Joel Ross: But I Made These for You: True Stories and Other Objects

Joel Ross But I Made These for You: True Stories and Other Objects June 8 – August 12, 2017

This publication was produced on the occasion of Joel Ross’ fifth solo exhibition at moniquemeloche in summer of 2017.

© 2017

Everything I Know, 2017 Acrylic, plaster, enamel, and pigment on wood 39 x 48 x 2 in. (99.1 x 121.9 x 5.1 cm)

“America is a place and a story, made up of exuberance and suspicion, crime and liberation, lynch mobs and escapes; its greatest testaments are made of portents and warnings, Biblical allusions that lose all their certainties in American air.”

—Greil Marcus, (from his book The Shape of Things to Come: Prophecy and the American Voice)

The first time I read this Marcus line I smiled, and then I cried. It was 2006, I was 40 years old, and at that point I’d been making art, with serious conviction, for over a decade.

We were also three years into a bloody, unjustified war we were pushed into by the former Governor of Texas, my home state. Marcus’ succinct description of this country wasn’t potent because it was a revelation, it hooked me because it was a tight and unflinching description of something I understood very well. It was a confirmation, and a validation, of the contradictory feelings I have about this place some people call America. All the work I’ve ever made has, in one way or another, been an effort to give form and voice to the landscape and the ideas that create so much love, and pain.

—Joel Ross, 2017

Installation views

Joel Ross has shown at moniquemeloche since 2001, when our first public gallery space was inaugurated with his ambitious installation, I Borrowed My Mother’s Bedroom. Subsequent exhibitions have dealt with narrative representations of the dynamics of public and private spaces in a variety of media. Two intertwined and consistent themes run through the artist’s practice over his 20-year career: his fascination with the role of the roadside in the mythos of American culture, and the slipperiness of language.

Ross’ texts revolve around the contentious and fragile nature of semantics. The available grasp on words’ collective meaning, now more than ever, is tenuous. Our connection to people and history feels especially frail at this time. But I Made These for You: True Stories and Other Objects engages the American landscape and its citizens, vernacular architecture, and familiar tropes of signage, especially the Southern tradition of handmade religious signage and a culture built on roadside messengers.

With these latest pieces, Ross selected a group of characters’ stories to tell that define him. The contemplative spirit of this body of work on view, his first solo exhibition at the gallery since surviving Lymphoma, is evident in the quiet color palette and the often barely visible letterforms.

Most of the pieces in this exhibition read initially as minimalist paintings, particularly from a distance. Upon closer inspection, the paintings seem to refer to blown-out signs that have narrowly weathered the sun and the rain. They are residues left of an untidy mix of the complexity of vulnerability, bravado, incompleteness, humor, mistakes, and loss of the human experience.

Words appear as voices emanating from—and on the verge of disappearing into—the surroundings. The signs’ voices activate the gallery as well as echoing throughout the implied spaces of alleys, parking lots, diners, motel rooms, highways, and gas stations.

These new works evoke those locations and the characters who inhabit them through the faded panels and billboards instead of showing the landscapes, as in the earlier installations and cinematic photographs that Ross made in collaboration with Jason Creps for the series, Alleys and Parking Lots, or his 2015 “off the wall” public bus bench project, THE EVER. These stories made material by Ross, who comes from the places his characters occupy, operate in our post-Raymond Carver, post-Flannery O’Connor world. They are physical manifestations of true, poetic, often unflattering, sometimes heartbreaking, accounts of pieces of lives lived. He pays attention to how context and form shape the way a story is heard and understood—whether it resonates, when the meaning is carried, and when it is lost. We try to identify who believes it, or doesn’t.

Installation view

If I Could Run, 2017 acrylic and plaster on wood 32 x 48 x 3 in. (81.3 x 121.9 x 7.6 cm)

Twelve Assorted Medals, 2017 acrylic and plaster on wood 24 x 28 x 3 in. (61 x 71.1 x 7.6 cm)

Ready When You Are, 2017 enamel on aluminum 10 x 14 in. (25.4 x 35.6 cm)

Explain It, 2017 enamel on aluminum 14 x 10 in. (35.6 x 25.4 cm)

LIVE BAIT, 2017 graphite, ink, pigment, oil, and acrylic on wood 57 1/2 x 46 1/2 x 4 in. (146.1 x 118.1 x 10.2 cm)

Better Said, 2017 acrylic and plaster on wood 32 3/4 x 28 1/2 x 3 in. (83.2 x 72.4 x 7.6 cm)

An Understanding, 2017 enamel on aluminum 14 x 10 in. (35.6 x 25.4 cm)

Thieves, 2017 Acrylic, plaster, and enamel on wood 36 x 43 x 3 3/4 in. (91.4 x 109.2 x 9.5 cm)

Tears of Joy, 2017 acrylic and plaster on wood 26 1/2 x 37 1/2 x 3 1/4 in. (67.3 x 95.2 x 8.3 cm)

Installation view

Installation view

Various Words, 2017 Acrylic, plaster, and graphite on wood 63 x 48 x 2 3/4 in. (160 x 121.9 x 7 cm)

Installation view

Birthday Card, 2017 Acrylic, plaster, and enamel on wood 33 x 46 1/2 x 4 in. (83.8 x 118.1 x 10.2 cm)

Installation view

Rob Banks, 2017 acrylic and graphite on wood 48 x 43 1/2 x 3 in. (121.9 x 110.5 x 7.6 cm)

on the wall TORTURE SOUNDS INCREDIBLE, 2006 electronic LED sign 57 1/2 x 84 1/2 x 7 1/2 in. (146.05 x 214.63 x 19.05 cm)

JOEL ROSS

American, born Texas 1966, lives Champaign-Urbana, IL Education 1992 MFA, Cranbrook Academy of Art, Bloomfield, MI 1990 BFA, Tufts University, Medford, MA 1990 Diploma, School of the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, MA 1985 Richland College, Dallas, TX Selected Solo/Two Person Exhibitions 2017 But I Made These for You: True Stories and Other Objects, moniquemeloche, Chicago, IL 2016 Deconstructing the American Landscape (with Sarah Krepp), Rockford Art Museum, Rockford, IL 2015 THE EVER, off the wall, moniquemeloche, Chicago, IL Selections from Alleys and Parking Lots, The James Hotel, Chicago, IL 2013 Not How It Happened (a collaboration with Jason Creps), Tiny Park, Austin, TX 2012 Alleys and Parking Lots (a collaboration with Jason Creps), moniquemeloche, Chicago 2011 It’s Not My First Time, Beta Pictoris Maus Contemporary Art, Birmingham, AL 2010 Leaving Stories, James Hotel, Chicago, IL 2009 ROADSIDE: A Presentation of Recent Field Experiments and Prototypes, moniquemeloche, Chicago 2007 Tell Me Something I Don’t Know, Raw + Co., Cleveland, OH I Tried to Tell You, IPRH Gallery, The Illinois Program for Research in the Humanities, University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign, IL 2006 It’s a Free Country, Rare Gallery, New York, NY 2005 A Place Some People Call America, moniquemeloche, Chicago, IL 2001 I Borrowed My Mother's Bedroom, moniquemeloche, Chicago, IL Playing Dead and other Recent Work, Rare Gallery, New York, NY 2000 Slip, Performance with Ribbon Effect, Empty Bottle, Chicago, IL 1999 Slip, Performance with Ribbon Effect, Vedanta Gallery (now Kavi Gupta), Chicago, IL Measuring Texas, Vedanta Gallery (now Kavi Gupta), Chicago, IL 1996 Capacity, Chicago Project Room, Chicago, IL Between, Pictura Gallery, Lunds University, Lund, Sweden 1995 Severed, Gallery One, Elgin Community College, Elgin, IL Selected Group Exhibitions 2018 The Expanded Broadside, curated by Lisa Kurzner, Cleveland, OH 2017 Baggage Claims, curated by c2, Orlando Museum of Art, Orlando, FL; travels to Weatherspoon Art Museum, University of North Carolina, Greensboro (2018); Peeler Art Center, DePauw University, Greencastle, Indiana (2018); Weisman Art Museum, University of Minnesota, Minneapolis, MN (2019) 2014 INTERTWINED: Words and Art, University of Chicago Medicine, Chicago, IL 2013 The 7 Borders, Kentucky Museum of Art and Craft, Louisville, KY Word on the Street: Image, Language, Signage, Center for Book and Paper Arts, Columbia College, Chicago Sign of our Times: Text Based Art in the 21st Century, Contemporary Art Gallery at Southeastern Louisiana University, Hammond, LA 2012 WOOD, moniquemeloche, Chicago, IL (No) Vacancy, Carrie Secrist Gallery, Chicago, IL 2011 Write Now! curated by Nathan Mason, Chicago Cultural Center, Chicago, IL Pulp, Beta Pictoris Maus Contemporary Art, Birmingham, AL 2010 New Work, moniquemeloche, Chicago, IL Gone to the Other Side, curated by Pete Schulte, The Times Club, Iowa City, IA

Selected Group Exhibitions continued 2010 I Feel Fine, Bradley University, Peoria IL TXT, James Harris Gallery, Seattle, WA Our Kind of Town: Rethinking Chicago Images, Rena Sternberg Gallery, Chicago, IL Four American Landscapes: Sang-ah Choi, Jeffrey T. Jones, Andrew Lenaghan, and Joel Ross, Maier Museum of Art, Randolph College, Lynchburg, VA; travelled to George Adams Gallery, New York, NY 2009 School of Art + Design Faculty Exhibition, Krannert Art Museum, Champaign, IL Don’t Mention It, Kent State University Downtown Gallery, Kent, OH 2008 Boys of Summer, moniquemeloche, Chicago, IL Cultivating Instability, curated by Iain Muirhead, Cliff Dwellers, Chicago, IL Lifting: Theft in Art, Georgia Scherman Projects, Toronto, Canada 2007 Facades, curated by Judith Hoos Fox and Ginger Gregg Duggan, Krannert Art Museum and Kinkead Pavilion, University of Illinois at Urbana Champaign, Urbana, IL Lifting:Theft in Art, curated by Atopia Projects, Peacock Visual Arts, Aberdeen, Scotland; travelled to Georgia Sherman Projects, Toronto, Canada (2008) (un)-Building, curated by Dina Deitsch, Mills College Art Museum, Boston, MA Revive, Zygote Press, Cleveland, OH 2006 Something to do with Failure, Moser Performing Arts Center of the University of St. Francis, Joliet, IL Under Fire, I Space, Chicago, IL Spectacles of the Real: Truth and Representation in Art and Literature, IPRH Gallery, Illinois Program for Research in the Humanities, Urbana, IL 2005 Mind in Matter, Opensource, Champaign, IL School of Art and Design Faculty Exhibition, Krannert Art Museum, Champaign, IL 2004 Going West, Arthouse at the Jones Center, Austin, TX; travelled to Arthouse, Austin, TX; Galveston Arts Center, Galveston, TX; Wayland Baptist University, Plainview, TX; Stark Galleries, Texas A&M, College Station, TX Shutters, curated by Sandra Firmin, UB Art Gallery, Center for the Arts, Buffalo, NY School of Art and Design Faculty Exhibition, Krannert Art Museum, Champaign, IL 2003 Operation: Human Intelligence organized by the C.I.A. (curatorial intelligence agency) produced by C.A.C. (contemporary arts council) at Hyde Park Art Center Chicago, IL; travelled to University of Memphis Art Museum, Memphis, TN PasCap! curated by Pierre Raine 2002 Bad Touch, curated by Bill Thelen, Lump Gallery, Raleigh, NC; travelled to Ukranian Institute of Modern Art, Chicago, IL; Keith Talent Gallery, London, UK (2003); The Rose Art Museum at Brandeis University, Waltham, MA (2003); Beaker Gallery, Tampa, FL (2004) There Goes My Hero: Works on Paper by Chicago Artists, Squire Gallery, College of Northumbria in Newcastle upon Tyne, UK Gun Crazy, curated by Brett Levine, University of Alabama Visual Art Gallery, Birmingham, AL Mixer02, moniquemeloche, Chicago, IL 2000 HOMEWRECKER, moniquemeloche, Chicago, IL 1999 Chicago Artists 1999, Gallery 312, Chicago, IL 1998 Sculpture in Chicago, Gallery 400, University of Illinois at Chicago, Chicago, IL 1997 Greatest Hits, Volume 2, Beret International Gallery, Chicago, IL Obsessions, SPACES Gallery, Cleveland, OH 1996 Greater Than 2 Dimensions, Beret International Gallery, (2 person show), Chicago, IL

Selected Group Exhibitions continued 1992 Thesis Exhibition, Cranbrook Art Museum, Bloomfield Hills, MI Selected Bibliography 2016 “Deconstructing the American Landscape: Sarah Krepp & Joel Ross at Rockford Art Museum” Chicago Gallery News, December 8.

Makri, Vangelis. “The works of Joel Ross whisper bitter truths”, LiFO, March 16.

2015 Dowd, Alicia C. and Estela Mara Bensimon. Engaging the ‘Race Question’: Accountability and Equity in U.S. Higher Education. New York: Columbia University Press, p. 151 2013 Koebel, Caroline. “How to Cure World Blindness: An Interview with Joel Ross and Jason Creps”, Glasstire, June 23.

Greenwood, Caitlin. “Not How It Happened,” The Austin Chronicle, May 31.

2012 Miller, Randall. “Alleys and Parking Lots,” DailyServing.com,October 23.

Swann, Jennifer. “Culture: Wicker Park,” Chicago Magazine, October, p. 32.

Fishman, Elly. “What to do this month,” Chicago Magazine, September, p.

127.

Stein Wellner, Allison. “The Quirky Art of Travel at The James Chicago”, Perceptive Travel, April.

2011 Aspon, Catherine D. “Your Guide to the Dallas Art Fair,” www.papercitymag.com, April 1.

2010 Ritchie, Abraham. “Cohesive by Coincidence” www.artslant.com, Dec 6.

Graves, Jen. “Found in Translation.” The Stranger. July 27.

Adams, Bonnie Jean. “Meet Chicago artist Joel Ross - See ‘Leaving Stories’ at The James Hotel tonight. Examiner.com, April 30.

2009 Wiens, Ann. Galleries: Straight Talk. Chicago Magazine, June.

Tucker, Daniel. Consider the City. Chicago Journal, May 22.

Velez, Pedro. “Around Artropolis”, Artnet.com, May 11.

Weinstein, Michael. Review: “Joel Ross / Monique Meloche Gallery,” New City Chicago, May 7.

2008 Morrison, Gavin and Fraser Stables. “Lifting – Theft in Art,” Atopia Projects in collaboration with Peacock Visual Arts, exhibition publication.

2007 Deitsch, Dina et al. “Joel Ross / Room 28” Thresholds: Portibility, MIT Dept. of Architecture, MIT Press, issue 34, p.. 54-56.

Bly, Liz. Review: “Tell Me Something I Don’t Know at raw&co,” Art US, Issue 19, p. 51.

“The James, Chicago”, Conde Nast Traveler, May. 2006 Glusac, Elaine. “The Class of 2006”, The Dallas Morning News, Nov. Hochman, David. “Travel: Chicago”, Forbes Life, Oct, p. 60-61.

Hahn, Jason. “The Art of Comfort”, Design and Architecture, Issue 032, p. 58 61.

Ballinger, Barbara. “Making the It List,” i4design, fall 06, vol.1, no.3.

Toller, Carol. “Sleepover: The James Hotel, Chicago”, The Globe and Mail, Wed. Sept 27, Hotels, Travel, R-9.

Artner, Alan. Review of “Under Fire” at I Space, Chicago Tribune, Sept 22, sec.7, p. 25.

Chen, Aric. “Hotel of the Moment: The James”, Departures, Sept. cbs 2 eye on chicago june 2006 video clip – review of James Hotel, http://www.jameshotels.com/press/index.php?id=43 2005 A.M. “Joel Ross: A Place Some People Call America”, www.flavorpill.net, issue 58, Oct p. 25-31.

McKinnon, John. “Flagging Power: Questioning the Authority of a Symbol”, news, Dec. 2004 Santomauro, Jenny. “Spies Like Us: ‘Shutters’ at UB Art Gallery”, ArtVoice: Buffalo’s Alternative Newsweekly, Sept 30.

Keever, Erin. “Going West”, Catalogue, Arthouse at the Jones Center.

Koper, Rachel. “In Review: Going West”, Glasstire: Texas Visual Art Online, http://www.glasstire.com/reviews/austin/arthouse_gowest.htm

Selected Bibliography continued 2004 Atwell, Wendy. “Reviews: Austin, Texas”, Artpapers, p.54.

Gonzalez, Karen C. “Austin Review: Going West”, ARTL!ES, Spring, p..70-71 Review: “Austin and Art Destination to Watch”, www.inthegalleriesaustin.com, Feb. Review: “Between Fact and Fiction / Contemporary Art”, The Galleries in Austin, http://www.inthe galleriesaustin.com/eletter.htm Review: “The Myth of the West”, Austin American-Statesman, Feb 24, sec. E2.

Van Ryzin, Jeane Claire. Review: “Go West, Young Curator, and Find a Curious Collection for Inner Cowboys”, Austin American-Statesman, Feb. 5.

Radloff, Laura. Review: “A New Look at the Old West”, The Daily Texan, Feb 2.

2001 Review: “Leaving Stories project curated by Monique Meloche”, Bridge 5, vol.2, no.1, p.133-141.

Nelson, James. “Gun takes on loaded forms in exhibit, but most misfire” The Birmingham News, Aug. Speh, Scott. “Sex in Chicago”, artnet.com, Oct 3.

Finch, Leah. Review: “I Borrowed My Mother’s Bedroom”, New Art Examiner, Sept.

Kastner, Jeffery. Review: “Playing Dead and other Recent Work”, ArtTex, May/June.

2001 Waddell, Stephanie. Review: “I Borrowed My Mother’s Bedroom”, TenByTen Magazine (www.tenbyten.net/joelross.html), June.

2000 Wiens, Ann. The Chicago Collection, fall.

Bulka, Michael and Pedro Velez. Review: “HOMEWRECKER”, Chicago Art Critics Association, FGA online (http://www.chicagoartcriticsassociation.org).

1999 Wiens, Ann. Review: “Measuring Texas”, Dialogue, Sept/Oct. Hixson, Kathryn. Review: “Measuring Texas”, New Art Examiner, Nov. Bastyr, Kim. “The Fab Five: A Sampling of Chicago’s New Guard of Artists”, Chicago Social, Sept.

Artner, Alan. Review: “Measuring Texas”, Chicago Tribune, June.

Camper, Fred. “Size Matters”, Chicago Reader, June.

1997 La Piana, Siobhan. “Obsessive Replay”, The Cleveland Times, March.

Litt, Steven. “Disturbing, provocative views of the mundane”, The Plain Dealer, March 14.

1996 Wiens, Ann. Review, New City, Dec 5.

Dorlings, Jim. Review: “Buried Alive”, The Chicago Reader, Oct. Syahn, Gorel. Review: “Har soks konstens innersta sanningar”, Sydsvenska Dagbladet, May. Wickberg, Jenny. Review: “Installation med hangande tandborstar”, Skanska Dagbladet, May. Teaching Experience 2013-14 Chair of Graphic Design, School of Art + Design, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, IL 2010Associate Professor, School of Art + Design, University of Illinois at UrbanaChampaign, IL 2009-11 Chair of Foundations, School of Art + Design, University of Illinois at UrbanaChampaign, IL 2004-10 Assistant Professor, School of Art + Design, University of Illinois at UrbanaChampaign, IL 1998-02 Visiting Assistant Professor, The School of the Art Institute of Chicago, Chicago, IL Grants, Fellowships, and Awards 2008 Arnold O. Beckman Research Award, University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign 2007 Arnold O. Beckman Research Award, University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign

Grants, Fellowships, and Awards continued 2007 Residency, Zygote Press, Cleveland, OH 2005 Research Board Grant, University of Illinois 1999 Illinois Arts Council Fellowship 1997 Community Arts Assistance Program Grant, Chicago Department of Cultural Affairs Fellowship Finalist Award, Illinois Arts Council 1996 Chicago Artists International Program Grant for residency abroad, Chicago Department of Cultural Affairs

Monique Meloche Gallery was founded in October 2000 with an inaugural exhibition titled Homewrecker at Meloche’s home, and officially opened to the public in May 2001.

Working with an international group of emerging artists in all media, the gallery presents conceptually challenging installations in Chicago and at art fairs internationally with an emphasis on curatorial and institutional outreach.