Everything Led Here by Chet Taylor

Separate Reality is pleased to present Everything Led Here, the gallery’s first solo exhibition with California artist Chet Taylor.

Based in Los Olivos, Taylor works with coast live oak, eucalyptus, concrete, steel, and charcoal to create sculptures, drawings, and items of furniture that reflect the artist’s relationship to nature and attunement to impermanence.

The works in Taylor’s debut solo exhibition highlight his range and material dexterity, along with reverence for natural forms.

Anchoring the exhibition is a series of charcoal drawings, Render 1-5, which trace the texture of rippling water.

Meditative yet humming with energy, Taylor conjures both movement and stillness in these drawings, employing a kind of via negativa to represent a near photographic presence of light.

Zooming in on the repetition of movement in water, Taylor’s hand is loose yet faithful to the image.

The drawings feel lush with sound yet profoundly silent.

The negative space produced by the effect of light on water is echoed in Taylor’s concrete works, which hang beside the drawings in conversation.

Don’t listen to me I’ll only lie to you consists of a rectangular concrete slab inscribed with steel pins and simply mounted by four steel corner clasps.

The pins form a sort of aisle which, according to where the light lands or depending on the time of day, casts different pathways for the eye to follow.

The confluence of rigidity and transience suggests alternative methods for finding meaning in an otherwise harsh landscape.

On the floor in front of the paintings, Taylor’s furniture pieces invite dialogue across materials, calling to mind David Nash’s cross-media investigations.

Drawing influence from Brazilian mid-century modernist Jose Zanine Caldas and French designer Pierre Chapo, the artist’s stools, bench, and chair represent his commitment to forms that emphasize the refinement in nature.

Architectural yet relaxed, each piece features Taylor’s signature stitch joint, a variation of the butterfly joint, used to create structural reinforcement and repair damage naturally occurring in the wood.

At the heart of these works lies Taylor’s drive to re-contextualize the elemental. 

Everything Led Here will be on view at Separate Reality from March 14 to April 26, 2026. 

Opening Reception: Saturday, March 14, 5–7 PM. 111 Santa Barbara Street, #C, Santa Barbara, CA 93101.