the artist’s second solo exhibition with the gallery, on view at Acropolis space April 06 – May 11, 2024. Published on the occasion, an anthology of the artist’s short storypoems, is being released in conjunction with the show.

The exhibition highlights a meticulously curated array of Rosenberg’s newest sculptural works. In ‘Muscle Memory,’ the artist, who joined the gallery’s residency program in 2022, ventures into the intricate realms of human consciousness, inviting contemplation and a hint of playful defiance against traditional masculine values.

For the artist, “when an action is repeated frequently enough, it starts to bypass conscious thought. We call this Muscle Memory. Where habit becomes encoded into second nature, embedded as a feature of the self; where behaviours are seemingly woven into the muscle fibres of our limbs.

The ego consists of countless personal narratives that play over and over like childhood movies on repeat. Scripts are recited by heart, until the semantics of each word dissolve and only phonetics and unexamined moral values remain. Family folklores merge, reinforcing a set of amalgamated memories that fix a grasp on who we are.”

Focused on sculpture and installation, Ally Rosenberg’s art takes a whimsical approach to exploring the human form through cutting and shaping familiar materials and textures, revealing a dynamic relationship between image and object. Reflecting on the inscription of personal and trans-generational narratives onto our physical selves, this body of work grapples with the multifaceted connections—material, virtual, emotional, and structural—between body, memory and myth.

Rosenberg’s background in neuroscience significantly informs his choice of materials, as he skilfully integrates them to represent the perplexities of human consciousness. The marriage of domestic materials with both traditional and cutting-edge processes allows him to articulate profound insights into consciousness and human cognition. The deliberate selection and manipulation of materials become a means through which Rosenberg communicates his exploration of the essence of experience. As for him – me – not one cell of that fourteen year old flesh still exists. Every fibre of muscle and gristle that makes up my larynx has been regenerated several times over. But what sticky residue of our dead selves remains smeared on the psyches of others? What responsibility do we have for the mess we made when we were clumsily forming? (Ally Rosenberg, Sorries, 2024)

Short Bio

Ally Rosenberg (b. 1991, Manchester, UK) has received a BFA from Central St. Martins following with an MSc in cognitive neuroscience at UCL and a residency at Harvard’s neuro-imaging lab. Rosenberg has participated in solo and group exhibitions internationally. Solo exhibitions include ‘Long Shadows’, Dio Horia Gallery, Athens; ‘On Solid Ground’, Bomb Factory Foundation, London. Selected group exhibitions include: ‘A Vibrant Sanctuary’, UNTITLED 2023, Dio Horia Gallery, Miami, ‘2 For 1’ Curated by Thorp Stavri & HAZE, Hypha Studios, London, UK; ‘WINK WINK at The Whitaker Museum & Gallery, Rossendale; ‘Saucisson’, Shtager Gallery, London, UK; ’The Sound of a Falling Tree’, Tuesday to Friday (Curated by Liam Fallon), Valencia; ‘Come Out and Play’, Beers Gallery, London; ‘Better Go South’, Studio Berkheim, Stuttgart; ‘The Factory’, Skip Gallery, Thorp Stavri, London; ‘The Fiction’, Gallery Func, Shanghai; Noises From the Closet’, The Flat – Massimo Carasi, Milan; ‘Bums’, Dio Horia Gallery curated by Skip Gallery; ‘Noises From the Closet’, The Flat – Massimo Carasi, Milan; ‘Back to Back (duo w/ Natalia Gonzalez Martin)’, Artists Contemporary, London; ‘Five Hides’, Thorp Stavri; ‘Much Too Shy’, A.I.R. Gallery, Altrincham; ‘Reinventing the Future’, Plain Gallery, Milan; ‘Twilight of The Idols’, Alice Black Gallery, London; ‘A.I.R Open’, Altrincham. The artist has been shortlisted in Summer Marathon 2020 & 2021, Beers London and awarded the AIR Open, 2019 – Visitors’ Choice Award. Ally Rosenberg’s works have been presented in international art publications and media such as Wall Street Journal, FAD Magazine, Artists Contemporary Podcast, Floorr Magazine, amongst others.