Artist Rachel Lee Hovnanian looks 'Beyond the Hedges' at County Gallery in Palm Beach

When artist Rachel Lee Hovnanian and her family moved from New York City to Miami in 2019, she was struck by the physical divisions between her neighbors and her home.

Towering hedges blocked from view the daily goings-on of each house on her street — a far cry from the Big Apple, where people seem to live their entire lives in public.

It made Hovnanian wonder: What was happening beyond those hedges?

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Her curiosity about the inner sanctum created by a 6-foot ficus hedge and her fascination with the intricacies of domestic life are behind Hovnanian's latest exhibition, "Beyond the Hedges," on view now through March 22 at County Gallery, 375 S. County Road, Palm Beach.

The traditional 6-foot hedge represented throughout the series has another layer of meaning: Hovnanian began creating "Beyond the Hedges" at the advent of the COVID-19 pandemic in 2020, when people were encouraged to maintain a distance of 6 feet from others to prevent the virus' spread.

"We couldn't be with people," she said. "We had technology to keep us in touch with each other, but we had to be 6 feet apart."

Now in Miami, all she knew of her neighbors were their gorgeous, well-kept hedges, she said.

Hovnanian began to piece together bits and pieces of the domestic lives she imagined happening around her. She drew inspiration and made composites using vintage print ads and photos from social media and publications, plus old photos she had in her phone. The plant life in each painting came from Hovnanian's imagination.

She assembled these inspirational odds and ends on her phone using several apps.

The combined images are "kind of wonky," Hovnanian said.

"I've taken different perspectives and put them together," she said. "So you can see that something's off in them, but you're not exactly sure what it is."

It's that slightly unsettling element that draws a viewer into each piece, some of which are on a massive scale. "Where the Hedges Meet the Sky" stands 10 feet tall and about 7 and a half feet wide. In the painting, a woman in what looks like white linen pants and a shirt and wearing flat sandals walks next to a swimming pool that is surrounded by towering hedges of vibrant green.

The shifting perspectives between the woman, the pool and the landscaping create a surreal effect.

Another painting, "Perfect Lawn," also incorporates a representation of one of the bathing suit sculptures she has on display now as part of "The Divine Feminine: Contemporary Women Sculptors” through the end of April at Ann Norton Sculpture Gardens, 253 Barcelona Road, West Palm Beach.

As Hovnanian examined human interaction in the series, the figures within each piece seem to be disconnected. In "Cocktail Hour," a man and woman stand on a manicured lawn near a sweeping patio umbrella. Each holds a beverage, and while the man faces the woman, the woman is turned away from him.

Hovnanian during the pandemic had been invited to a cocktail party via the video-conferencing software Zoom. She made herself some coconut shrimp, poured a glass of wine and joined her friends for the party.

And though it was fun, it didn't give her the same feeling of connecting with people in the flesh, she said.

"I was super happy to have it, but I just felt like there was something missing," she said. "Technology is a fantastic thing to have, but it still doesn't give you that, and I think everybody's sort of realized that after" the pandemic, she added.

Featured in "Beyond the Hedges" are pieces from Hovnanian's "Robe" series, inspired by the iconic Jim Dine robe paintings, but with a feminist twist that contemplates women's historic invisibility.

There have been many times when walking through her neighborhood that Hovnanian meets people, but no one asks what she does, she said. "It happens so often to women," Hovnanian said. "We kind of fade into the hedges."

When exploring houses in Miami, Hovnanian came across examples of vintage wallpaper that caught her eye.

"I felt like it was important for me to do sort of the female perspective," she said, noting that she drew on some of those floral wallpapers she found to create the backgrounds that act as a sort of camouflage for the pieces in "Robes."

Each robe is integrated in a layered composite image that uses photography, collage and painting to distinguish a robe's shape from its matching hedge. A close look provides a glimpse at the detail and care Hovnanian takes, with some leaves individually cut and placed onto the canvas.

This was a return to figurative painting for Hovnanian, who had turned to other media for the past two decades before coming back to her exploration of humanity and its surroundings for "Beyond the Hedges."

She was drawn back as a tribute to friend, art dealer and longtime gallerist David Beitzel, who died in 2019. "Beyond the Hedges" was created in Beitzel's honor, she said.

Her work over the past two decades has included sculptures, neon, performance art and video pieces. A piece from her 2022 "Angels Listening" installation at the prestigious Venice Biennale is tucked away at County Gallery, though not a part of the current exhibition.

Hovnanian's parents were artists who had many friends who also were artists, and art came very naturally to her, she said. She recalled that as a child, her parents were called to class by a teacher, who showed them one of young Rachel's drawings that used proper perspective with a horizon line behind the drawing's main figure.

She has dyslexia, a disorder that causes difficulties in learning how to read, spell and write. Through her art, she tells stories and seeks to make connections that her words cannot.

"If I can create a conversation and I can make an impact on somebody's life, that's what drives me to do a lot of work," she said.

Hovnanian's work is popular with many collectors in Palm Beach, including Beth Rudin DeWoody, who has some of Hovnanian's pieces on display now at her Bunker Artspace in West Palm Beach.

"I think this work could go anywhere, not just Palm Beach," Hovnanian said. "But Palm Beach has got some incredible institutions, incredible collectors and really great art scene. I'm so thrilled to be able to be here, and be at the Bunker at the same time ... and then also at the Sculpture Gardens."

Hovnanian's work is a great fit for Palm Beach, said Lisa Brintz, owner of County Gallery.

"'Beyond the Hedges' is at once beautiful to look at and also asks provocative and profound questions about the human condition," Brintz said. "Palm Beach is home to a remarkable density of sophisticated collectors who are receptive to engaging with these questions through art," she added.

If you go

What: Rachel Lee Hovnanian's "Beyond the Hedges" exhibition

Where: County Gallery, 375 S. County Road, Palm Beach

When: 10 to 5 p.m. Monday and 10 to 6 p.m. Tuesday-Saturday, and Sunday by appointment, through March 22

Information: county.gallery, 305-713-7588

Kristina Webb is a reporter for Palm Beach Daily News, part of the USA TODAY Florida Network. You can reach her at kwebb@pbdailynews.com. Subscribe today to support our journalism.

This article originally appeared on Palm Beach Daily News: Artist Rachel Lee Hovnanian looks 'Beyond the Hedges' in Palm Beach