Alison Saar: Coup | Review Excerpt
Alison Saar's deeply personal sculptures in her first solo show at LA|Louver deserve tremendous applause — for their emotional honesty, sure, but more for the balance of strength and tenderness, in form and idea, through which she conveys it.

The daughter of celebrated African American artist Betye Saar and painter-conservator Richard Saar, she demonstrates deft skill with seemingly unforgiving materials (bronze, lead, tar, wood). Here, Saar juggles themes of personal and cultural identity as she fashions various sizes of female bodies (often her own) that are buoyant with story while solid in stance. Hair, similarly, she constructs with dense wire (sometimes even barbed), only to have it attract more than repel — thick, smooth strands you long to run your fingers through.

Rebecca Epstein, Los Angeles City Beat, March 9-15, 2006

Energy Bursts from Wooden Forms | Review Excerpt
In person, however, the works have an intensity of presence that transcends easy characterizations, thanks to masterly manipulation of basic but evocative materials. The figures are carved out of wood and coated either in paint or scraps of hammered ceiling tin, resulting in a warm, folksy spectrum of tones and textures. Though stiff, they're full-bodied and sensual, their postures bursting with energy. Their hair is made from strands of thick, black wire and its abundance, as in much of Saar's previous work, is beguiling and formidable.

Around the Galleries, Los Angeles Times, March 3, 2006