 Patrick Jackson's debut solo exhibition at Los Angeles' Chung King Projects will be a chorus of stuff. Found objects, construction, and ephemera all make up Jackson's work, creating an environment in which dirt and technology have equal footings. Recent MFA grad, Patrick Jackson has quickly made himself known in the LA art world. He initially studied at San Francisco Art Institute and attended the Skowhegan School of Painting and Sculpture before finishing up his graduate work in 2007 at the University of Southern California. He's a recipient of the Jacob K. Javits Fellowship, an enviable honor for a young artist, and he also participated in the annual LA Weekly Track 16 exhibition in 2006 and has participated in residencies at the Lower Manhattan Cultural Council and the Marie Walsh Sharpe Art Foundation in New York. | |||||
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 Tony de las Reyes first re-imagined Herman Melville's Moby Dick in 2006, with an exhibition at Carl Berg that drew the attention of national critics. Ahab's America, the continuation of de las Reyes preoccupation with Melville's classic novel, is now on view at Carl Berg Gallery. De las Reyes uses red bister to make lush stains on paper. At first glance, these stains seem unassuming. But a closer examination reveals the intricate marine scenes that play out within the jurisdiction of the stains: rollicking waves or the confident mast of a ship. In Ahab's America, de las Reyes has also included a bronze sculpture of a skull, an elongated resin spout, and text paintings that quote passages from Moby Dick. The exhibition is a well-crafted, visually alluring exploration of American identity. De las Reyes received his BFA from California State University and his MFA from the San Francisco Art Institute. He has had solo exhibitions at Bentley Gallery in Scottsdale, Arizona, Howard House in Seattle, and Artplace in Los Angeles. His work has been featured in Art in America and Modern Painters. Ahab's America runs through April 12, 2008. | |||||
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Theresa Sapergia's show, A Thousand Natural Shocks, opened March 15th, 2008 at Cerasoli Gallery in Culver City, Los Angeles. Drawings, mostly large-scale and monochromatic, of various animals and one monumental depiction of the artist as both nymph and satyr hang in the front section of the gallery. The drawings have a tranquilized or sedated vibe to them, and yet there is also a drowsy yearning towards - for lack of a better word - nirvana. Theresa Sapergia received a B.F.A. from Emily Carr Institute of Art and Design in Vancouver, B.C. and an M.F.A. from Concordia University in Montreal. She has exhibited at AIR Gallery in New York City, and across Canada in Vancouver, Toronto & Montreal. She currently lives and works in Prince George, British Columbia. Please read below for a full interview with the artist by Darrin Little.
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 Houston-based artist Robert Pruitt makes beautifully crafted work, but his exceptional craftsmanship is only a tool for exploring the ways in which African Americans have been represented throughout history. An exhibition of Pruitt's new work, titled Two Tears in a Bucket: Considering The Alcubierre Metric, is currently on display at Mary Goldman Gallery in Los Angeles. The exhibition presents a series portraits on Kraft paper. Predominately rendered in orange and black, the portraits exude an introspective confidence, but they also suggest a disturbing coalescing of misrepresentation. In Pruitt's work, Historic imagery merges seamless with contemporary imagery. The Alcubierre Metric, also known as Alcubierre Drive or, in Start Trek terms, "warp drive," is a mathematical speculation. Alcubierre Metric proposes a measure of space time in which you can travel faster than light, something that Pruitt hopes to do through his current work. Speeding up the dialogue surrounding representations of African Americans may, hypothetically, launch us into the future. Pruitt is a member of Houston collective Otabenga Jones & Associates, which participated in the 2006 Whitney Biennial. Pruitt has also shown at the Studio Museum in Harlem and the Contemporary Arts Museum in Houston. Two Tears in a Bucket opened on March 15thand runs through April 19th. | |||||
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 In a two-part show for Howard House in Seattle, Gretchen Bennett presents her own work in "Hello," located in the front of the gallery, as well as curating "Supernature," located in the center gallery. Bennett is best known for her interest in urban iconography and her downloadable and printable sticker series. For "Hello," she chooses to re-examine through drawings the widespread imagery of the ill-fated lead singer of Nirvana, universal pop icon Kurt Cobain. Methodically and meticulously penciling line-by-line single video frames of her subject collected from YouTube, the artist presents colorful and luminous drawings of the drug-addled musician. By stopping motion and revealing the painstaking precision of her own hand, Bennett refreshes our view of the ubiquitous iconic image, giving us a more personal look at the star without becoming sentimental. In the center gallery of Howard House is "Supernature", curated by Bennett, which examines the notion of the perfect landscape in the works of Saul Chernick, Andrew Guenther, Matthew Day Jackson, Alexander Kantarovsky, Robert de Saint Phalle, Suzanne Walters, and Aaron Williams. Instead of presenting a romantic and idealistic view of the natural world, the artists assert the idea that the perfect landscape can be found in artificial or abandoned settings. The show is a collection of assembled topography in the form of paintings and installations which act as landmarks or "places" for the viewer to examine. In contemporary society, we become increasingly detached from the experience of authenticity or purity in the natural world. This mediated view of our world is not Nature, but Supernature, and can offer us a new kind of authenticity. Gretchen Bennett received her M.F.A. from Rutgers in 2001 and has exhibited widely on both coasts. She has had a solo show at Amo Gallery in Washington, and has exhibited at PS122 Gallery in New York City. | |||||
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 The Whole of Everything,a recent collection of works by Del Kathryn Barton is currently showing at Karen Woodbury Gallery, Richmond. Often of a dark, fantastical nature, Barton's paintings, sculptures and ink works portray child-like characters, mutant creatures and deranged human forms. Best known for her vibrant water colours, Barton's monochromatic, whimsical ink works also make a prominent appearance within the exhibition, and depict a sexualized fusion of fantasy worlds and naked bodies. Barton currently lives and works in Sydney, Australia. She earned a Bachelor of Fine Arts from the College of Fine Arts, Paddington, where she later worked as a drawing lecturer. She has won various awards for her art practice, and most recently became the winner of this year's prestigious Archibald Prize - for a self portrait with her two children entitled You Are What Is Most Beautiful About Me, A Self Portrait With Kell and Arella. Her work has appeared in various solo and group exhibitions around Australia, while also appearing internationally in 2002 within Half a World Away: Drawings from Glasgow, Sao Paulo and Sydney, at Hallwalls Contemporary Arts Centre, New York. | |||||
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 The current exhibition at Kips Gallery, Fay Ku: A Survey of Works 2004-2008 curated by Brendon MacInnis, demonstrates Ku's most significant works to date. Ku's exhibit coincides with Asian Contemporary Art Week in New York, which runs from March 15-24th. The Brooklyn-based artist is simultaneously showing at Sam Lee Gallery in Los Angeles in a two-part group exhibition, her part titled, Deviance. Born in Taiwan but raised in suburban America, Fay Ku's work explores the dichotomy of two worlds. Her sparse graphite, watercolor, and ink drawings on paper display Eastern influences, at times referencing the Japanese woodcutting technique, ukiyo-e or "pictures of the floating world," though the subject matter is purely her own. Children and women figure predominately in Ku's work, often presented precariously straddling the divide between myth and reality. Because of the scale of Ku's chosen canvas and the subject matter therein, the viewer is forced to investigate every minute limb and figure floating among the large stark white paper. In Deviance, there is a metamorphosis of Ku's subjects where feminism, coquettishness and innocence are faced with uncertainty and the treacherous adult world. Fay Ku received her MFA from Pratt Institute (2006) in Brooklyn and bachelor's degrees in visual arts and literature from Bennington College, Vermont (1996). | |||||
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 Christof Mascher's show at The Happy Lion Gallery in Los Angeles features a whimsically insidious array of paintings and drawings. Titled 'Fake Empire,' the exhibition is the artist's first U.S. solo show. Mascher's work eerily merges the expressionistic mark-making with illustrative, though far from literal, imagery and his paintings call to mind scenes from dark fantasy novels. While exhibition titles often seem removed from the work included, Mascher certainly seems to be masterminding a 'Fake Empire' in which murky expanses of water connect icy fortresses. Mascher, a German artist who lives and works in Braunschweig, attended the Braunschweig University of Art and the University for Applied Sciences and Arts in Hanover. His recent exhibition at Galerie Michael Janssen in Cologne, titled 'The Ghost Yard,' featured paintings on wood that were as dark and fantastic as the work at Happy Lion. However, the paintings and drawings currently on view in Los Angeles have significantly more perspectival depth to them, making it seem as though Mascher has created his own dimensional world. Mascher, who is new to the international art world, has also shown at Kunstverein Hannover and Figge Von Rosen Galerie, where he participated in 2006 show 'Cropped: Young Artists from European Academies.' 'Fake Empire' runs through March 1st. | |||||
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 Rachel Mason's solo show at Circus Gallery is certainly timely. The Candidate includes a slew of dumb-fisted charcoal, ink and pastel renderings of politicians. The drawings span the gallery walls and Mason has installed mock podiums around the space. Arms protrude from the podiums, grasping microphones and suggesting the podiums might double for politician's bodies. Circus Gallery is appropriately taking advantage of The Candidate's timeliness, hosting a February 2nd speech by candidate Mike Gravel and a February 5th viewing of the media's primary coverage. Rachel Mason received her MFA from Yale School of Art in 2004 and her BFA from University of California Los Angeles in 2001. It's only taken her three years to become an internationally known artist and she showed or performed extensively in 2007, exhibiting at Newman-Popiashvili Gallery in New York and The Henry Art Gallery in Seattle among other venues. Mason's projects tend to have an interactively political overtone, and she is currently maintaining a campaign journal that tracks the 2007/2008 primaries. Presented in a news-like page format, Mason's journal is no where near as dry as it appears. Instead, she makes colorful, biting observations that call into question the behind-the-scenes aspect of politics. The Candidate runs through February 16th. | |||||
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 Swiss artist Virginie Morillo is having her debut solo exhibition in Zurich with Galerie Mitterrand + Sanz this week. The show, which is on view through the first week of March, has come after the young artist received much acclaim for her participation in the group exhibition "Swiss Folks," and her solo exhibition at Galerie Edward Mitterrand in Geneva, Switzerland. Morillo often renders Disney characters with other more naturalistic figures to create absurd and slightly deviant situations. The artist has referred to herself as a "natural born Walt Disney character killer," as she takes control of the childhood characters and causes them to act outside of their originally illustrated behavior. The exhibition will contain 10 new drawings and a large candle sculpture that is set on fire. Morillo, who is only 25 years old, is at the beginning of her career having only graduated from Ecole Supérieure des Beaux Arts, Genève in 2006. Morillo currently lives and works in Geneve Switzerland. | |||||
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 Multi-talented artist Donald Urquhart is currently showing stylized paintings, drawings and mixed media at Jack Hanley Gallery in LA. Urquhart devised the exhibition, titled The End, to be a farewell to the past and the included work feels like a montage of 20th Century iconography. Urquhart, who fell in with the infamous performer Leigh Bowery in the 1980s, became an intricate part of London's campy nightclub scene, collaborating with Bowery and even co-running a club called The Beautiful Bend. As Urquhart suggests in his writing on Bowery, the flashiness of the nightclub life influenced his stylized aesthetic. Urquhart's work was included in the Saatchi Gallery's Unreal: Altered Perspectives in Painting and in Beck's Futures at the ICA in London. His recent solo show at Maureen Paley Gallery in New York included multiple renderings of girls and his 2006 exhibition at Herald Street Gallery in New York also featured girl-centric imagery, broaching everything from school girl play to pin-up girl glamor. The End at Jack Hanley Gallery will remain on view through February 12th. | |||||
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 "A week of Sundays", now showing at the Tim Olsen Gallery, Woollahra, showcases an exciting collection of works by David Bromley. The exhibition includes an array of canvases, embroidery and works on linen. Part of the display explores the female form in a multitude of nudes and portraits, while the other is a discovery of children at leisure, stylised as vintage graphics. Bromley emigrated from England to Australia as a child, where he has remained ever since. His work has appeared in numerous group and solo exhibitions, including the 2004 Toronto International Art Fair, Zaishu Show at Jan Murphy Gallery, Brisbane and the 2006 Melbourne Art Fair. All works on display are able to be purchased. | |||||
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 Currently showing at Hardware Gallery, Enmore is Josonia Palaitis' evocative paint series Metamorphoses. Inspired by Ovid's collection of poetry by the same name, the artist's works provide a modern spin on classical myths such as Venus and Adonis, The Abduction of Europa and The Cave of Envy. Palaitis received her Diploma of Art Education from National Art School in Sydney, where she currently lives and works. She has received several awards for her art practice, including the 1994 Doug Moran National Portrait Prize and the People's Choice Award at the 1995 Archibald Prize Exhibition. She has been commissioned to create works of highly notable subjects including ex-Australian Prime Minister John Howard and his wife Jeanette, TV journalist Ray Martin and the victims of the Childers Backpackers Hostel fire. | |||||
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 Jim Shaw's "Dr. Goldfoot and his Bikini Bombs" at Metro Pictures re-opened January 4th with the addition of many new works. The original exhibition of paintings, drawings, and sculpture, on view since November 30 has doubled in size with the addition of Shaw's previously self-edited work. Included in the show are Shaw's series of "Dream Objects" that use sculptural forms of human body parts. Also on display are giant sculptures of half heads and noses, as well as a monumental 11x15 foot painting that merges a self portrait of the artist with one of Vincent Price. During the initial installation in November, Shaw edited works he deemed as unresolved, undesirable or noncommercial. His vision of a "traditional" gallery exhibition is placed aside in the second half of the show as he vulnerably exposes these "unfinished" pieces, illustrating the ongoing artistic practice. Jim Shaw has exhibited widely in the US and internationally since the late 1980s. Among his previous series are "My Mirage" (1985-1990) which follows the experiences of a fictional boy named Billy as he grows up during the 60s and 70s; "Dream Drawings" and "Dream Objects," (1991-present) featuring recreated imagery and art objects from the artist's dreams; and works defining the evolution, dogmas and rites of his fictitious religion "Oism" (2000 to present). Recent solo shows include PS1, New York ("The Donner Party"); Magasin Center of Contemporary Art, Grenoble; and Kunsthaus Glarus, Switzerland. | |||||
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 Currently on view at Antwerp's newest gallery, Base-Alpha, are two solo shows by the young Antwerp artists Rachel Agnew and Lieven Segers. Seeking to break open the Antwerp art sceane, Base-Alpha will be presenting young unknown talent that have previously not found a place in the hermetic Belgian art scene. Run by, Captain: Bart Vanderbiesen and 1st Commander: Geoffrey de Beer II, the reining look at this gallery is a sort of Futuristic Adrenalized Post Punk. In this, her first solo gallery exhibition Rachel Agnew presents large scale paintings that sarcastically celebrate abundance. Be it credit cards, cash or beauty, these self portraits relish in excess, but their crude making under cuts her belief in this system. While seductive and repulsive at the same time, they ask us to question our involvement in the selfish capitalist system. Having received his MFA from Post Sint Joost, Breda (Holland) in 2001, Lieven Segers has previously exposed at De Brakke Grond and Stella Lohaus Gallery. Segers takes this opportunity to show a wide range of graffiti influenced, text based works. Directly addressing the anxieties that are a common component in contemporary life. His is a whimsical attempt to find a way out, in our desperate times. Rachel Agnew "Collateral Damage" and Lieven Segers "Blow-ups and Other Things" December 15, - January 28, 2008 at Base-Alpha, Antwerp, Belgium | |||||
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 Tim Hawkinson's first Australian exhibition "Mapping the Marvellous," is currently on show at the Museum of Contemporary Art, Sydney. In addition to photo collages and drawings, The Los Angeles based artist is best known for creating theatrical sculptural and installation works through the use of mundane materials. Works on display include a bat constructed from plastic bags and an iris made of green biros. Hawkinson initially graduated from San Jose State University before later earning his MFA at the University of California. Exhibitions in which he has previously displayed his work include the 1999 Venice Biennale, "Zoopsia" - a solo exhibition at the Getty in Los Angeles and "How Man is Knit" at the Pace Wildenstein, New York earlier this year. | |||||
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 Opening next week at the Jeff Bailey Gallery in New York City will be "Focused Aggregate Intensity," an exhibition of new drawings and paintings by NYC-based artist Will Yackulic. This will be the artist's first solo exhibition in NYC, following successful shows at Gregory Lind Gallery and the Adobe Backroom Gallery, both in San Francisco. Yackulic has developed a geometric vocabulary that is built with a typewriter, gouache, watercolor and India ink, causing the visual plane to vibrate through optically intense patterning. The dominant spheres in the work pulsate through thousands of marks allowing the two-dimensional space to operate as a three-dimensional form. Often the work resonates as snow on an old TV screen or as planets floating in an indeterminate galaxy of information. The artist has participated in several U.S. and international group exhibitions including works at fa projects in London and Zentral Buro in Berlin, and received a BFA in Painting from the State University of New York at Purchase. Yackulic's works have been featured in both Modern Painters and Artforum Magazines. | |||||
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 Tracey Emin's first Los Angeles solo show, "You Left Me Breathing", opened at Gagosian Gallery in Beverly Hills on November 2nd. Emin, who was shortlisted for the Turner Prize in 1999, is one of the hyped Young British Artists whose work gained notoriety in the mid 1990s. She recently represented Britain at the 2007 Venice Biennale, installing large-scale neon signs and drawings on the walls of the British Pavilion. Emin openly uses her life as her subject matter and her work vacillates between virtuosity and one-liner candor. Paintings, like "Reincarnation III" (2005), explicitly play on the expressive style of Edvard Munch while neon works, like "Very Happy Girl" (1999), are gaudy and blunt. Emin's expansive oeuvre includes sculpture, drawing, video, photography, and needlework and "You Left Me Breathing" emphasizes her ambiguous, controversial breadth. At Gagosian, Emin's confessional drawings, including "Family Suite II" (1994), hang alongside her crude, tongue-in-cheek textile assemblages and her flashy neon signs contrast her large, expressionistic paintings. The Gagosian show also features a recent series of delicate jesmonite sculptures that incorporate bronze, bundled wood, cement, and glass. | |||||
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 Blowing up on the rock-poster scene, Leia Bell is bringing a new show of posters and original paintings titled "The Business of Ferrets" to the Richard Goodall Gallery in London Sept. 29 - Oct. 25. After only seven years Bell has created 250 limited edition hand-printed silk-screened music posters for bands such as Echo and The Bunnymen, The Darkness, My Chemical Romance, and The Decemberists. Bell uses a camera to document people she knows at parties and shows. She later uses the photos as references simplifying the scene to something universal that anyone can relate to. The artist was recently featured in Print magazine's "20 Best Under 30" annual issue and Art of Modern Rock. Bell received her BFA in Print Making from University of Utah. | |||||
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 The Canadian collaborative duo "Fighting" is currently presenting their newest project "Different Strokes," with the OKOK Gallery in Seattle. "Fighting" consists of childhood friends Niall McClelland and Lukas Geronimas. The artists collectively explore metaphysics, pseudo shamanism, natural history, and subversive political and social movements through gothic ink drawings and collages. The two undermine the seriousness of their chosen imagery by employing subtle humor through satire and references to pop-culture. For their current show with the OKOK Gallery, McClelland and Geronimas constructed a temporary residence in the gallery that is constructed of found material and contains a burlap roof. The artists lived in the structure as they produced much of the work for the exhibit. The work manifested into large collages, some of which act as vertical banners spanning the back portion of the gallery. The artists have transformed the front of the gallery into a faux-natural history museum, and have individual black and white still life ink drawings that depict a variety of objects such as a human skull. The artists have been interviewed on fecalface.com and have appeared in the publications Lo Down and Color. | |||||
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 The visceral paintings and works on paper by artist Paul Mullins seem to pay homage to the rural contentment and simplicity of life as represented by images of dogs, fish and land working people. However, the sensitivity of the artist's renderings elevates the commonplace imagery, offering a more substantial look at this subject matter. Mullins' new work is a departure from his previous imagery of muscle cars, grand champion hogs and bulls, which spoke much more of masculinity within that type of lifestyle, yet the focus still remains on rural American life. Opening this Saturday at the Nathan Larranmendy Gallery in Ojai, California, will be "Some Other Day in the Garden," new works by Mullins. The artist has exhibited widely in the U.S. with shows at Heather Marx Gallery in San Francisco, Ambrosino Gallery in Miami, Florida, and Aron Packer Gallery in Chicago, among many others. He has been featured in Flash Art and Flaunt Magazine as well as Artnet.com. Mullins received his MFA from Ohio State University, and his BFA from Marshall University in West Virginia, and is currently an Assistant Professor of Art at San Francisco State University.
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 Galerie Adler in New York will present new drawings, animations and an installation in "Paradox Parade," opening this Friday, featuring Icelandic artist Sigga Bjorg Sigurdardottir. The artist produces several anthropomorphic creatures existing in stark white environments that seem to walk the line between playful and grotesque. The illustrated creatures have a strange humanistic quality, often becoming menacing while simultaneously offering comic relief in their awkward and laughable stance. When describing her work the artist has stated, "My work is about what happens when someone does something to somebody or something happens to someone but sometimes someone is simply doing something or thinking something else." Sigurdardottir was born in Reykjavik, Iceland and currently lives and works Reykjavik and Glasgow, Scotland. The artist is an MFA graduate of The Glasgow School of Art and received her BFA from The Icelandic Academy of Art and Design. Sigurdardottir has already began an international career with exhibitions "Wrong House," with Washington Garcia Gallery in Glasgow, "Paracide Park," with Centre d'art et de diffusion Clark in Montreal, Canada, and a forth coming exhibition at Kunstverein Uelzen in Uelzen, Germany. The artist has been featured in LIST Icelandic Art News and received an artist award from The Woollen Glove, from The Icelandic Art Academy in 2006. | |||||
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 Outlining sidewalk stains, skid marks and graffiti on the streets on New York City, Los Angeles and Las Vages is just a portion of what goes into the work of L.A.-based artist Ingrid Calame. What may look like a Pollock-style painting at first glance is more a method of controlling shapes and outcomes than personal expression. After the painstaking process of tracing each found stain, Calame returns to the studio and begins to cut out the forms and arrange them in what she calls constellations. She then creates a final tracing of the pattern in order to transfer them onto an aluminum panel as the underdrawing for a final painting. For her first solo show at Deitch Projects in 2000, Calame included three elements of her project: colored pencil drawings, enamel on aluminum paintings and an excerpt of a large constellation. Calame received her BFA from Purchase College in New York and her MFA from California Institute of the Arts in Valencia, Calif. The artist will be showing at the James Cohan Gallery in September and the Indianapolis Museum of Art in November. She also has a show scheduled at Galerie Schmidt Maczollek in Cologne, Germany, in 2008 and has served as a studio assistant for Harriet Schorr and Chuck Close. | |||||
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 In an exhibition ending just last week with the Peres Projects in Los Angeles, artist Chris Ballantyne presented "Existing Outside of Another." Ballantyne, who was born in Mobile, Ala., focuses much of his works on mundane architectural structures such as parking lots, old swimming pools and billboards. A dominate characteristic found in his recent work is a strong and eerie glowing natural light that seems to reference the glow of urban artificial lighting. Ballantyne, a previous DailyServing feature, moved around the country in his youth and has since remained influenced by suburban developments, interstate highways and the ideas of ownership and trespassing. Ballantyne's paintings, drawings and sculptural installations have been exhibited in "Out of Place" with the Santa Barbara Contemporary Art Forum in California and "Body of Water" at Cheekwood Museum's Temporary Contemporary gallery in Nashville, Tenn. The artist received his MFA in painting and drawing from the San Francisco Art Institute (2002) and has since been featured in Art Forum and Artweek magazines. | |||||
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 Chris Dent is a 22-year-old British illustrator and artist who explores the energy of urban street culture through densely informative drawings of cityscapes. Dent often captures his imagery with pen directly on paper, preventing any reworking and allowing the first mark-making instinct to dominate. The artist recently graduated from Camberwell College of Arts in London with a degree in illustration. Since his graduation, the young artist has been busy working on commissioned illustrations for Zoo York, Capitol Records and Swindle Magazine, among many others, and has also co-founded HYBRID BUNNY, a collective group of illustrators and designers. Dent has exhibited his work with the Subway Gallery and Notting Hill Arts Club, both in London. | |||||
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 The photographic process employed by California-based artist Noah Wilson includes traditional gelatin mono-print photography with direct applications of charcoal. The artist's main interest lies in the process of development and the possibility and interpretation of uncertainty. Wilson illustrates feelings of tension, isolation and the unknown by rendering portions of a scene, while allowing the remaining sections to be ambiguous and undetermined. The work provides questions rather than solutions, allowing the viewer to connect to the image from popular symbols while remaining free of direct conclusions. Wilson graduated from San Jose State University with his M.F.A. in 2005 and received his undergraduate degree from Humboldt University in 2001. Since, the artist has completed residencies with at the San Francisco Recycling & Disposal. Inc and has exhibited with Manoux Gallery in Berkeley, Calif., Callisto Press Editions Gallery in Yountville, Calif., and in 2005 produced his M.F.A. thesis exhibition in Gallery 2 of San Jose State University. | |||||
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 Dysfunctional Americana that uses familiar imagery to tell stories is how Michael Paige Glover describes his new body of work. Glover uses adults and children that are placed against backgrounds of anarchy, destruction and uncertain imagery that he relates to past memories and self-awareness. Pulling inspiration from '20s to '50s photos, films, magazines and personal photographs, the artist spends months combining, arranging and decoding metaphors that unravel a specific feeling contained within each piece. In the end, Glover creates personal symbols using iconic imagery that aid in the discovery of his process. After traveling to Vance, France, to apprenticeship alongside Nall Hollis at the N.A.L.L. Art Association and then to Florence, Italy, to study with Andrea Spinelli, Glover received his M.F.A. from the New York Academy of Art. The artist also received a one-month fellowship from the Vermont Studio Center and was recognized by the Queen Museum of Art for the Queen Artist Registry. | |||||
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On view now at the Redux Contemporary Art Center in Charleston, S.C., is "Tentacle House," new works by Korean artist Si Jae Byun. Byun was the 2007 artist in residence with Redux, completing the program only five days ago. The work of Byun often revolves around the artist's childhood experiences, focusing on inner conflict from social experiences, which are communicated to the viewer through the interactivity of her pieces. Using characterized images of human organs and videos that incorporate the artist's own body, Byun creates vibrant youthful works using multiple materials to achieve her diverse ideas. Byun currently lives and works in New York City. She received a BFA and MFA from the Kookmin University in Seoul, Korea, and has just completed her second MFA from the School of the Visual Arts in New York City. The artist has exhibited internationally, including "Da-Da-Da-Da-Da" with the Shin Art Museum and installations with the Seoul Art Center and the Seoul Museum of Art in Korea. Additional group exhibitions include "kinaesthetics" at Visual Arts Gallery in New York City and "Dual Scenery" at Artcom Center in New Jersey. To read an interview with the artist, please click below.  | |||||
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 Bay Area artist Michelle Blade creates paintings that deal with social hierarchy and its absence in times of group accomplishments. Moments of trust within peer groups are captured amid pools of color, all contained on large sheets of light and fragile paper. By capturing ideas and activities held within a collective conscious, Blade is able to highlight a society's failures and triumphs as it strives to move toward social equality and group connectivity. Blade was born in Los Angeles and is currently living and working in San Francisco while attending the M.F.A. program at the California College of the Arts. The artist has been featured in two solo exhibitions this year with Motel Gallery in Portland and Parklife in San Francisco. Blade has had original artwork featured in The New York Times Magazine and Flavorpill, both printed this year. | |||||
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New York City-based artist SWOON creates fantastical cityscapes that are delicately rendered through cut paper and often posted publicly on the streets of New York. In the above video, the artist presents her work as part of this year's "Conversations with Contemporary Artists" series at The Museum of Modern Art (MoMA) in New York. SWOON introduced herself to New York by covering the city's streets with her signature public works, including cut-outs, billboard alterations, poster campaigns and street parties. The artist creates life-sized installations, indoors and outdoors, that depict friends and families engaging in a variety of everyday activities that take place within the city. SWOON gained much notoriety from her outdoor works, especially her street peepholes that, once discovered, allow viewers a glimpse into a secret world. The artist has been traveling for several years, exhibiting works across the United States and Europe. SWOON has collaborated with such groups as the Barnstormers, Glowlab and Change Agent. She has exhibited in the P.S.1 Contemporary Art Center's "Greater New York" show in 2005 and has exhibited a massive walk-through installation with the Deitch Projects in New York City. | |||||
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 The paintings and drawings of Stanford University graduate Shaun O'Dell are rooted in autobiographical and historical narratives. The artist employs a complex iconography to investigate ideas of imperialism and nationalism as well as racism and environmental blunders that are often associated with America's governing parties and social elite. Some of the visual icons found in the work are buffalos, bald eagles, liberty bells and skulls, all contained within flat, abstractly rendered landscapes. In the artist's current exhibition with the James Harris Gallery in Seattle, O'Dell has created several ink and gouache drawings that contain a similar symbolic language as found in previous works. However, in this recent body of work, the artist has further developed the fictional narratives that attempt to recreate a new American story, casting greater light on societal conditions and their inherent consequences. O'Dell's work has recently been acquired by the Museum of Modern Art in New York City and has been featured in "How to Build A Universe That Doesn't Fall Apart Two Days Later," a group show at the Watts Institute in San Francisco. In 2005, O'Dell became a recipient of the SECA Art Award from the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art, and, in 2006, the artist exhibited with the Jack Hanley Gallery in Los Angeles. | |||||
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 By synthesizing ideas of modern technology and the experience of life in the information era, the artist Mark Schoening offers a social commentary about the effects of inescapable media. While the paintings are a reflection of our time, they certainly speak of the possibilities and ramifications of future technological growth. Schoening attempts to capture this atmosphere in a fixed image, allowing the viewer the opportunity to step back and contemplate their relationship to the recent influx of technology, advertising and media and how we process this information. Schoening currently lives and works in Boston. He is a graduate of the Massachusetts College of Art and will exhibit this year with artist Shawn El C. Leonardo at the RHYS Gallery in Boston, Mass. Previous exhibitions include "Balletic Disintegration" with Montserrat College of Art in Beverly, Mass., and "Project 604" at the National Arts Club in New York City. | |||||
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 South African-born artist Robin Rhode works in a variety of media, including performance, photography, sculpture and video that centers on his personal experiences as a young man growing up in Johannesburg suburbs. The artist uses and alters everyday objects that reference South African products or that embodies a personal or social connection to the artist. Rhode is currently exhibiting new work in all three of the Perry Rubenstein Gallery's exhibition spaces. The artist has continued his interest in exploring narratives where he uses only the most basic of materials to complete his ideas. Recently, the artist has expanded to 16mm film and sculpture and has created a collaborative performance in Rheims, France, with professional dancer Jean-Baptiste Andre and violinist and cellist Didier Pertit. Rhode lives and works in Berlin and in September will have his first major museum exhibition in Europe at the Haus der Kunst in Munich. Rhode has exhibited internationally, including notable shows with Mori Art Museum in Tokyo, Museo Tamayo Arte Contemporaneo in Mexico City and Witte de With Center for Contemporary Art in Rotterdam. | |||||
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 Artist Chris Johanson's brightly colored, socially saturated works offer a humorous light to current cultural and societal feelings. With the background of the artist rooted in contemporary culture rather than formal art training, Johanson is able to rely solely on his personal experiences and the collective experience of all Americans to explore absurdity and humor in contemporary life. The artist is a prolific creator and clearly prefers a steady stream of ideas to be completed over tedious long-term works. Johanson is a Bay Area artist who is often included in the "Mission School," a group of suburban-influenced creators, including Barry Mcgee and Margaret Kilgallen. Johanson was launched into art stardom after receiving the SECA Art Award from the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art (SFMOMA) and being included in 2002 Whitney Biennial. The following year, the artist completed an exhibition with the Deitch Projects in New York City titled "Now is Now" and was included in an exhibition at SITE Santa Fe. This year, the artist will exhibit "Apex: Chris Johanson" at the Portland Art Museum, and, in 2008, Johanson will exhibit again with the Jack Hanley Gallery in San Francisco. | |||||
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 Currently on view at Tony Wight/Body Builder & Sportsman in Chicago are new works by New York-based artist Dannielle Tegeder. "The Chicago Index of the Invisible: Incidents and Interconnections" is a project that investigates unexplained disappearances within the greater Chicago area. The artist has constructed a space in the gallery for projections of actual and fictional sites of the disappearances and murders. In addition, the artist has also created a series of poems by reconstructing published texts of the incidents and a series of two-dimensional works that act as diagrams, drawing connections and new relationships between various incidents. Tegeder is a MFA graduate of The School of the Art Institute of Chicago and attended the Amsterdam School of Fine Arts in The Netherlands. The artist has received numerous awards and grants, including an Elizabeth Foundation Studio Award (2006), Smack Mellon Residency (2005) and a Lower East Side Print Shop Fellowship Edition Award (2004). The artist is also represented by Priska Juschka Fine Art and has exhibited with Galerie Xippas in Paris (2005). | |||||
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 The Seattle-based duo Lead Pencil Studio is comprised of artists Annie Han and Daniel Mihalyo. The two artists investigate elements of architecture, often rebuilding the framework of physical structures to reveal a mere trace of the original. Last year, with the help of the Creative Capital Foundation, Han and Mihalyo assembled a full-scale replica of the Maryhill Museum of Art titled "Maryhill Double " that was built completely of scaffolding and located one mile south of the Columbia River Gorge on the border of Oregon and Washington. Currently on view in Seattle's premiere contemporary art space, Lawrimore Project, is Lead Pencil Studio's "Drawing Space," a multi-room installation that extends the gallery's pre-existing architecture while also inventing new structures within the space. The duo is exhibiting in the San Francisco Exploratorium through June and will be presenting new works with the Boise Art Museum in Idaho in 2008. | |||||
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 Brooklyn-based artist Shinique Smith recently presented an exhibition titled "Open Strings" with the Skestos Gabriele Gallery in Chicago. The artist produces her works through the collection and accumulation of objects, which are often autobiographical and taken from several decades and generations of use. Smith binds many of these found objects in a ritualistic process that reconnects the meaning and physical qualities of each piece. Through cross-relating her materials, Smith is able to investigate identity and personal history through painting, drawing and sculpture, while formally referencing the energy found in much of abstract expressionism and traditional graffiti. Smith received her BFA and MFA from the Maryland Institute College of Art (MICA) and attended Tufts University and the School of the Museum of Fine Arts in Boston. Recent exhibitions include, works with Franklin Artworks in Minneapolis, Minn., and "No Dust No Stain," which was curated by Sara Reisman, and exhibited with Cuchifritos Gallery in New York. In '06-'07, Smith was included in "Altered, Stitched, and Gathered," an exhibition with PS1 in New York City that explored familiar objects and social practices through a variety of artists working with a deliberate methodology. | |||||
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 Artist Karl Haendel renders a variety of loosely associated imagery through seductively real drawings. Haendel has become as well known for his method of presenting the work as for his meticulous rendering of such a wide range of images. His unique salon-style presentation allows the associated meanings of the images to be re-contextualized to offer infinite new relationships. Some of the works are stacked against the wall only partly exposed, while others are placed in such proximity that they are touching. Haendel was born in New York and received a degree in art semiotics and art history from Brown University (1998). The artist attended Skowhegan School of Painting and Sculpture and the Whitney Museum Independent Study Program before receiving his MFA from the University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA) (2003). Currently, Haendel is presenting his third solo exhibition with Anna Helwing Gallery in Los Angeles. | |||||
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 San Francisco-based artist Val Britton constructs and integrates maps with other referenced imagery such as freeways, billboard scaffolding and road signs. The artist uses this process to navigate her past, charting memories and creating a personal record through symbols and metaphors. The artist's laborious process is created completely by hand, fusing the media of printmaking, collage, painting and drawing and fiber arts within a single composition. Britton is a graduate of the California College of the Arts in San Francisco and is currently an affiliate artist at the Headlands Center for the Arts in Sausalito, Calif. This year, Britton exhibited "Time Lines" at Mina Dresden Gallery and "Near and Far" with 301 Bocana Gallery, both in San Francisco. | |||||
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 South African artist William Kentridge produces works that exist somewhere between film, drawing and theater and sometimes as a combination of all three. Kentridge's drawings and stop-motion videos often have a subtle but reflectively political undertone, investigating the cultural dualities of South Africa and the artist's birth city of Johannesburg. Using the reductive medium of charcoal with only a small amount of blue or red chalk, Kentridge is effectively able to portray narratives while allowing the drawing process to be revealed by erasing and redrawing the object on the same sheet of paper. Since the late nineties, Kentridge has exhibited with museums worldwide. In 2004, the Metropolitan Museum in New York presented a solo show of the artist's work, which was followed by a premiere of Mozart's Die Zauberflote (The Magic Flute) in 2005 at the Theatre de La Monnaie in Brussels, with Kentridge as the director. The artist had perhaps his largest exhibition to date at the Musee d'art Contemporain in Montreal, and he received a project commission from the Deutsche Bank Guggenheim in Berlin the same year. | |||||
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 Chris Ballantyne's paintings, drawings and sculptural installations are an examination of suburban space. Ballantyne's inspiration is drawn from the universalities of his different neighborhood homes. Ideas of land boundaries, manipulated space and economic design are developed out of observations from a variety of urban and rural settings. Ballantyne's works are focused on architecture and landscape design and often explore complex relationships between individuals and their surroundings. Ballantyne received his M.F.A. in painting and drawing from the San Francisco Art Institute. Recent exhibitions include a self-titled show with the Cheekwood Museum of Art in Nashville, Tenn., and "Dream of New Jersey" at the DCKT Contemporary in New York. The artist has exhibited in Los Angeles and Berlin with the Peres-Projects, and, last year, he was featured in the 2006 California Biennial at the Orange County Museum of Art in Newport Beach, Calif. | |||||
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 Matthew Ritchie is an artist with an interest in the totality of our universe. Information, the structures of knowledge and belief and the human ability to comprehend the world around us are a perpetual theme in Ritchie's paintings, sculptures, animations, Web sites, drawings and installations. The artist creates these elaborate worlds by scanning drawings into a computer to manipulate, fragment and reform different elements before projecting and redrawing the image onto a final surface. Ritchie has also created expansive Web sites such as "The Hard Way," where users are prompted to answer a series of questions that lead into a variety of directions, each revealing unique fragments of information. Ritchie is a graduate of Camberwell School of Art in London and lives in New York. The artist has exhibited worldwide, including recent shows with Andrea Rosen Gallery in New York City, The Fabric Workshop and Museum in Philadelphia and Atle Gerhardsen in Berlin, Germany. Ritchie was featured on the PBS artist interview series Art:21 and was reviewed this year in Art in America. | |||||
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 Israeli artist Yehudit Sasportas creates large drawings and room-sized installations that investigate dreamlike, generic landscapes that are combined with dense, repetitive lines. The images reference intense spaces that are universally familiar, yet non-specific, creating a context that all viewers can recognize. The lines create a space that depicts modernism through a mathematic, systematic method that contrasts the organic qualities of the landscapes. After her graduation from Bezalel Academy of Art and Design in Jerusalem (1999), Sasportas exhibited with Galerie Eigen + Art in Berlin (2004), the Barbara Davis Gallery in Houston (2001), Deitch Projects in New York and the Berkley Museum of Art in San Francisco (2002). Sasportas was featured with the Valencia Biennial in 2001, and her work was reviewed in an article in ArtForum in 2003. | |||||
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 The possibilities and pitfalls of language are of constant interest to artist Tauba Auerbach. Her text-based drawings and paintings investigate the origin of language as a system for information and the relationship between meaning and symbol. The question of how a symbol is chosen and what it reveals about the human brain is also of interest. The works are presented as technically rendered typography, singularly familiar, while collectively abstracted. Her new work addresses the technological language of binary code and its inherent limitations. Auerbach is a Bay Area artist who attended Stanford University. She had a solo New York premiere at the Deitch Projects in New York City this fall and was included in The Dreamland Artist Club exhibition in 2005, organized by Creative Time and Steve Powers. The artist was reviewed in Art in America in 2005 and was reviewed in The New York Times in 2006. | |||||
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 Havana-based artist collective Los Carpinteros creates work that investigates the intersection of art and society and often takes the form of architecture, design, sculpture and drawing. Los Carpinteros consisted of artists Marco Castillo, Dagoberto Rodriguez and, until 2003, Alexandre Arrechea. The group first adopted the name Los Carpinteros ("The Carpenters") in 1991, choosing the collective name as a way of abandoning an individual artist persona for a more traditional collective laborer and artisan guild name. In recent years, the group has reached international success with exhibitions in countless countries. Last year, the artists exhibited with Galerie IN SITU in Paris, Unosunove in Rome and the USF Contemporary Art Center at South Florida University in 2005. Los Carpinteros has received awards from the Ministerio de Cultura and the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO), both in Havana. In 2004, the group's exhibition with Anthony Grant Inc. in New York City was reviewed by Art in America magazine. Both current members of Los Carpinteros are graduates of the Superior Art Institute of Havana (ISA) (1994 and 1995) and continue to live and work in Havana, Cuba. | |||||
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 The fantastical worlds of Swiss artist Leopold Rabus are loaded with cliches and symbols, as his satirical characters engage in a variety of dualities. Rabus' characters investigate morals, ethics, religion and sexuality through absurd and ambiguous narratives. The surrealistic imagery is rooted in Christian iconography and art history and is explored through a variety of media, including wax, real hair and miscellaneous particles. Rabus attended Cite des Arts de Paris (2000) and has exhibited with Galerie Une in Neuchatel, Switzerland, and Galerie Adler in Frankfurt, Germany. In 2005, the artist was featured in the Scope Miami art fair, and, last year, Rabus exhibited in the Collections de Saint-Cyprien in Saint-Cyprien, France. | |||||
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 Los Angeles artist Tim Hawkinson has been called one of America's most singular and inventive sculptors today. He is renowned for creating both monumental and microscopic works made of complex kinetic and sound producing elements, which are operated through low-tech programmed systems. Hawkinson's work is seemingly scientific, and the necessities of his inventions often lead to new tools, widely imaginative approaches and diverse mediums. Hawkinson has created major works in drawing, |
