Rhonda Roland Shearer

Rhonda Roland Shearer (born 1954, Aurora, Illinois) is an American artist, scholar, and entrepreneur. Shearer is known for her interdisciplinary approach, which combines art, science, geometry, and investigative journalism techniques.^[1][2]Forbes has called her an expert on Dadaist art.^[3]

As a sculptor, Shearer was represented by the Wildenstein Galleries and has had solo exhibitions in London and New York, as well as a museum exhibition tour in the United States. Her artistry and scholarship explores the similarities between revolutions in art and revolutions in geometry, which was initially sparked by Henri Poincare's book, Science and Method. In Poincare's chapter on "Mathematical Discovery," Shearer made a breakthrough, noting that the creative process itself was "not readymade" (toutfait) but something that must be tested by experiment before it is called a discovery. The French artist Marcel Duchamp cited Poincare in his own writing and Shearer has cited the readymades at a Whitney Museum exhibition of the artist's everyday mass-produced store bought items noted as non-functional objects to be impossible because artworks like the hatrack hooks went downward instead of up making the hats fall off. No one had noticed this discrepency. Soon, her controversial discovery about the readymades not being readymade was reported in a full-page story in the New York Times and subsequently Shearer was featured in Mirabella''s "The 25 Smartest Women in America," which noted,

Rhonda is applying the scientific method to the work of Marcel Duchamp in an effort to prove that the artist was not, in fact, a conceptualist who plucked his mass-produced readymades from a store but rather a cryptographer who fabricated his objects and planted them as physical clues in his own mathematical system.^[4]

Shearer began working in bronze in the 1970's with equestrian commissions of life-size horses.^[5] Shearer exhibited at Wildenstein & Company, London, in 1987 and Wildenstein, New York, in 1989 and 1990.In the early 1990's her monumental bronze, Pangea, was installed at 23rd st.^[6][7] Shearer exhibited Pangea—inspired by Fractal geometry—in New York and Los Angeles from 1990 to 1991. In 1996, she exhibited Shapes Of Nature, 10 Years Of Bronze Sculptures at The New York Botanical Garden, which experimented in the use of fractals as a new way to look at space and form.^[8][9]

Shearer’s Woman’s Work sculptures were installed in Union Square to offset an18th-century equestrian statue of George Washington.^[10] Titles such as Kiki a la Toilette, Yves’s Wife with Baby, Nina Vacuuming, and Virginia with Two Children explain the actions of each sculpture. Fabricated in bronze and finished in brightly colored patinas, these monumental works, placed on undulating bases, vary in height from ten to fifteen feet. In the traveling museum exhibition catalogue, Shearer described her exhibition "Woman's Work" by writing, "I depicted large scale images of motherhood and housework in heroic size, as are our most sacred monuments."^[11] The New York Times profiled the exhibit in an article "Celebrating Heroines of Drudgery".^[12]

Shearer has demonstrated that many of Marcel Duchamp's supposedly "readymade" works of art were actually fabricated by Duchamp.^[13] Research that Shearer published in 1997, "Marcel Duchamp's Impossible Bed and Other 'Not' Readymade Objects: A Possible Route of Influence From Art To Science", lays out these arguments. In the paper, she showed that research of items like snow shovels (In Advance of the Broken Arm) and bottle racks (Bottle Rack) in use at the time failed to turn up any identical matches to photographs of the originals. The inference of Shearer's viewpoint is that Duchamp was creating an even larger joke than he admitted.^[14]

Shearer founded the Art Science Research Laboratory (ASRL) is a New York based, not-for-profit organization for the advocacy of interdisciplinary study through research, collections and publishing.

Shearer was awarded the 2012 Mirror Award for Best Single Article in the Digital Media category for her work with Malik Ayub Sumbal on the murder of Benazir Bhutto in "Mrs. Bhutto’s Murder Anniversary Part 1: Troubling Double Standard, American photojournalism’s different treatment of foreign victims." ^[15][16]

Following the September 11 attacks in 2001, Shearer and her daughter, London Allen, worked to deliver supplies to firefighters and other personnel at the site of the destroyed World Trade Center in Manhattan. After being disappointed with her attempts to donate through official channels, she converted a 3,000 sq ft art studio about 1 mile from the World Trade Center into a warehouse for crucial supplies that first responders needed.^[17]  From her Spring Street warehouse, she and a legion of volunteers^[18][19][20] began distributing supplies directly to emergency workers. The New York Times  reported, "One thing is certain: to many of the workers at the site, she is a heroine."^[17] Shearer later told The Washington Post that she had borrowed $1 million to finance her efforts, repaying the debt after the crisis with the help of money donated from foundations and individuals.^[21]

"A lot of this stuff, Rhonda is responsible for,'' said Lt. John Moran of the New York Police Department Emergency Service Unit, pointing out a wall of boxes full of respirators, flashlights, tools and warm winter clothing in the unit's supply station next to ground zero.^[17]

Shearer felt called to help those in need once again when the COVID-19 pandemic took root in 2020.^[22] Shearer founded Cut Red Tape 4 Heroes and worked to distribute personal protective equipment (PPE), such as masks, gloves, antibacterial wipes, and hazmat suits, to firefighters, hospital workers, organizations focused on helping people with special needs, and low-income individuals. She again faced resistance from officials, as hospitals refused to allow her to donate on their property, forcing her to set up distribution areas nearby.^[23] Shearer explained in an interview on WNYC's Brian Lehrer Show that she used her knowledge from front line work post 9/11 and the contacts she amassed to acquire PPE at notably low prices. She described herself as "highly competitive with sharp elbows".^[24] During an interview with Sharon Osbourne on CBS' The Talk, Shearer highlighted the comparisons of her post 9/11 work with the time sensitive work in supporting front line workers during the COVID pandemic.^[25] As of May 6, 2020, Shearer reportedly borrowed more than $600,000 on a home equity line of credit to fund the donations and was raising additional money through GoFundMe.^[21] In recognition of her efforts, Shearer was dubbed the 'Patron Saint of PPE'.^[26][27][24]

"Once again, today we see the greatness and decency of our people. Rhonda Roland Shearer and Cut Red Tape 4 Heroes have stepped forward to help the oft-neglected special needs community and its service providers." – NYS Senator Andrew Lanza^[28]

New York Magazine states, "Over the years, Housing Works has been touted as one of the most innovative AIDS organizations in the country." Realizing there was a need to enhance fundraising, Shearer proposed the creation of an upscale thrift store and offered $100,000 to cover its startup costs.^[29]