Artist Amy Trachtenberg and writer and curator Jarrett Earnest first met around David Ireland’s dining table at 500 Capp Street in 2010, just before Earnest moved to New York. Sixteen years later, they have renewed their exchange through a correspondence of handmade postcards sent between San Francisco and New York.

Throughout Abstract Objects of Devotion, Trachtenberg and Earnest exchange postcards combining original photographs, collage, and writing. Sent and received through the mail, the postcards accumulate within the exhibition alongside Trachtenberg’s correspondence with David Ireland from decades earlier. As one exchange gathers alongside another, the correspondence traces friendship, artistic dialogue, and the continuation of ideas and relationships across time and distance.

For this public program, Trachtenberg and Earnest return to the place where they first met to discuss the evolving postcard project, its relationship to the exhibition, artistic process, and everyday life. 

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This public program is presented in conjunction with Amy Trachtenberg: Abstract Objects of Devotion. The exhibition is supported by the Teiger Foundation.


About Amy Trachtenberg & Jarrett Earnest

Amy Trachtenberg is a San Francisco–based artist whose multidisciplinary practice encompasses sculpture, painting, installation, and architectural interventions.

Jarrett Earnest is a writer and curator living in New York City. He hosts “Private Life” a podcast from The New York Review of Books, where he is also a frequent contributor.