Exhibition

Alkali Shift
Anders Herwald Ruhwald
March 28 - May 23, 2026

Louis Buhl & Co. is pleased to present Alkali Shift, a new exhibition with Anders Herwald Ruhwald. The exhibition opens on March 26, 2026, with an artist reception on Saturday, March 28, 2026 from 11AM - 11PM.

For the new series of work, Ruhwald developed an array of lithium-based glazes used across the sculptures. By incorporating lithium directly into the surfaces of the works, the artist highlights the material’s dual role: as a key component in the transition to renewable energy, and as a resource whose extraction carries significant environmental costs. Rather than offering a resolution to this contradiction, the sculptures hold these opposing realities in view, placing the aesthetic experience within the larger systems of mining, production, and consumption that shape contemporary life. In doing so, Ruhwald seeks to expand the visual vocabulary through which pollution and resource mining are represented, moving beyond a documentary approach to embed these concerns within the material and surface of the work itself.

A focal point of the exhibition is Ruhwald’s The Way of Water. Created with diluted blue paint applied along the upper edges of the wall, the artist allowed for gravity to dictate the material’s downward movement; individual streams occasionally converged, forming irregular, layered patterns across the surface. Evoking both natural flow and cause-and-effect, The Way of Water introduces a quiet sense of inevitability into the space. This is mirrored in the large sculpture "Rain Mound" where a cobalt-rich glaze oozes over a magnesium-based crawl glaze, contrasting the effects of drought and erosion.

In the center of the gallery are ten sculptures, each presenting a distinct tonal variation derived from the expansive evaporation ponds scattered across the Atacama Desert, where salt brine is pumped to extract lithium. The works reference the vivid, mineral-rich waters that characterize these otherworldly landscapes.

The exhibition's title Alkali Shift references lithium’s classification as an alkali metal, and points to processes of chemical and environmental change. The presentation wholly considers how materials associated with sustainability carry complex histories and impacts, and how shifts in energy production are inseparable from shifts in landscape, labor, and perception. Ruhwald invites viewers to reflect on how these material realities shape both our environment and our understanding of it.

Anders Herwald Ruhwald: Alkali Shift is on view from March 26 - May 16, 2026 at Louis Buhl & Co.