1053 is pleased to present 3 FRIENDS, an exhibition of works by Brenda Goodman, Angela Dufresne, and Mala Iqbal, on view from August 2 through September 7, 2025.

Friendship as a Way of Art: Angela Dufresne, Brenda Goodman, and Mala Iqbal
Essay by Ksenia M. Soboleva

I met Brenda first. Profoundly taken by her survey of self-portraits at Sikkema Jenkins in January 2022, I described the work in a social media post as feeling “visceral and heavy, like a teenage heart.” To my great delight, this small act of public appreciation prompted a personal message from Brenda, expressing not only gratitude but genuine excitement to learn about me as well. I have since come to understand this insatiable curiosity as one of the driving forces behind her practice—a curiosity that extends to the shapes of living beings, and the lives of shapes.

After her next opening at the gallery, I had the honor of sitting next to Brenda at the dinner party. On my other side sat Angela—someone I had encountered repeatedly in the queer ecosystem of the New York artworld, yet with whom, shy as I am, I had never engaged in substantive conversation. It turned out that we were exceptionally good at it. Angela appeared to me like a Fellini character–a maestro of brilliant gestures whose paintings seem to emerge from the same theatrical sensibility that animates her being.

Throughout the dinner, Angela repeatedly gestured toward her partner, Mala, sitting on the other side of the large table, but it was one of those nights where you’re so rapt with the two people you’re seated between that you never make it to anyone else. It would be another year or so, until Mala and I got to meet properly, when Angela painted a portrait of me followed by a delicious homecooked porkchop dinner. In that intimate setting, I recognized that Mala’s apparent reserve masked a devoted observation and astute attentiveness to others’ movements, qualities that permeate her artistic practice.

These three friends have become my friends, and I am a lucky witness to their friendship.

In an art world often characterized by competition and the myth of individual genius, the exhibition 3 friends: Angela Dufresne, Brenda Goodman, and Mala Iqbal presents friendship not only as a subject, but as a methodology of artistic practice. Featuring both individual and collaborative work by the three artists, the exhibition stems from their ongoing conversations and investment in each other’s work—the times they’ve shared in each other’s studios, at each other’s openings, and around each other’s dinner tables. Paint functions as a connective tissue between them, exemplifying their shared commitment to painting as both philosophical inquiry and material process. They are moved by paint and allow paint to move them – a process that demands trust.

For some time now, I have been interested in what I refer to as “friendship as a way of art,” thinking through the ways in which queer artists inform each other’s practices. In a society ruled by dominant patriarchal paradigms where we’ve been conditioned to believe that we are all in competition with each other, I am invested in thinking about collaboration as a radical alternative. The inspiration for this framework comes from Michel Foucault’s 1981 interview "friendship as a way of life,” in which he suggests that the threat of queerness on heteronormative society is not sexual acts themselves, but rather the network of relations that emerges from a queer way of life. “The problem is not to discover in oneself the truth of one’s sex,” Foucault writes, “but, rather, to use one’s sexuality henceforth to arrive at a multiplicity of relationships.” This approach challenges individualistic models of existence and emphasizes our interconnectedness. “To imagine a sexual act that doesn’t conform to law or nature is not what disturbs people,” Foucault continues, “but that individuals are beginning to love one another—there’s the problem.”

Writing about friendship during the same decade as Foucault, Jacques Derrida delivered a series of seminar lectures on the topic in the late 1980s, ultimately publishing them as “The Politics of Friendship” in 1994. Here, Derrida uses friendship as a framework to warn against binary thinking. Taking as his departure point Aristotle’s paradoxical statement “O my friends, there is no friend,” Derrida suggests that while the dominant conception of friendship has been structured around sameness, true friendship depends on difference. The acknowledgment of this difference is what makes the friend feel seen.

This weariness of, indeed a warning against, the seeming stability of binaries is exactly what manifests in the large three-way collaborative painting Sap Stalk Scion that anchors the exhibition. In this vibrant work, there is simultaneously an acknowledgment and a negation of individual style. While ruled by a largely abstract composition of organic and geometric forms, representational elements burst forth as ghostly figures emerge across the canvas and destabilize the abstraction. The brushstrokes vary significantly from section to section – some areas rendered with confident strokes while others display a more exploratory approach, suggesting the different temperaments across the three collaborators. Even its identity as a painting is disrupted by the sculptural element of a branch that stretches diagonally across the surface. In doing so, the piece embodies the very principles of friendship that Derrida articulates: rather than seeking harmonious unity, it celebrates productive tension. The artists’ distinct approaches don’t merge into a seamless whole but rather create a dynamic conversation where differences generate new possibilities.

3 friends offers friendship as a model for artistic practice that extends far beyond the gallery walls. What happens when trust opens a space in which to take risks, when collaboration unfolds from genuine affection and not only professional strategy? And what would happen if we allowed friendship to direct all parts of our lives?

In a culture that valorizes individual achievement above all else, these three artists propose a practice rooted in mutual support, investment, and love. An ode to collaboration, this exhibition recognizes that creative work does not have to emerge in isolation, but can flourish in friendship.