Transmitter presents:
As the Hand Enjoys the Glove
NOVEMBER 8 – DECEMBER 13, 2026
OPENING PERFORMANCE: Sunday, November 8, 4:00 pm, followed by a reception
OTHER PERFORMANCES: Sundays at 4:00 pm on November 15, November 22, December 6
The author lies propped up in bed dozing while the reader sits in a chair by his side. When the author awakes with a start, he notices the yellow legal pad in the reader’s hands and assumes she is taking dictation. He clears his throat, “Where were we?”
The reader looks down, “Transmitter is pleased to present As the Hand Enjoys the Glove, a solo exhibition and accompanying performance by Colleen Asper, organized by Meena Hasan. As the Hand Enjoys the Glove continues Asper’s practice of using paintings of her labia as curtains in the staging of her performances. It continues, too, her use of satin gloves, only in As the Hand Enjoys the Glove it is two performers that appear as gloved hands. The performance unfolds as a series of alternate endings to Henry James’s The Beast in the Jungle.”
The author blinks furiously.
“Perhaps you could describe The Beast in the Jungle?” suggests the reader.
“The Beast in the Jungle? That story first appeared in 1903 in a volume of my miscellanies.” The author warms to his subject, “The protagonist, a poor sensitive gentleman named John Marcher, lives with the conviction that experience would be marked for him by some rare distinction, some incalculable violence or unprecedented stroke. Like the blindfolded seeker in a game of hotter and colder, he burns, on occasion, with the sense of the thing near only to deviate again into the chill. His career thus risks a great negative adventure, my report of which presents, for its center, the fine case that has caused him most tormentedly to burn and most unprofitably to stray.”
“That center is May Bartrum.”
“Why yes, in their youth John Marcher conveys to May Bartrum his sense of all that lies in wait. May Bartrum discovers that the possession of his secret is hers alone when they reencounter each other as adults, a curious fact which compels her, at Marcher’s appeal, to agree to wait with him for the arrival of his peculiar fate.” The author pauses. “Why is this Aspern…”
“The name is Asper.”
“Why is this Asper retelling the ending of The Beast in the Jungle?”
“She is interested in the peculiar fate of May Bartrum. She can imagine no more disagreeable reason to create a character than to send her to wait for something to happen to a man. And yet, she finds May Bartrum to be the story’s center indeed. By putting her finger on this center again and again, she effects to change the story’s shape.”
“The successive peripheries constitute, then, new beasts?” the author says in a voice that has become hoarse.
“Exactly.” The reader puts down her legal pad to pour the author a glass of water.
Colleen Asper is a painter, writer, and performer based in Brooklyn, NY. She has had solo and two person exhibitions at galleries that include New Media Artspace at Baruch College, New York, NY; 17Essex, New York, NY; On Stellar Rays, New York, NY; P!, New York, NY; Art Production Fund Lab, New York, NY; The End, Atlanta, GA; Gallery 650 at Georgia State University, Atlanta, GA; and Steven Wolf Fine Arts, San Francisco, CA. Her work has been included in numerous group exhibitions in the United States and abroad at institutions that include The Drawing Center, New York, NY; Art in General, New York, NY; Queens Museum, Queens, NY; The Luminary, St. Louis, MO; Kunstverein Langenhagen, Hanover, Germany; and Lošinj Museum, Mali Lošinj, Croatia. Her work has been reviewed in publications that include Artforum, Art in America, frieze, The New York Times, and The New Yorker. Additionally, she has contributed writing to publications such as Art Practical, Common Notions, The Brooklyn Rail, Lacanian Ink, and Paper Monument.
For Press Inquiries, please contact: hasan.meena@gmail.com + info@transmitter.nyc