New American Paintings MFA Annual Issue #171

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CONTENTS

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EDITOR’S NOTE Steven Zevitas

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JUROR’S COMMENTS Devon Zimmerman, PhD Curator of Modern and Contemporary Art, Ogunquit Museum of American Art, Ogunquit, ME

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NOTEWORTHY Juror’s and Editor’s Picks

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JUROR’S SELECTIONS MFA Annual Review 2023

175

EDITOR’S SELECTIONS MFA Annual Review 2023

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PRICING GUIDE Asking prices for selected works

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Eble p28

Apr/May

EDITOR’S NOTE

I have spent my entire adult life living and working in Boston. While a lot has changed over the years, Boston remains a small town with its own quirky, unflappable way of being. In terms of the arts, the city has always been an extremely strong supporter of the performing arts, while the fine arts have taken somewhat of a back seat, especially when it comes to contemporary art. We are lucky to have a clutch of world class art institutions in Boston and its immediate environs—the Museum of Fine Arts and the Institute of Contemporary Art, among them—yet the most forward thinking and interesting programming tends to happen at smaller institutions and non-profits. I am happy to say that under the curatorial leadership of this issue’s juror, Devon Zimmerman, we have another institution in proximity to Boston that has a lot of exciting things planned: the Ogunquit Museum of American Art (OMAA).

After spending four years at the Cooper Hewitt, Smithsonian Design Museum, Devon joined the OMAA in early 2022 as Curator of Modern and Contemporary Art, and he is quickly making his mark. As I write this, he has just opened the first institutional exhibition of much lauded painter Anthony Cudahy.

Devon’s passion for contemporary art was evident when I first met him in 2023, and I am extraordinarily impressed by him and his vision for the OMAA As juror for this issue, Devon did a superlative job of sifting through a bewildering amount of visual information and arriving at a group of artists

7

who each have their distinct practices and yet, collectively, tell us a lot about where the medium of painting is at this current moment.

More than seven hundred MFA candidates and recent graduates, from seventy-two art schools in total, applied to the MFA Annual issue this year.

All the major schools were well represented by multiple applicants, with the School of the Art Institute of Chicago, the Rhode Island School of Design, the Yale School of Art, the Virginia Commonwealth University School of the Arts, and the Cranbrook Academy of Art leading the way. I should say that we received very strong applications from numerous programs, so it’s clear that the “elite” art schools do not have a monopoly on artistic talent.

While they are all very much emerging, several artists in this issue—Josiah Ellner, Khalif Tahir Thompson, and Lizzy Gabay, among them—have already had solo exhibitions at prominent galleries. I expect that several others will soon follow suit.

Please have a careful look through these pages. There is a lot to like.

Enjoy the issue!

Steven Zevitas Publisher & Editor

STEVEN ZEVITAS GALLERY 450 Harrison Ave. Boston, MA 02118

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May 17 - July 6, 2024

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JUROR’S COMMENTS

DEVON ZIMMERMAN, PHD Curator of Modern and Contemporary Art, Ogunquit Museum of American Art, Ogunquit, ME

Artists working through and emerging from their graduate studies have been tasked with making sense of a world unmoored. The ongoing recurrences of political quagmires and social violence cloud paths forward in an eternal return of the same. Meanwhile, the climate crisis continues to careen evermore into the present. All these events stream image after image, endlessly, into lived experience, blurring the thin boundaries between the real and the virtual. Artists must navigate and contend with the vertigo of this present moment; art has long been a site where new imaginaries for living are transformed into real praxis.

The talented group of artists in this issue of New American Paintings gestures toward paths of rethinking. Their work expounds upon renewed approaches to engaging with the natural world; to constructing and being in space; and to reflecting on the body as a site of affect, memory, and resilience in the world. These paths all intersect and grapple with the ever-complicating forces of technology, history, and identity.

Painting has a long tradition of marshalling abstraction to channel more direct and affectual relations to the natural world. Among the artists selected, there is a strong impulse toward abstraction as a device to break down barriers between society and the environment. For one, Sabrina Piersol’s compositions undulate between the specificity of the flora and arid topography of Southwestern meadowlands and the billowing, contorting abstract forms that extend from and around them.

The poetics of Piersol’s work activate a vital naturalism that is alive on her canvases. Sarah Martin-Nuss’s work explores the connectivity of ecological systems. Her paintings’ murky fields of color and electric lines 9

Littlejohn p74 Simpson p149 Ellner p30

collapse differing scales and pictorial genres; in doing so, they model a breakdown between virtual, built, and natural environments. Engaging landscape as a conceptual project, Jacob Littlejohn’s sonorous compositions operatically recall feelings and histories of the sublime, whereas Kyung Kim’s gossamer-like washes of color register the sensorial impressions—of sound, temperature, and time—that she experienced in the Korean landscape.

Abstraction’s nonlinearity also allows artists to collapse temporal divides and bring to the present reflections on and connections to ancestral histories. In this issue, Gabriel Arturo Rojas’s exploration of abstraction brings forward ancestral systems of knowledge and meaning imbedded into patterning and the materiality of objects, such as rope, textiles, and wooden constructions. Ivan David Ng, meanwhile, reflects on the temporal nature of lunar and solar cycles that bind the present with ancestral pasts. Through richly layered paintings that incorporate collaged elements (including photography) he crafts constellational meditations that collapse the divide between lived experience and a lost history.

Figuration—particularly, representations of the body—continues to be a critical vehicle for reflecting on being in this time. For example, Heejo Kim’s curving figures in high-key colors are caught by fleeting glances; her fragmentary scenes of momentary encounters contemplate a desire for connectivity and intimacy in a fractured world. Sara Nickleson contends with this fragmentation, and the melancholy it instills, through uncanny bodies constructed from an archive of collaged, found images,

“Artists must navigate and contend with the vertigo of this present moment; art has long been a site where new imaginaries for living are transformed into real praxis.” while Bryan Ali Sanchez locates the physical toll and psychological trauma of the humanitarian crisis at the U.S./Mexico border on the bodies of figures in his work.

at the seeming ludic nature of such quotidian activities, while also asserting their essential meaning to life. Miranda Pikul gravitates toward a similar sense of humor in the tensions that guide interpersonal relationships and societal expectations.

Memory frequently offers a space for thinking through personal histories and identities, seen here in the work of William Maxen, whose phantom-like figures emerge from veils of color washes—apparitions from personal and historical memory. The dissolution of solid forms in Maxen’s work blends boundaries of history and identity that define his mixed-race experience. Elsewhere, Louise Mandumbwa engages memories of home through her diasporic lens as she creates works from trace imagery that is blurred at times and photographically sharp at others.

The multidirectional currents churning the tumult of the present age brings forth a range of responses that overlap with and extend beyond the themes above. Josiah Ellner, Yuan Ge, and Abrahm Guthrie’s fluid figurative scenes harken to a desire for unity between humanity and the natural world. Benjamin Kaita and Ji Woo Kim engage the archive as a source of navigating person histories, while Evan Mazellan and Ellery Thompson turn to a world effused of things.

Reflections on space—whether constructed or imagined—is a recurring theme among many of the artists selected for this edition of NAP. Khalif Tahir Thompson’s intimate interiors emanate as extensions of the figures that occupy them; Skyler Simpson’s cinematically composed paintings play off the tension between mid-century modernist architecture and highly decorative ornamentation to examine the construction and intrusion of socially defined gender roles within domestic spaces.

Meanwhile, Shabnam Jannesari crafts spaces outside of conventional norms within patriarchal systems to find space as an Iranian woman for female empowerment.

Surrealist strategies are also present through many practices, including that of Ji Zou, Taekyung Suh, Jingqi Wang Steinhiser, and Sangun Park.

Grace Bromley and Alexis Mabry, meanwhile, challenge architypes of femininity, while Dana Schein and Nour Malas follow extensions of the physical into the psychological. Kathryn Mecca and Madeleine Herrison-Leplae both capture fragments of bodies and nature, respectively, in poetic, non-linear explorations; Rachel Hakimian Emenaker, on the other hand, examines experiences of transnational migration, while Kevin Cobb analytically provides a personal perspective on perception itself.

In times of cynicism, joy and humor remain crucial for re-enchanting us with lived experience. Finding poetry in mundane practices of the everyday—from riding bikes to drawing outside—Alyssa Eble pokes

Our fractious moment brings prismatic responses. The varied approaches and interests of the artists in this issue of NAP offer a range of paths for making sense of the present.

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NOTEWORTHY

JUROR’S PICK: SABRINA PIERSOL

p123

In our ongoing reckoning with nature during a time of climate crisis, Sabrina Piersol’s work lends breathtaking space for thinking with and of the natural world. Her pulsating, landscape–like compositions emit an aliveness, an agency to nature. She does so with a remarkable push/pull between the detail of a specific flower or place and the open extensions of abstraction that offer sites of entry and imagination. The poetics of her work relate to nature’s place in a post-humanist ecology that binds humanity and the environment on the same sensuous and psychological plane.

EDITOR’S PICK: GABRIEL ARTURO ROJAS

p133

It is no secret that abstraction has taken a back seat to figurative painting over the past decade, both on a commercial and critical level. The art world is funny like that; the individuals and institutions that make up this small but complex ecosystem have a need to rally around something. Rojas’s work proves that abstraction has plenty to offer; his practice is complex—conceptually, and in terms of its facture. Born in Argentina, Rojas incorporates a range of formal strategies, from Andean textile design to modernist painting. His work is very much about the act of “making” and, to this end, Rojas’s fluid studio practice brings together a variety of materials that push, pull, react to, and, ultimately, reinforce one another. His paintings feel like living things, each in possession of its own logic and agency.

SELECTED ARTISTS: PACIFIC COAST REVIEW 2023

JUROR’S SELECTIONS: GRACE BROMLEY KEVIN COBB ALYSSA EBLE JOSIAH ELLNER RACHEL HAKIMIAN EMENAKER YUAN GE ABRAHM GUTHRIE MADELEINE HERISSON-LEPLAE SHABNAM JANNESARI BENJAMIN KAITA HEEJO KIM JI WOO KIM KYUNG KIM JACOB LITTLEJOHN ALEXIS MABRY NOUR MALAS LOUISE MANDUMBWA SARAH MARTIN-NUSS WILLIAM MAXEN EVAN MAZELLAN KATHRYN MECCA IVAN DAVID NG SARA NICKLESON SANGUN PARK SABRINA PIERSOL MIRANDA PIKUL GABRIEL ARTURO ROJAS BRYAN ALI SANCHEZ DANA SCHEIN SKYLER SIMPSON JINGQI WANG STEINHISER TAEKYUNG SUH KHALIF TAHIR THOMPSON ELLERY THOMPSON JI ZOU

EDITOR’S SELECTIONS:

JAMES PARKER FOLEY LIZZY GABAY YEZI LOU AMADEO MORELOS FAVELA JESSE ZUO

Suh p159

JUROR’S SELECTIONS

Artists are presented in alphabetical order.

Artist biographies have been edited to prioritize recent highlights.

Pricing Guide can be found on p201.

GRACE BROMLEY

graceannbromley@gmail.com graceannbromley.com @grace__bromley Virginia Commonwealth University

b. 1994 Chicago, IL | lives in Richmond, VA Education

Through painting I challenge archetypes of femininity and question expectations surrounding care, strength, and martyrdom. I reimagine familial stories, biblical folklore, and classic tropes of the hero, villain, and damsel through technicolor avatars and multilayered fields of light. By creating my own mythological taxonomy, I invite the viewer to indulge in fantasy as a way of grappling with interpersonal dynamics.

As a worldbuilder with a background in set painting, I often imbue the work with a sense of theatricality. Although these figures are bathed in dramatic and heavenly light, they are anything but spotlight seeking or “divinely feminine.”

They are tired, balding, jealous, resentful, and cowering with inescapable embarrassment. At times they are emboldened as celestial bodies, weightlessly orbiting one another, only to relish in the freedom of disappearing into thin air.

These paintings serve as portals to self-perception, self-preservation, and an exploration in the otherworldliness of humankind itself.

2024

MFA candidate, Virginia Commonwealth University, Richmond, VA

2018

BFA, School of the Art Institute of Chicago, Chicago, IL Residencies

2021

La Maison de Beaumont, Beamont-de Pertuis, France Solo Exhibitions

2023

In the Field, SPRING/BREAK, New York, NY Peculiar Countenance, D. D. D. D., New York, NY Latent Dreaming, with AucArt, Seefood Room, Hong Kong, China Water is Not for Sale, Bloom Galerie, Saint-Tropez, France

2022

Action, New Collectors, New York, NY My Secret Place, Mozuku Gallery, Taipei, Taiwan They’re On to You, Thierry Goldberg Gallery, New York, NY

The Dwellers oil on canvas, 70 x 64 inches

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BROMLEY

Both Brides oil on canvas, 72 x 90 inches

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Achilles Heel oil on canvas, 60 x 52 inches

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BROMLEY

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Siren’s Wake oil on canvas, 72 x 110 inches

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KEVIN COBB

917.450.8366 (Storage) kbc2135@columbia.edu kevin-cobb.com @forprophet Columbia University

b. 1994 Baltimore, MD | lives in New York, NY Education

I play with perspective, reflection, and flatness to explore embodiment and identity; creation and imagination; illusion and truth. Most of my works with spherical perspective are painted from observation, but I also work extensively with 3D modeling, animation, and photogrammetry to bring a heightened sense of design and hyperreality to others. I am devoted to finding new and broader ways of seeing the world. As science and technology fractalize traditional anthropologies and artificial minds challenge our senses of self, originality, and agency, I seek to freshly represent how it is to be a subject in the world with a careful, scientific, and enigmatic eye.

2023

MFA, Columbia University, New York, NY

2016

BFA, Maryland Institute College of Art, Baltimore, MD Residencies

2023

Hercules Art, New York, NY Solo Exhibitions

2023

What’s New in Still Life, Portrait, and Landscape, LaiSun Keane, Boston, MA Momentum: Imagining Social Justice Art Exhibit, CSREA, Brown University, Providence, RI Columbia MFA Summer Exhibition, Storage, New York, NY Stand-outs: Selections from the Columbia MFA Program, Fredric Snitzer Gallery, Miami, FL Collections Beth Rudin DeWoody, West Palm Beach, FL Represented by Storage, New York, NY Klaus von Nichtssagend Gallery, New York, NY LaiSun Keane, Boston, MA

Anglic Tiltle oil on canvas, 10.5 x 21.5 inches

22

COBB

He Is! oil on linen, 39 x 39 inches Rainbow Pumpkin oil on canvas, 44 x 50 inches

23

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ALYSSA EBLE

alyssa.eble@gmail.com alyssaeble.com @a_boneserble University of New Mexico

b. 1986, Oaklawn, IL | lives in Albuquerque, NM Education

Simply being present feels tenuous in this current era of distraction. My work is a conscious attempt towards happiness, humor, and resiliency, chronicling the complex nature of being human during these modern times. I illustrate figures who seek to stay present when anxieties and emotions abound. When portraying such commonplace scenes, I utilize symbolism along with my materials to describe the visual, digital, and physical performance within quotidian life. My compositions are exercises in color, movement, and material application; they build unworldly yet tangible narratives of awkwardness and warmth. I am partial to the tactility and legacy of drawing and painting, and use both loose gesture and rendering to mediate between the corporeal and the imagined. By embracing a range of timelines, I create layers of personal memories and art historical references, folding various histories upon themselves.

2023

MFA, University of New Mexico, Albuquerque, NM

2008

BFA, Indiana University, Bloomington, IN Solo Exhibitions

2023

Glory Box, Sanitary Tortilla Factory, Albuquerque, NM Selected Group Exhibitions

2023

Modern Women, Runnels Gallery, Eastern New Mexico University, Portales, NM Connective Tissue, Sanitary Tortilla Factory, Albuquerque, NM

2022

Humor Has It, Olympia, New York, NY Propagate, Tamarind Institute, Albuquerque, NM

2020

Gesture and Motion, Site:Brooklyn, New York, NY

2018

watch it burn, Trestle Art Space, New York, NY

2017

Tooth and Nail, Peninsula Art Space, New York, NY Collections Beth Rudin DeWoody, West Palm Beach, FL The Graham Collection, Albuquerque, NM

nude artist standing in front of the bathroom mirror (after Balthus) oil on canvas, 60 x 54 inches

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EBLE

joy rider oil and oil stick on canvas, 54 x 60 inches

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outdoor practice acrylic, oil, and oil stick on canvas, 54 x 60 inches

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JOSIAH ELLNER

josiahcellner@gmail.com @josiahcellner School of the Art Institute of Chicago

b. 1996 Milwaukee, WI | lives in Chicago, IL Education

My paintings are born from narratives that revolve around the relationship between humanity and the natural world. They draw from moments that embody the feeling of oneness with nature; moments of intimacy, tranquility, and reflection; and experiences that allow us to perceive the greater connection that pervades the environments we inhabit. These moments are often pulled from childhood experiences of wonder and everyday moments that conjure feelings of nostalgia.

The formal decisions I make in the work are all informed by the characteristics of these moments, which tend toward the awkward, whimsical, playful, and sometimes slightly humorous. This results in ungainly figures and highly saturated colors that express an augmented sense of reality. Through these abstractions I strive to achieve a heightened narrative that encapsulates these moments of connection that we have with the natural world in a digital age.

2023

MFA, School of the Art Institute of Chicago, Chicago, IL

2019

BFA, University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee, Milwaukee County, WI Selected Group Exhibitions

2023

Night Glimmer, LATITUDE Gallery, New York, NY Kindred Spirits, SENS Gallery, Hong Kong, China California Dreamin, Lorin Gallery, Los Angeles, CA Homecoming, tchotchke gallery, New York, NY

2022

Hella Good, Glass Rice, San Francisco, CA Gentle Distraction, Août Gallery, Beirut, Lebanon

2021

Creature Comforts, tchotchke gallery, New York, NY

Mako’s Wish oil paint and oil pastel, 40 x 28 inches

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ELLNER

Earth Star oil paint, 20 x 19 inches Moon Peeker oil paint, 28 x 24 inches

31

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RACHEL HAKIMIAN EMENAKER

rachelemenaker.com @rachelemenaker University of California Los Angeles

b. 1992 Los Angeles, CA | lives in Los Angeles, CA Education

As an Armenian American raised between Suriname and Russia, I have always had to navigate the complexity of multiculturalism, diaspora, migration, and globalization. My art employs traditional Eastern ways of art and craft, which have rich histories in global trade—such as textile and tile making—to further explore these ideas.

2024

MFA candidate, University of California, Los Angeles, Los Angeles, CA

2015

BFA, Biola University, La Mirada, CA Residencies

2019

Monastery of St. Gertrude, Cottonwood, ID Solo Exhibitions

2023

Dreaming Between Memories, American University of Armenia, Yerevan, Armenia Selected Group Exhibitions

2023

We Will Dance in the Garden Again, Guest House, Inglewood, CA GLAMFA, California State University, Long Beach, Long Beach, CA

2016

25 and Under, Museum of Contemporary Art San Diego, San Diego, CA Collections Boise City, Boise, ID Biola University, La Mirada, CA

Untitled (Dinner at Tante Sylvia’s) batik/dye on cotton, 57 x 67 inches

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EMENAKER

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Untitled (Suriname) batik/dye on canvas, 70 x 156 inches

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YUAN GE

irisge66@gmail.com @irisge66 Savannah College of Art and Design

b. 1976 Tiajin, China | lives in Duluth, GA Education

I found myself mesmerized by the mysterious beauty and complexities of the natural world; I also see the same qualities of vulnerability and power interwoven in the aesthetic of female forms. Inspired by the sanctity and power of water, I infuse fluid elements in my paintings to provoke a sense of fantasy, reminding people of brief moments when life felt like a series of dreamy encounters.

I paint in oil, which allows me to achieve a sense of healing and selfdetermining resolution through its variety and flexibility. My instinctive process reveals an imaginative energy through an accumulation of unreal colors and distorted forms that gradually fill the watersheds of time and space. I use abstract expression to endow a sense of space and emotion toward my work, theoretically avoiding the collisions of sexuality being compared to literal forms. Starting from secret, automatic drawings, I articulate for the familiar then fashion them into something strange—a creative experience I hope holds my audience in suspension so that they may reconsider their own personal struggles.

2022

MFA, Savannah College of Art and Design (SCAD), Atlanta, GA Solo Exhibitions

2022

Diamagnetic Suspension, Mason Fine Art, Atlanta, GA Selected Group Exhibitions

2023

Rise and Thrive, Asian American Pacific Islander Heritage show, The Coca-Cola Company Global Headquarters, Atlanta, GA

2022

Voice of Silence, The H Foundation, Los Angeles, CA Spring Forward, SCAD, Atlanta, GA Forbidden Fruit, Piano Craft Gallery, Boston, MA

2021

Moments like this, Womanmade Gallery, Chicago, IL

I’m a place you wandered oil on canvas, 48 x 48 inches

38

GE

The Insider oil on canvas, 30 x 40 inches

39

Low Tide oil on canvas, 30 x 40 inches

40

ABRAHM GUTHRIE

abrahmguthrie@gmail.com @abrahmguthrie University of Wisconsin-Madison

b. 1983 Portland, OR | lives in Milwaukee, WI Education

They swim, they make love, they experience each other and the nature that surrounds them as an animating force. I paint them as if I am watching a dream or a fairy tale unfold. With my brush I work to find the light of their surroundings or a glimpse at their personality, exploring the touch that becomes the distinctive qualities of their flesh.

2020

Each painting begins in a state of suspension—of time, of movement, of light—the figures a combination of corporeal beings and psychic energy. I am interested in them as a counterweight to the entombing world of highways, phones, emails, and the constant barrage of clicks and likes. They mature naturally through time and iterations, finding connections and meaning in their bare, animal state.

2021

MFA, University of Wisconsin-Madison (UW), Madison, WI

2012

BFA, Rhode Island School of Design, Providence, RI Residencies Wormfarm Institute, Reedsburg, WI Solo Exhibitions

2023

Marking the Seasons, Marian Art Gallery, Mount Mary University, Milwaukee, WI

2022

What if Where I am is What I Need?, Backspace Gallery, Milwaukee, WI

2020 2019

Interiors, Art Lofts Gallery, UW, Madison, WI The Games They Play, Art Lofts Gallery, UW, Madison, WI Selected Group Exhibitions

2023

Small Works, Soft Times Gallery, San Francisco, CA Every Rock Turns, Each Stick Breaks, Usable Space, Milwaukee, WI

2022

GOOD DOG BAD DOG, SHED, New Orleans, LA

2021

The Sex Show, Usable Space, Milwaukee, WI

2019

Out of Scale, Gallery 7, UW, Madison, WI

The Promise oil on board, 14 x 11 inches

42

GUTHRIE

Soul Journey oil on canvas, 30 x 30 inches

43

Hidden Place oil on canvas, 30 x 30 inches

44

MADELEINE HERISSON-LEPLAE

madeleine.leplae@gmail.com @madeleineleplae Virginia Commonwealth University

b. 1994 Biarritz, France | lives in Richmond, VA Education

Having spent hundreds of hours as a passenger driving through Midwest landscapes, I am interested in reorganizing these scenes to tell small poems. Through reorganization and abbreviation, I discover how to understand the image, really breaking it down to its bare bones. My flat and patterned base style is heavily inspired by the look of world-building in video games, such as Animal Crossing, Super Mario, and The Sims—games that reference our real world, while snapping to the grid of the magical, digital space. This portfolio of paintings represents my exploration of human life and death using trees as characters. The trees stand alone on the canvas, confined by the edges, and forced into artificial silhouettes.

Using trees, I feel more comfortable confronting questions of life and death, both naturally and violently, as it relates to human life.

2025

MFA candidate, Virginia Commonwealth University, Richmond, VA

2017

BFA, School of the Art Institute of Chicago, Chicago, IL Residencies

2019

Ace Hotel, Chicago, IL Solo Exhibitions

2023

Rotten Luck, Cleaner Gallery, Chicago, IL

2018

Spare Stripes, Yours Truly, Milwaukee, WI Selected Group Exhibitions

2023

Adventure in my dream, Andrew Rafacz, Chicago, IL Local Visions II, Art Museum, Northern Illinois University, Dekalb, IL Viewing Room, Marvin Gardens, New York, NY West, Wester, Westest 4, Left Field, Los Osos, CA

2022

July Show, SULK, Chicago, IL

2021

LUCKY CHARM, with Moosey, Hoxton Arches, London, UK Usual Objects, Carrie Secrist Gallery, Chicago, IL

The very first leaf to fall from a tree oil on canvas, 45 x 39 inches

46

HERISSON-LEPLAE

First kill oil on canvas, 30 x 40 inches Fall drive through the forest oil on canvas, 24 x 48 inches

47

48

SHABNAM JANNESARI

508.638.8944 shabnamjannesari@gmail.com @shabnam.jannesari University of Massachusetts Dartmouth

b. 1991 Hastings, NE | lives in Hastings, NE Education

My work challenges the oppression that Iranian women face within the Islamic patriarchy. Rather than explicit radicalism, I aim to craft an alternative world in my paintings—a realm exuding quiet power, intimacy, and freedom. Constructing heterotopic dreamscapes allows for an escape from the harsh reality of oppression and empowers the women depicted. These artworks narrate the life I left behind; they are exploring the bittersweet nostalgia of distant intimacies. Close friends and family members transform into surreal figures in idealistic visions of an alternate reality. While these paintings convey my own personal journey, their aim is to resonate with any woman who is or has been subjected to censorship or oppression. Purposefully situating figures in heterotopic spaces, I unveil and empower the Iranian female identity, challenging traditions of objectification. My art stares back, defying the notion that women should conform. By creating imaginary spaces, I construct an emotive world and shed light on the plight of Iranian women. Through this process, I reclaim multiple aspects of my identity, establishing a profound longing for genuine selfhood.

2021

MFA, University of Massachusetts Dartmouth, Dartmouth, MA Residencies

2022

Chautauqua Visual Arts (CVA), Chautauqua, NY Solo Exhibitions

2023

Each String is Thread, Each Color a Chord,

2021

The Carpet Grew like a Garden, Gallery 263,

Fred Simon Gallery, Omaha, NE Boston, MA Ribbons of Space, Jackson Dinsdale Art Gallery Center, Hastings College, Hastings, NE

Selected Group Exhibitions 2023

A Pot Nudged Into Oblivion, Miranda Arts Project Space, Port Chester, NY Social Memory: Sites of Remembrance, Elizabeth Foundation for the Arts, Brooklyn, NY Collections Fidelity Corporate, Boston, MA University of Massachusetts School of Law, Dartmouth, MA

Green House oil on canvas, 55 x 66 inches

50

JANNESARI

51

Azin is Getting Married oil on canvas, 55 x 82 inches Floating oil on canvas, 47 x 77 inches

52

BENJAMIN KAITA

@benjaminkaita Southern Illinois University Carbondale

b. 1996 San Diego, CA | lives in Carbondale, IL Education

My artwork addresses the loss of my Japanese heritage from my family’s intergenerational experiences in the United States. I can connect with my lost Japanese identity by pairing the remnants of my family’s past with more dominant American realities—such as the Japanese American internment camps of World War II—in my artwork. Multiple types of techniques, materials, and imagery are layered on to one of my collaged paintings. Certain layers are seamless, while others are dissonant. With both I seek to question what right I have to appropriate imagery from a history I was not present for, a culture I never experienced, and a family that is no longer here. The central family figure in any painting is consequently isolated in a fragmented and shifting landscape that now defines their identity.

2023

MFA, Southern Illinois University Carbondale (SIU), Carbondale, IL

2021

BFA, California State University, Long Beach (CSU), Long Beach, CA Selected Group Exhibitions

2022

Diversity Week Art Exhibition, Student Center Art Alley, SIU, Carbondale, CA MFA Exhibition (online), Missoula, MT

2020

Near Far, Dennis W. Dutzi Gallery, CSU, Long Beach, CA INSIGHTS, School of Art Galleries, CSU, Long Beach, CA

Fixed Exhibits oil on canvas, 67 x 41 inches

54

KAITA

Staged Imitations oil on canvas, 66 x 38 inches Recurring Headstones oil on canvas, 72 x 52 inches

55

56

KAITA

57

Family Reunions oil on canvas, 24 x 40 inches

58

HEEJO KIM

420.539.1080 (C. Grimaldis Gallery) heejoe0214@gmail.com heejokim0214.com @heee__h Maryland Institute College of Art

b. 1995 Seoul, South Korea | lives in Baltimore, MD Education

The figures in my oil paintings have their facial expressions hidden, as if keeping a secret or like they are asleep. Their huge bodies look heavy enough to make a lot of noise when moving around, but, paradoxically, they also seem to float as in dreams or recollections, implying the suspension of time in memory.

Tenderness, to quote Roland Barthes, is an “infinite…metonymy” for love.

The gentle gestures of the figures in my works are a metonym of their desire to be loved by others. Even in a small space, they keep a careful distance from each other, which expresses a waiting for affection so as not to seize it right away. Even if their love needs more time to be noticed, it is always there. Their symbiotic relationship is based on the Buddhist belief of Dependent Arising, which offers proof of one’s existence through the interaction with others and surrounding objects. Therefore, the figures are here, in this place, to find and grasp their identity and existence comfortably by staying together.

2023

MFA, Maryland Institute College of Art (MICA), Baltimore, MD Solo Exhibitions

2022

Hi, could you spare some time for me?, Gateway Galleries, MICA, Baltimore, MD Selected Group Exhibitions

2023

Art Miami, Miami, FL Summer Focus Collection, Uprise Art, New York, NY Summer ‘23, C. Grimaldis Gallery, Baltimore, MD Constellations: MFA Thesis Exhibition, The Peale, Baltimore, MD

2022

Figure/Narrative, C. Grimaldis Gallery, Baltimore, MD Represented by C. Grimaldis Gallery, Baltimore, MD

Red Booth oil on canvas, 93 x 63 inches

60

KIM

Glimmering Light oil on canvas, 48 x 36 inches Excuse Me? oil on canvas, 48 x 36 inches

61

62

JI WOO KIM

jiwoo-kim.com @jiweowmeow School of Visual Arts

b. 1996 Suwon, South Korea | lives in New York, NY Education

I make work that addresses the meaning of home or, sometimes, the lack thereof for individuals like myself: those who grew up as children of multiple cultures and places. My paintings are a personal investigation into the complex question of how we as individuals define home and, more specifically, where home is located for people with variegated cultural identities. My own experience as a Generation 1.5 immigrant has put me on a journey of floating back and forth in perpetuum between time zones seventeen hours apart, trying to navigate myself to a place that feels like home. Having never been able to find a sense of belonging to any one culture or environment, painting has become a vehicle for me to create my own sense of community. I focus on depicting group scenes that convey a sense of true belonging between the figures, while also observing their surrounding cultural and physical environments. Through painting these scenes that are both foreign and familiar to me, I am able to visually concoct my own cultural identity and history.

2023

MFA, School of Visual Arts, New York, NY

2018

BFA, Pratt Institute, Brooklyn, NY

2022

Rediscover, Recapture, Reclaim, Blouin Division,

2021

We Yearn to Belong, ATM Gallery, New York, NY

Solo Exhibitions Montreal, Canada

Selected Group Exhibitions 2023

KIAF Art Seoul, with Carl Kostyál, Seoul, South Korea Poetics of Falsification, Harper’s Gallery, East Hampton, NY Sprout, STEMS Gallery, Brussels, Belgium

2022

Through a Glass, Darkly, Carl Kostyál, Milan, Italy

2021

Alphabetic Image, Arsenal Contemporary Art, New York, NY 36 Paintings, Harper’s Gallery, East Hampton, NY

Haesu Gwaneum Statue at Naksansa Temple Yangyang oil on canvas, 18 x 14 inches

64

KIM

65

Dolhareubang, Jeju Island oil on canvas, 72 x 52 inches Gakhwangjeon Hall of Hwaeomsa Temple oil on canvas, 52 x 72 inches

66

KYUNG KIM

kyung-kim.com @kyung_kim Pratt Institute

b. 1996 Seoul, South Korea | lives in Brooklyn, NY Education

I create paintings using oil on clear primed linen, translating sensorial memories into images. My various sources of inspiration range from cherished objects to culturally significant artifacts, such as old Korean landscapes, architecture, and porcelain. These tangible influences intertwine with intangible elements encompassing temperature, time, sound, and scent. Through abstraction of space and shapes, I fuse these contrasting substances and capture fleeting moments that are otherwise elusive to grasp.

The use of monochromatic colors in each painting unifies all elements onto a single plane, minimizing distinctions and fostering a perception of harmonious coexistence. These colors blend with the natural hue of linen, resulting in an overall tone that is gentle and subdued. As I apply the paints my approach is not merely putting them on the surface; rather, I envision the act as a process of soaking the paint into the canvas. Hence, the work slowly unfolds and manifests itself—much like how my memories resurface. These shallow paint layers, along with areas where the colors are more assertive, establish a nuanced perception of space and generate a greater depth.

2019

BFA, School of the Art Institute of Chicago (SAIC), Chicago, IL Solo Exhibitions

2022

Nabee Sang-Ja, H Contemporary Gallery, Gyeonggi-do, South Korea Selected Group Exhibitions

2022

ZEROBASE X DKNY, CLUB MONACO, Seoul Auction, Seoul, South Korea Transference: A Study of Space, with Artsy, KO Art & Antiques

2021

GS E&S Gallery Sisun, Seoul, South Korea

2020

ZEROBASE, Seoul Auction, Seoul, South Korea

Lotus Leaves oil on linen, 31 x 25 inches

68

KIM

69

Muffled Not Silence oil on linen, 62 x 60 inches The Mirror Door oil on linen, 58 x 52 inches

70

JACOB LITTLEJOHN

jacoblittlejohn95@gmail.com jacoblittlejohn.format.com @jacobalittlejohn Hunter College

b. 1995 Edinburgh, Scotland | lives in New York, NY Education

My paintings are informed by the momentary sublime that is rooted in the vastness of the natural world. The work is centered around landscape as a concept—unity, balance, focal points, and transitions—and explores the tension between conscious and subconscious interpretations of place and spaces.

Through continually reworking intervals of space, rhythmic movement, and perspective, my work critiques the human consumption of natural locales, while honoring the poetic, everyday subject matter that is often overlooked. Each work attempts to draw from and convey both personal and cultural narratives; to preserve folktales; to survey notions of time; and to question our perceptions of reality by welcoming the supernatural or enigmatic. I am deeply interested in differing positions of interpretation and challenging conventional perception, which I feel abstraction encourages. I believe that each work created is deeply dependent on the ontological experience.

2024

MFA candidate, Hunter College, New York, NY

2018

BFA, The Glasgow School of Art, Glasgow, Scotland Residencies

2020

Leith School of Art, Edinburgh, Scotland Solo Exhibitions

2023

Seeing the forest through the trees, Half Gallery, New York, NY Metamorphosis, Half Gallery, New York, NY Selected Group Exhibitions

2023

Tales of Soil and Concrete, Pippy Houldsworth Gallery, London, England Fresh Nature, Kutlesa, Arth-Goldau, Switzerland

The Dipper oil on canvas, 11 x 9 inches

72

LITTLEJOHN

A Jets Feathering oil on linen, 76 x 64 inches Oshkosh oil on linen, 84 x 64 inches

73

74

ALEXIS MABRY

alexismabry.com @alexis.e.mabry Virginia Commonwealth University

b. 1985 Dallas, TX | lives in Richmond, VA Education

My work examines nuances of counterculture archetypes within narratives of personal experience and geography, pop culture, and the social mystifications around individuals often categorized as social deviants—members of various subcultures that include punks, metal heads, skateboarders, and bicycle motocross (BMX) riders. As an artist I am engaged in the poetic pursuit of failure, parallels of which I find in both painting and subcultural sports, with a focus on BMX and skateboarding. As a woman who participates in BMX, I interpret feminine empowerment through abject expression, highlighting injuries sustained from these brands of male dominated sports, while still opening an art historical dialog. Using a multitude of traditional art, material languages, and installation, I build an immersive experience that offers a new perspective into these worlds. The work examines intersections and contrasts between the reality and fantasy of these performers and their relative environments. Through observation and anecdote, I find the idea of a person more compelling when it lives in this popular imagination—one with a tenuous connection to lived reality.

2023

MFA, Virginia Commonwealth University, Richmond, VA

2019

Texas State University, San Marcos, TX

Solo Exhibitions 2022

Good Morning Cruel World, Rainbow, Cincinnati, OH

2020

Static Age, Third Room Project, Portland, OR Selected Group Exhibitions

2023

In the Field, SPRING/BREAK Art Show, New York, NY Peculiar Countenance, D. D. D. D., New York, NY Drop In, M+B, Los Angeles, CA

2022

A Healthy Dose of Nihilism, The Ministry of Culture & Tourism, Columbus, OH

2021

A Wished For and Welcome Guest, Co-Lab Projects,

2020

Never Ender Bender, Martha’s Contemporary,

2019

Routine Malfunction, 1969 Gallery, New York, NY

Austin, TX Austin, TX M*A*S*H, Co-Lab Projects, Austin, TX

Because Down is the New Up acrylic, wood, and printed fabric on canvas, 61.5 x 41 x 11 inches

76

MABRY

77

Ladies & Gentlemen Without a Safety Net wood, spray paint, acrylic, oil stick, paper collage, fabric, printed fabric, thread, sports bra, canvas, and charcoal, 50 x 39.5 x 27.5 inches I Shall Now Amputate, I Shall Now Contort acrylic, oil stick, fabric, printed fabric, braided pigtail wig, wood, paper collage, and thread on canvas, 46.5 x 52 x 17.5 inches

78

NOUR MALAS

nourkodmalas@gmail.com nourmalas.com @nourmalas_ School of the Art Institute of Chicago

b. 1995 Cannes, France | lives in Chicago, IL Education

Nour Malas explores transient emotions and the in-between. Her gestural, bold, and expressive brushstrokes give the paintings an almost sculptural sense. Her spontaneous and intuitive marks—signatures of Malas’s distinctive pictorial language—are a direct response to her environment. Expressions of curiosity, rage, and desperation, the mark making invites viewers to immerse themselves in poignant landscape, both internal and uncharted. Movement is muse as Malas follows forms (figures, animals, an occasional vehicle) along the image. The compositions fall within the link of past and present, depicting subtly moving figures within layers that exist between dream and reality. Using light and darkness to highlight these figures, and relying on the immediacy of painting, she explores the automation of memories appearing.

By making work that quite literally relates to her own body, Malas’s practice conveys ideas of what it’s like to be in a body and within a space: its gestures, its scale, and its preconscious memories. Led by a ceaseless exploration of emotive and psychological spaces, Malas intricately weaves movement and introspection into her compositions.

2022

MFA, School of the Art Institute of Chicago (SAIC), Chicago, IL

2017

BA, Goldsmiths, University of London, London, England Solo Exhibitions

2023

Running, DIANA, New York, NY Heavyweight, Mae Lombardi, Glencoe, IL

2019

Desperately Discontinuous Bodies, Gonzo Unit, Thessaloniki, Greece Selected Group Exhibitions

2023

Nouvelle Vague, lbf contemporary, London, England Nice Work Forever, SULK CHICAGO, Chicago, IL Four AM, Carbon12, Dubai, United Arab Emirates

2022

Catnip Meow, SAIC Galleries, Chicago, IL

2021

Garage Sale, Terrain Exhibitions, Chicago, IL Street Walk and Talk, Albany Carroll Arts Building, Chicago, IL Represented by Carbon12, Dubai, United Arab Emirates

Eyes Shut oil and pastel on panel, 8 x 10 inches

80

MALAS

Pink is the Color That Changed Me oil on canvas, 35 x 38 inches

81

I Just Need to Hear it Again oil on canvas, 45 x 48 inches

82

LOUISE MANDUMBWA

501.507.8112 louisemandumbwa@gmail.com louisemandumbwa.com @louise_mandumbwa Yale University

b. 1996 Francistown, Botswana | lives in New Haven, CT Education

Through the gestures of painting, drawing, and printmaking, my practice grasps at the notion of home in the context of a diasporic experience.

2024

MFA candidate, Yale University, New Haven, CT

2021

BFA, University of Central Arkansas, Conway, AR

Utilizing the material language of what would ordinarily be used to build a home in Southern Africa, my work employs the anecdote, the fragmented recollection, and a register of legibility. I am invested in a practice of close looking, exploring collective memory, and analyzing personal history; and in what is possible when the recognizable image or language begins to fall away.

2022

My work parses through what’s activated in the gaps between what is knowable and the other kinds of knowing that emerge in conversation with the illegible image—the haptic and the failed translation. I am building out a constellation of meaning that holds space for the ephemeral and the constant, for both a presence and an absence.

2019

Your Name Is Not Your Own, East Arkansas Community

2018

On Being and Becoming, Hearne Fine Art,

Residencies Sam and Adele Golden Foundation for the Arts, New Berlin, NY 2019

Chautauqua Visual Art, Chautauqua, NY Solo Exhibitions College Gallery, Forrest City, AR Little Rock, AR Selected Group Exhibitions

2023

Second Thoughts, Green Hall, Yale School of Art, New Haven, CT Made in Paint, Sam and Adele Golden Gallery, New Berlin, NY

2022

Blanket Statement, Green Hall, Yale School of Art,

2021

Mapping Narratives, Print Center New York,

New Haven, CT New York, NY

They stole the sweet away serigraph and charcoal on paper, variable dimensions

84

MANDUMBWA

Something to be grounded in photo transfer and liquid charcoal on paper, canvas, and concrete, variable dimensions

85

Configuration 1 (file b) charcoal, ink, gouache, and liquid graphite on concrete, canvas, and paper, variable dimensions

86

SARAH MARTIN-NUSS

203.246.7849 (Prince & Wooster) contact@sarahmartinnuss.com sarahmartinnuss.com @sarahmartinnuss Pratt Institute

b. 1992 Corpus Christi, TX | lives in Brooklyn, NY Education

My paintings draw inspiration from biological systems, post-humanist thought, and the intricate web of ecological relationships. These elements converge within a style of painting I call “transfigurative,” which embraces the constant coevolution of the body with other forms of life, environment, and technology. I create orchestrations of color, line, and space that evoke a sense of exchange, activation, and transformation. Scratching directly into the paint to create a dynamic visual effect that responds to even the subtlest of changes in light, my paintings have a layered, tactile quality. My compositions obscure the typical figure/ground relationship and resist easy categorization as landscapes, figurative representations, or pure abstractions. Metamorphosis, growth, and decay happen simultaneously, suggesting that various temporal states— past, present, and future—can coexist within a single visual field.

Oscillating between macro and micro, my work merges imagery associated with biological systems and celestial phenomena to create visual narratives that explore a realm where the boundaries between the microcosm of biological entities and the vastness of cosmic bodies blur, inviting contemplation on the shared threads of existence across scales.

2023

MFA, Pratt Institute, Brooklyn, NY

2014

BA, Austin College, Sherman, TX

2013

College International de Cannes, Cannes, France Solo Exhibitions

2023

Open Systems, Prince & Wooster, New York, NY

2021

Death of a Stag, PRODUCE Gallery, Corpus Christi, TX

2018

Him Her You Me and The Imaginary Fire, Mathieu

2015

A Place Well Pollinated, El Cubo Blanco, Dallas, TX

Electric Company, Corpus Christi, TX

Selected Group Exhibitions 2023

What in the World, Steuben Gallery, Pratt Institute, Brooklyn, NY

2021

The Nature of Things, Flatiron Gallery, School of Visual Arts, New York, NY

2020

Creative Distancing, Art Museum of South Texas,

2018

The Femme Abstract, East Austin Studio Tour,

Corpus Christi, TX Austin, TX Represented by Prince & Wooster, New York, NY

From the Origin oil and pastel on linen, 66 x 56 inches

88

MARTIN-NUSS

Scattered to Water, Scattered to Wind oil, pastel, and oil pastel on canvas, 66 x 56 inches

89

One Moment Breathing oil, pastel, and oil pastel on canvas, 66 x 56 inches

90

MARTIN-NUSS

91

Open System oil, pastel, and oil pastel on canvas, 72 x 128 inches

92

WILLIAM MAXEN

424.261.0101 (Residency Art Gallery) maxenw59@gmail.com @williemaxen University of California, Davis

b. 1993 Waterbury, CT | lives in Houston, TX Education

My work explores the duality and ambivalences of the mixed-race experience.

It pulls from past experiences, both personal and historical, to bring to light my connections with memory, environment, and belonging. Dynamics of intimacy emerge in my work as the painted figures simultaneously interrupt, obstruct, bridge, appear, and erase traditional lines of demarcation between race and color, time and dimension, and subject and viewer.

As a person of color born and raised by a white, single mother in the inner city and later the suburbs of Connecticut, I make work that allows me to confront racial realities that I have otherwise refused to acknowledge: my legibility and Blackness, my contentious relationship to my sense of inheritance, the past, and interactions within particular spaces. My practice is informed by these experiences, as well as my experience as a football player. I incorporate the physicality and the acute understanding of space that sports provide and consider how it translates into painting, both conceptually and materially.

2023

MFA, University of California (UC), Davis, Davis, CA

2015

BA, Central Connecticut State University (CCSU), New Britain, CT Selected Group Exhibitions

2023

SPACES, Chilli Art Projects, London, England New Contemporaries Vol. III, Residency Art Gallery, Los Angeles, CA When We See Us, Faith J. McKinnie, Sacramento, CA Who’s To Say, Jan Shrem and Maria Manetti Shrem Museum of Art, UC, Davis, CA

2022

Footsteps to You, with the Black Voice Foundation, Museum of Northern California Art, Chico, CA Collections Jan Shremand Maria Manetti Shrem Museum of Art, UC, Davis, CA Represented by Residency Art Gallery, Los Angeles, CA

Sun Hour oil on canvas, 48 x 36 inches

94

MAXEN

95

It was to Keep you Safe oil on canvas, 68 x 68 inches And The Older One Began to Sing oil on inkjet transfer on canvas, 68 x 60 inches

96

EVAN MAZELLAN

765.661.3566 emazellan@cranbrook.edu evanmazellan.com @evanmazellan Cranbrook Academy of Art

b. 1990 Santa Ana, CA | lives in Bloomfield Hills, MI Education

Evan Mazellan’s paintings grapple with privacy, injury, and ownership, lifting objects and materials directly from digital media, personal photos, and belongings in and around their studio. Familiar objects take on new meaning as they are fragmented and reassembled into a pictorial space that highlights the permanence found in media and mass production. Mazellan explores the sought-after transformation found in art restoration and medical surgery, a process prone to unexpected outcomes and mishaps, where the pursuit of enhancement can swing between helping and harming.

Over the past year, Mazellan’s work has centered on celebrities, religious figures, and sports icons, all tied together by a common thread of personal transformation: a desire to leave behind one’s old self and become someone anew. Expanding based on scale and charged associations, the work simultaneously revels in and calls into question the blurred lines of personal and public life.

2023

MFA, Cranbrook Academy of Art, Bloomfield Hills, MI

2018

BA, Indiana Wesleyan University (IWU), Marion, IN Solo Exhibitions

2022

Eye Care, Massey Klein Gallery, New York, NY

2021

Bunker East / Bunker West, The Bunker, Rockaway, NY Pope Hands, Williams Gallery, IWU, Marion, IN Selected Group Exhibitions

2023

HIGH-STAKES, with Lisa Boudet, Art Basel,

2022

Walker Walls Tarver and Evan Mazellan, Passageway

Paris, France Gallery, Bloomfield Hills, MI 2021

Read Desert, Rockaway Artists Alliance, Rockaway, NY SHRINE, New York, NY Represented by Massey Klein Gallery, New York, NY

Bust of A Horse (After Carl) oil on canvas, 10 x 8 inches

98

MAZELLAN

Handhold (After Mainz) oil on canvas, 10 x 8 inches Little Drip oil on canvas, 10 x 8 inches

99

100

MAZELLAN

101

Erased Carl oil on canvas, 84 x 48 inches Couple in Water oil on canvas, 84 x 96 inches

102

KATHRYN MECCA

kathryn.mecca@gmail.com kathrynmecca.com @katmecca Tyler School of Art, Temple University

b. 1987 Manhasset, NY | lives in Solomons, MD Education

I work with oil paint and digital tools to express and examine the tension between ideas of intimacy, movement, perception, and the technological lens. I explore connections between people and how intimacy is experienced, grasped onto the more quiet, nuanced moments and shifting away from overtly narrative aspects. Layers, materials, and forms are merged and unified; synthetic materials and applications meet with lavish opulence to create a cheapened yet indulgent atmosphere. Historically technical and often laborious methods are blended with new technological systems to capture the cold familiarity of the ever-changing present.

2020

MFA, Tyler School of Art (TSA), Temple University (TU), Philadelphia, PA

2010

BA, Mason Gross School of Art, Rutgers University, New Brunswick, NJ

Solo Exhibitions 2022

Into The Fold, Massey Klein Gallery, New York, NY

2021

Surveilled Silence, Temple Contemporary, TU,

2020

By Proxy, AUTOMAT, Philadelphia, PA

Philadelphia, PA

Selected Group Exhibitions 2023

Hajimemashite!, Bridge Mogura Gallery, Tokyo, Japan

2021

LUCKY CHARM, Moosey Gallery, London, England

Prisma Art Prize, Fondamenta Gallery, Rome, Italy Everything Must Go, Atelier Art Gallery, TU, Philadelphia, PA 2020

Tyler MFA Painters, with TSA, Massey Klein Gallery, New York, NY

2019

AXA Art Prize, New York Academy of Art, New York, NY Festa di Roma, Stella Elkins Tyler Gallery, TU, Philadelphia, PA

New York in Solomons oil on polyester, 44 x 30 inches

104

MECCA

Polignano oil on polyester, 31 x 51 inches

105

Lavender Top oil on canvas, 30 x 24 inches

106

IVAN DAVID NG

info@ivandavidng.com ivandavidng.com @ivandavidng Ohio State University

b. 1991 Singapore | lives in Columbus, OH Education

My family is from a people group called the Hakka (“guest”) who fanned out from central China after 800 AD. Some settled in Southeast Asia and later became Singaporean, but the ancestral homeland is lost, swallowed up by the passage of time. Much of my Hakka identity has also been lost through an oral history left withheld and denatured by the construction of “Singaporean.” The provenance of images and materials—their secret histories become a vehicle to explore what is irretrievable in me.

My lived experience in the 21st Century is so different from that of the Hakka a millennia ago, but the same sun and moon preside over our existences. I work with their images and light, hoping to coax a connection backwards in time. I do not have a native land to claim but I can be native to the sky. It is yours as much as mine. If our story of land is marked by exploitation, conquest, and pillage, then what is our corresponding story of the sky?

2023

MFA, Ohio State University, Columbus, OH

2016

BFA, Maryland Institute College of Art, Baltimore, MD Residencies

2023

Skowhegan School of Painting & Sculpture, Madison, ME Selected Group Exhibitions

2023

Light in Perpetual, S.E.A. FOCUS, Richard Koh Fine Art, Singapore

2022

Roads Around a Mountain, Chan + Hori Contemporary, Singapore Collections Louis Vuitton, Singapore United Overseas Bank, Singapore

We will feast and weep no more kozo paper, digital prints, arches paper, oil, acrylic, and tempera on wood panel, 66 x 48 inches

108

NG

Celestial signs for wondering minds archival digital print, thread, monotype, mulberry paper, acrylic, handmade paper, PVA, and varnish on wood, 55 x 40 inches

109

Embargoed till noon day archival digital prints, charcoal, kozo paper, solvent transfer, micaceous iron oxide, acrylic, PVA, and varnish on wood panel, 55 x 40 inches

110

NG

I bury the Sun photograph, archival digital print on silk and kozo paper, laser print, acrylic, kozo paper, and PVA on canvas, 59 x 48 inches

111

After the moon and it’s beam photographs, archival digital print, laser print, acrylic, PVA and kozo paper on canvas, 55 x 48 inches

112

SARA NICKLESON

saranickle@gmail.com @sara_nick Cranbrook Academy of Art

b. 1982 Ontario, Canada | lives in Detroit, MI Education

In search of a departure from prevailing ideas around figuration, I imagine the body as impermanent, morphing and changing as a representation of complex emotion and cognition. Rooted in my own longtime battle with depression— and the significant reprieve found through psychedelic therapy—I pursue world-building that draws from my studies in consciousness and melancholia, as well as theories around “deep adaptation” in the face of climate crisis. The works omit the presence of modern infrastructure entirely, reflecting on the failed promises of modernity and contemplating a future in which the object world has been emptied of significance.

Inspired by Surrealism’s psychological underpinnings, I begin each painting by amassing a multitude of images to create a digital collage as an interpretation of the exquisite corpse, wherein a figure is formed through intuition rather than as a product of the conscious, disciplined mind. This process—along with an application of oil paint that is active and divergent—channels the metaphysical and expresses a human condition that is awkward, expansive, and fragmented.

2023

MFA, Cranbrook Academy of Art (CAA), Bloomfield Hills, MI

2009

BID, College for Creative Studies, Detroit, MI

2004

BFA, University of Windsor, Windsor, Canada Solo Exhibitions

2023

The Fourth Way, Louis Buhl & Co., Detroit, MI Selected Group Exhibitions

2023

Get Together, Reyes | Finn, Detroit, MI Is Any/Body Home?, Forum Gallery, CAA, Bloomfield Hills, MI

2018

The Rusty Show, Corktown Studios, Detroit, MI

2016

Come Up To My Room, Gladstone Hotel, Toronto, Canada

My Subterranea oil on canvas, 60 x 48 inches

114

NICKLESON

The Fourth Way oil on canvas, 60 x 96 inches

115

Three Graces (The Mysteries) oil on canvas, 72 x 60 inches

116

SANGUN PARK

667.391.9814 psolkdy@gmail.com @laughing_devil_friend_97 Cranbrook Academy of Art

b. 1997 Seoul, South Korea | lives in Bloomfield Hills, MI Education

Drawing from his own experiences, Sangun Park’s art serves as a means to confront and transcend personal pain. His series “On My Shelf” explores objects on a shelf arranged by the artist’s aesthetic and criteria of value; it reflects his concept of value as intertwined with life’s finite and infinite aspects, mortality, and the embrace of imperfection. Park’s life has limitations, while his collections can fluctuate in value, mirroring the mutable nature of his own name and works as affected by condition, time, and perspective. The artist’s approach melds figurative and surrealistic imagery in a multidimensional space. His compositions are simultaneously familiar and strange, featuring characters, animals, and hybrid, grotesque forms against intricate backdrops, creating a muted yet uncanny experience.

2024

MFA candidate, Cranbrook Academy of Art, Bloomfield Hills, MI

2022

BFA, Maryland Institute College of Art (MICA), Baltimore, MD Solo Exhibitions

2021

Blooming from Darkness, Gateway Galleries, MICA, Baltimore, MD Selected Group Exhibitions

2021

MICA Residential Art Show and Art Walk, MICA, Baltimore, MD Back in Action: Selections from Senior Thesis, MICA, Baltimore, MD COMBUSTION: Selections from Senior Thesis, MICA, Baltimore, MD

2020

Collective Subconsciousness, MICA, Baltimore, MD Personal Directions (online), MICA, Baltimore, MD

Selfish Corner oil on canvas, 38 x 18 inches

118

PARK

Silent Clamor oil on canvas, 46 x 57 inches Love is Blue oil on canvas, 36 x 36 inches

119

120

PARK

121

Love Is Blue (Centaur) oil on canvas, 24 x 96 inches

122

SABRINA PIERSOL

213.441.7230 (Sow & Tailor) sabrinapiersol.com @sabpsl University of California, San Diego

b. 1995 Greenwich, CT | lives in Aspen, CO Education

Collapsing inner and outer vision onto canvas, Sabrina Piersol investigates the value of the fragment as it relates to Archaic Greek, sapphic poetry through her environmental paintings. These works raise questions around desire, temporality, and speculative extrapolation by negotiating conceptual inquiry and visual logic. Piersol intends for her paintings to be accessible in their abstraction through combining explicit allusions to the natural world with purely abstract forms via a singular, cohesive painting language that prioritizes bold color and melodic composition. Silent deserts, sparkling topography, and bodily florals remain rich references for the artist. Each piece is an invitation to envision the alternate pasts and possible futures that simultaneously exist within each of us.

2023

MFA, University of California, San Diego (UCSD), San Diego, CA Solo Exhibitions

2023

no grove // no sound, Main Gallery, UCSD, San Diego, CA Selected Group Exhibitions

2023

The View We Seek, with Anthony Gallery and Sow & Tailor, High Bay Gallery, New York, NY Adorned Self, Sow & Tailor, Los Angeles, CA Sites of Blood and Water, VIELMETTER, Los Angeles, CA

2022

back2school, Friend of a Friend Gallery, Denver, CO Road Show, False Cast, San Diego, CA

Represented by

Sow & Tailor, Los Angeles, CA

arc/afterglow oil on canvas, 18 x 16 inches

124

PIERSOL

inland echo oil on canvas, 70 x 59 inches now again / efflorescent oil on canvas, 70 x 59 inches

125

126

PIERSOL

127

desert superblue oil on canvas, 72 x 108 inches

128

MIRANDA PIKUL

mirandapikul.art@gmail.com mirandapikul.com @mirandapikul Boston University

b. 1995 Tucson, AZ | lives in Boston, MA Education

I am inspired by the awkwardness of being alive and portraying moments of discomfort. Expectations push us to perform in all aspects of life; mimicking how people are expected to behave is my focus. A motif from my recent work is the smile, a symbol that embodies the pressures to alter one’s performance in social situations. I tend to gravitate toward humor to shine light on moments of embarrassment during human interactions. Though my work is playful, I take seriously thoughts about connection, intimacy, and belonging.

Questions often raised examine how isolation and loneliness influence our ability to maintain and build healthy, meaningful relationships in the modern world.

2025

MFA candidate, Boston University, Boston, MA

2022

BA, University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA), Los Angeles, CA Solo Exhibitions

2022

Walking in the Wrong Direction, Broad Art Center,

2019

It’s Not Dark Yet, Backfence Society, Vista, CA

UCLA, Los Angeles, CA

Selected Group Exhibitions 2023

Practical Jokes, Ramp Gallery, Boston, MA Arts to the Rescue, AFA Gallery, Scranton, PA

2022

Overflow, The Little Gallery, Los Angeles, CA Still, Stay Home Gallery, Paris, TN Undergraduate Juried Exhibition, New Wight Gallery, UCLA, Los Angeles, CA

2021

Without Long Goodbyes, The Little Gallery,

2020

How to Reinvent the World We Live In,

2019

Disco Boogie, Backfence Society, Vista, CA

2018

Parallels, Kruglak Gallery, MiraCosta College,

Los Angeles, CA The Wonderstone Gallery, Dunmore, PA

Oceanside, CA

Showing Off oil paint on canvas, 20 x 20 inches

130

PIKUL

Till Death Do Us Part oil paint on canvas, 18 x 24 inches May I Have This Dance oil paint on canvas, 48 x 60 inches

131

132

GABRIEL ARTURO ROJAS

grojas317@gmail.com @gabrielrojasart Rhode Island School of Design

b. 1988 Buenos Aires, Argentina | lives in Providence, RI

Drawing from various languages of abstraction—from Western modernist painting, to Andean textile design—I explore how the manipulation of painting, textiles, and traditional techniques can create tensions that reveal ideas about ancestral inheritance and transference, familial upbringing, and psychological contradiction. Through investigating these legacies of making, I invent studio rituals using formal painting moves and quotidian references to arrive at a place of intimacy.

Alongside painting, different materials like rope, textiles, and wooden constructions engage this process in which each physical act prompts new ways of revealing and reveling in the in-between stages of memory. My work is open to a fluid process of revision, reorder, and reuse. The provisional nature of my abstract painting is a way to expand from established structures, languages, and modes of making; to overcome its boundaries and reveal its new potential.

Education 2023

MFA, Rhode Island School of Design (RISD), Providence, RI Residencies

2023

Atlantic Center for the Arts, New Smyrna Beach, FL Fine Arts Work Center, Provincetown, MA Solo Exhibitions

2023

Nostalgia, Dreams, Ancestral Memory, Living Arts,

2021

Artifacts, Liggett Studio, Tulsa, OK

Tulsa, OK

Selected Group Exhibitions 2023

Rota Fortunae: RISD MFA Showcase, Field Projects, New York, NY Graduate Thesis Exhibition, RISD, Providence, RI

2021

ArtNow 2021, Oklahoma Contemporary, Oklahoma City, OK

Motherboard collaged oil, spray paint, fabrics, textiles, 84 x 114 inches

134

ROJAS

The Plastic Painter oil, acrylic, rope, textiles, found fabrics, found objects, 80 x 100 inches

135

The Studio oil, acrylic, spray paint, collaged paintings, and fabrics on raw canvas, 80 x 102 inches

136

ROJAS

137

Inherited Abstraction oil, acrylic, collaged paintings, wood constructions, plaster, spray foam, rope, and yarn, 120 x 192 inches

138

BRYAN ALI SANCHEZ

bryan.ali.sanchez@gmail.com bryan-ali.com @bryan_ali_sanchez Yale University

b. 1989 San Diego, CA | lives in San Diego, CA Education

My paintings address the psychological effects and hardships of the working class. Memory allows me to re-encounter truths that may have been either hidden, lost slightly in retelling, or abandoned in a state of disorientation. I explore moments between stillness and tension; blurred moments of clarity, followed by a dialogue between past and present, have led to multiple understandings of myself. Perhaps two halves reflect each other based on family history and a childhood spent near the U.S./Mexico border. This pursuit to revisit realities leads to more questions than answers.

I am constantly reminded of the perpetual cycle of life: the cyclical wear and tear on the body and mind and the weight that life bears. Throughout the process of painting, I search for color combinations that emit a sensorial quality. I apply slabs of paint along with thinned, washed layers and employ abrupt brush marks. The figural arrangements evolve through the process of reworking the painting. My gestures allow me to improvise my color palette, which is both invented and derived from observation.

2023

MFA, Yale University, New Haven, CT

2019

BFA, California State University, Long Beach, Long Beach, CA Residencies

2020

Bread & Salt, San Diego, CA Solo Exhibitions

2020

In Search Of, Bread & Salt, San Diego, CA Selected Group Exhibitions

2023

The Last Group Show, Bread & Salt, San Diego, CA A Breath on the Glass, SPURS Gallery, Beijing, China A Signal Urgent But Breaking, PERROTIN, New York, NY Otra Noche en L.A., VETA Galeria, Madrid, Spain

2022

Tiny Furniture, Green Shutter House, New Haven, CT

By Tomorrow, Horchow Hall, Yale University, New Haven, CT

2020

29th Annual Juried Exhibition, Athenaeum Music &

2019

Common Walls, Great Park Artist Studios, Palm Courts

Arts Library, La Jolla, CA Art Complex, Irvine, CA

La Sombra Del Árbol (Autorretrato) / The Shadow Of The Tree (Self-Portrait) oil on canvas, 74 x 56 inches

140

SANCHEZ

Pasan Los Días / The Days Go By oil on canvas, 52 x 76 inches Voces En El Viento / Voices In The Wind oil on canvas, 92 x 80 inches

141

142

DANA SCHEIN

scheindana@gmail.com @scheinonme Hunter College

b. 1990 New York, NY | lives in New York Education

My paintings play with a tension between hiding and communicating. The images depict characters breaking pianos, grieving over violins, committing acts of betrayal, and experiencing bouts of ecstasy and terror. Pulling from my own history as a musician, I am interested in conveying psychological states through narrative and destabilized compositions. Each painting portrays solitary figures struggling against the edges of the canvas and the instrument at hand, sometimes resisting and other times merging. Through rhythmic brushwork and bold marks, the paintings emit cacophonous sound despite their inherent silence. These images pose questions about inner realities, creative struggles, loneliness, and divinity. Ultimately, I regard musical instruments as conduits for communion between the self and higher realms—thus pointing to the limitations of language and themes of spirituality and authorship.

2023

MFA, Hunter College (HC), New York, NY

2012

BA, Bennington College, Bennington, VT Selected Group Exhibitions

2023

Invisible Cities, 205 Hudson Gallery, New York, NY Art for Healing, L’SPACE, New York, NY

2022

In Transition, Gallery MC, New York, NY Here & Now, Casa Lally, HC, New York, NY

2021

Beauty at the Swamp’s Center, 205 Hudson Gallery,

2020

Trust Fall, 205 Hudson Gallery, New York, NY

New York, NY

Kishkes oil on canvas, 40 x 32 inches

144

SCHEIN

Graceful Ghost Rag (After William Bolcom) oil on canvas, 60 x 48 inches Plankwalk oil on canvas, 72 x 60 inches

145

146

SKYLER SIMPSON

skylerhsimpson@gmail.com skysimpson.com @skylersimpsonart University of Wisconsin-Madison

b. 1995 Omaha, NE | lives in Madison, WI Education

My work explores gendered tension in the domestic sphere. These paintings depict the home as a fraught refuge, evoking suspense and unease through horror film tropes. Combining naturalistic techniques with surreal elements, I examine household rituals that are rooted in my Midwestern upbringing.

My current series weaves an enigmatic and ominous narrative within the canonical architecture of a Frank Lloyd Wright Usonian house. These vignettes include scenes of both labor and leisure, revealing a dialogue between the contemporary women in my work and the gender roles that the settings of a mid-century house imply. I am interested in the ways we are conditioned to perform at home. The paintings reflect my anxiety around social conventions governing our private lives.

2023

MFA, University of Wisconsin-Madison, Madison, WI

2018

BFA, University of Nebraska-Lincoln, Lincoln, NE Selected Group Exhibitions

2023

AXA Art Prize, Wilkinson Gallery, New York Academy of Art, New York, NY Painting Invitational, Abel Contemporary Gallery, Stoughton, WI TMA Contemporary, Trout Museum of Art, Appleton, WI

2022

AXA Art Prize, Wilkinson Gallery, New York Academy of Art, New York, NY

2019

Interim, Anderson Ranch Arts Center, Snowmass, CO Collections

Tandem Press, Madison, WI

Sinking gouache and graphite on mounted paper, 20 x 16 inches

148

SIMPSON

149

Little Fires oil and Flashe on panel, 36 x 48 inches Soak oil on panel, 24 x 36 inches

150

SIMPSON

151

Birdwatching oil and Flashe on panel, 16 x 20 inches

152

JINGQI WANG STEINHISER

929.607.5035 (VillageOneArt) jqsteinhiser@gmail.com jingqisteinhiser.com @jingqi_wang_steinhiser Rhode Island School of Design

b. 1997 Beijing, China | lives in Chicago, IL Education

Characters and symbols make sense within their context, but when that context is removed absurdity steps in and alienation is portrayed. In my work, I investigate the animal body as a traditional and contemporary symbol, and question how we represent them in culture, translation, and as commodities.

These animal allegories provide context to my own feelings of displacement; through visual signifiers of culture, they seek to explore how the idea of what is “traditional” can differ from person to person. By dying, layering, spraying, covering, and wiping out, I bring out this absurdity of alienation and create imagined spaces that question the history of migration, self-recognition, and the power structure behind pop culture and scenarios in commodification.

My work is not the story of finding a home; rather, it’s about coming to terms with nomadism and giving up the chase for a destination that never existed.

2022

MFA, Rhode Island School of Design (RISD), Providence, RI

2020

BFA, School of the Art Institute of Chicago (SAIC), Chicago, IL Residencies

2023

Massachusetts Museum of Contemporary Art, North Adams, MA Vermont Studio Center, Johnson, VT Solo Exhibitions

2022

Clumsy Birds Fly First, A/W Space, Nanjing, China Selected Group Exhibitions

2023

Waking Life, VillageOneArt, New York, NY Always Something There to Remind Me, DO! Collective Art Projects, New York, NY A Happy Beginning, LATITUDE Gallery, New York, NY Represented by VillageOneArt, New York, NY LATITUDE Gallery, New York, NY A/W Space, Nanjing, China

Hook acrylic and oil on canvas, 72 x 48 inches

154

STEINHISER

Sixth Reincarnation acrylic and oil on canvas, 60 x 48 inches

155

The Chase acrylic and oil on canvas, 60 x 50 inches

156

TAEKYUNG SUH

sutagu1@gmail.com tksuh.com @tk_50h Columbia University

b. 1993 Seoul, Korea | lives in New York, NY Education

I use painting as a way to reconstruct my internal experiences and explore unrecognizable emotions through personal allegories. My works reflect my own desires as a drifter in life, as well as societal pressures and responsibilities demanded of a painter. While I start painting with daily sketches and writings, I deviate from the initial plan by incorporating unexpected elements throughout my painting process. This approach allows me to create dramatic and absurd worlds within my paintings.

2023 2018

MFA, Columbia University, New York, NY BFA, School of the Art Institute of Chicago (SAIC), Chicago, IL Residencies

2018

Vermont Studio Center, Johnson, VT

2022

Bad Paintings Forever, CICA Museum, Gimpo,

2021

Boogie Nights, Gallery LVS, Seoul, South Korea

Solo Exhibitions Gyeonggi-do, South Korea 2019

Eye Kill You, Korean Cultural Center of Chicago Gallery, Wheeling, IL

2017

Vertigo Through the Night, gallery no one, Chicago, IL Selected Group Exhibitions

2023

Departure, Thierry Goldberg Gallery, New York, NY In Medias Res, TheBLANC, New York, NY Trading Cards, Field of Play, Brooklyn, NY

2019

Fire Alert, R. Mona, Chicago, IL

2018

Smile Behind the Mask, Heaven Gallery, Chicago, IL

19th Annual Benefit, Heaven Gallery, Chicago, IL FLESHCUT: Figure Salon, Z1 Gallery, Chicago, IL

Shame! oil on canvas, 24 x 18 inches

158

SUH

Teenage Blue oil on canvas, 48 x 60 inches S.O.S oil on canvas, 60 x 48 inches

159

160

KHALIF TAHIR THOMPSON

khaliftahirthompsonstudio@gmail.com @khaliftahir Yale University

b. 1995 Brooklyn, NY | lives in Elmhurst, NY Education

Through my practice, I chronicle the lived and imagined experiences of and between human beings. I believe painting can be a tool for considering the emotional, psychological complexity of an individual’s story and identity.

Creating imagery that connects one’s realm to that of another, I alter perception and aim to invoke empathy towards my subjects by depicting their reality across a visceral lens. Focusing on portraiture and figuration, my subjects include family, friends, and cultural figures placed in constructed settings. I render my subjects in oil paint, incorporating mixed media, collage, and handmade paper to build the abstracted environments in which they exist.

2023

MFA candidate, Yale School of Art, New Haven, CT Represented by Zidoun-Bossuyt Gallery, Luxembourg

The works submitted are a selection of paintings examining a range of subjects, with regards to cultural figures, romantic, familial relationships, and individual identity. This work essentially examines my interest in seeing and understanding the likeness and lived experience of people. Through the different subjects’ primary gaze, the work connects the viewer to them, establishing a relationship that garners insight and introspection. The atmosphere of each piece hosts distinct environments that fluctuate from tangible to ethereal, framing the viewers’ perception towards their pain, joy questioning, resolve, and role in the world in which they live.

Cherry Jubilee oil, pastel, acrylic, pleather, fabric, handmade paper, abaca, cotton, papyrus, tissue, and construction paper on canvas, 90 x 63 inches

162

TAHIR THOMPSON

Red Velvet oil, handmade paper, papyrus, and newsprint on canvas, 66 x 78 x 3 inches

163

Good Morning oil, pastel, acrylic, handmade paper (aback, cotton), papyrus, and leather on canvas, 64 x 88 inches

164

TAHIR THOMPSON

165

Pastor Jones and Friends oil, pastel, chalk, spray paint, foil, wax, fabric, leather, newsprint, stencil, stamp, and handmade paper (abaca, cotton) on canvas, 72 x 108 inches

166

ELLERY THOMPSON

502.438.0366 ellerytthompson@gmail.com ellerythompson.com @ellerytthompson Maryland Institute College of Art

b. 1999 Louisville, KY | lives in Baltimore, MD Education

My paintings’ shifting readability generates a fluidity between absence and presence, reflecting the flickering state of being created from living with a chronic disease. Working with motifs of miniatures and toys, I am interested in scale, motion, and repetition. What does it mean to make the miniature giant, to make the giant miniature, or to allow the miniature to remain?

2023

The mechanisms of illness represent something miniature growing, taking space, and yet existing on a scale that is much smaller than the effects it causes. The figurines waver between motion and motionless, animation and stillness. At times they feel moveable but not necessarily mobile. Their appearances in the paintings represent a psychological space and the inner workings of the body. The multiplicity of the miniatures references repetitive bodily processes and the cyclical nature of being.

2023

MFA, Maryland Institute College of Art (MICA), Baltimore, MD

2021

BA, Occidental College, Los Angeles, CA Selected Group Exhibitions Conjure, Leidy Gallery, MICA, Baltimore, MD Yes, color makes me feel something, Room 3557, Los Angeles, CA

2022

We Are Not Similar, Leidy Gallery, MICA, Baltimore, MD

Eyelids and Legs are Heavy acrylic on canvas, 23 x 23 inches

168

THOMPSON

Angels from the St. Louis Children’s Hospital Gift Shop acrylic on canvas, 24 x 30 inches

169

I Would Like to Ride a Bike acrylic on canvas, 30 x 40 inches

170

JI ZOU

azou@risd.edu ji-zou.com @ji.zouu Rhode Island School of Design

b. 1994 Columbus, OH | lives in Providence, RI Education

I am a Hmong Chinese American artist who works primarily through painting and video art. Pulling from embodied experiences, dreams, and spiritual rituals I address themes of race, gender, sexuality, and digital identity. Through smooth, metallic renderings of form, translated from digital origins, my work holds a mirror to contemporary culture. The screaming spirit escapes a body bound by illusions of a biological clock; lovers evaporate within the embrace of each other; a dripping hand transforms the human skin into that of a metal demon.

2023

MFA, Rhode Island School of Design (RISD), Providence, RI

2016

BS, University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, MI Selected Group Exhibitions

2023

A Room with a View, Vardan Gallery, Los Angeles, CA FEMBOT, The Hole, New York, NY

Questioning the tangible ways in which power moves through constructions of identity, I examine how modern Western ideologies govern our relationship to the self, to the erotic, and to liberation. I draw from feminist and queer theory, neuroscience, shamanic ritual, psychoanalytic theory, and marginalized histories to inform my practice.

Soft Fragments, Land to Sea, Brooklyn, NY A Happy Beginning, LATITUDE Gallery, New York, NY Swelter, Steven Zevitas Gallery, Boston, MA Finish Fetish, with Scroll NYC, Collaborations, Copenhagen, Denmark MOLDing, STILL Section, Stilllife Art & Design Fair, New York, NY 2022

Double Shift, LARTIQUE, Paris, France

Possession by Metal Demon acrylic and oil on canvas, 36 x 24 inches

172

ZOU

Can’t Hold On acrylic on canvas, 36 x 36 inches

173

Delivered by Meteorite acrylic on canvas, 42 x 42 inches

174

Foley p179

EDITOR’S SELECTIONS

Artists are presented in alphabetical order.

Artist biographies have been edited to prioritize recent highlights.

Pricing Guide can be found on p201.

JAMES PARKER FOLEY

jamesparkerfoley.com @jamesparkerfoley Maine College of Art

b. 1993 Concord, NH | lives in Portland, ME Education

The experience of making this work was akin to diving into a deep pool too narrow to turn around in but with an opening on the other end. I understood ahead of time that going through would require tremendous energy, contained within a single breath. I did not know, however, how deep the pool was, what was at the bottom, or if I would return.

2020

MFA, Maine College of Art & Design (MECA&D),

2023

Monson Arts, Monson, ME

We think of the horizon as a line or boundary—and it is—but it is also a space.

I found that by taking the horizon, pinching it between my fingers, and tipping it backward, forward, or a little to the side, I was able to expand its territory within the picture plane. I wanted this space—the space at the end of the deep and narrow pool–to become familial to me. I wanted to take a discomfiting, transitional, in-between space and make it visible. Horizons are defined in relation to transition, to movement. The border is made not for passing through, but by passing through.

2021

Monhegan Artists’ Residency, Monhegan Island, ME

Portland, ME Residencies

Solo Exhibitions 2023

Solo Debut, Sarah Bouchard Gallery, Woolwich, ME Selected Group Exhibitions

2023

How Do I Look, Moss Galleries, Portland, ME

2022

You Take the Cake, Sarah Bouchard Gallery, Woolwich, ME Courage in Retrospect, with Abigail Ogilvy Gallery, SPRING/BREAK, New York, NY Layered Truths, Abigail Ogilvy Gallery, Boston, MA

2021

Sorry We Missed You, with ICA, MECA&D, Portland, ME Collections Bowdoin College Museum of Art Represented by Sarah Bouchard Gallery, Woolwich, ME

Going Overboard oil on linen, 46 x 42 inches

178

FOLEY

Getting Carried Away oil on linen, 60 x 52 inches Divers Approaching Infinite Density oil on linen, 72 x 60 inches

179

180

LIZZY GABAY

lizzygabaystudio@gmail.com @lizzygabay Bard College

b. 1993, New York, NY | lives in New York, NY Education

My paintings contain an essence of memory that is ubiquitous and roaming. I adhere to a process of poetic-imaging, wherein scenic memories are changed by the spaces in which they are remembered. The same way the mind travels through memory and presence, a viewer can travel through the spectrum of definition and illusion in a painting.

2026

MFA candidate, Milton Avery Graduate School of the Arts, Bard College, Annandale-on-Hudson, NY

2015

BA, Roski School of Art and Design, University of California Los Angeles, Los Angeles, CA Residencies

2019

Casa Lü, Tlalpan, Mexico City Solo Exhibitions

2023

Still Towns, Entrance, New York, NY

Manya oil paint on canvas, 40 x 30 inches

182

GABAY

183

Sun Bathers oil paint on canvas, 54 x 48 inches Sun Mirror oil paint on canvas, 48 x 36 inches

184

YEZI LOU

uglyz327@gmail.com yezilou.com @departurepoem University of California, Los Angeles

b. 1997 Zhejiang, China | lives in Los Angeles, CA Education

Yezi Lou engages with a diverse range of artistic mediums that primarily encompass painting, drawing, and printmaking. Depicting the confrontation between familiarity and unfamiliarity, the subjects in her works may bely immediate comprehension as to how they were ‘supposed’ to be depicted. While some audiences view them as general observational art, perhaps this satisfies her idea of the unwanted attention.

Lou’s artistic expression is the integration of hybrid cultures and languages, along with a deliberate disillusionment that challenges the prevailing optimism often associated with American culture. The subjects in her works often exist on the periphery of awareness; imbued with abstract and cultural significance, they transcend any singular purpose. By approaching the concept of portraiture, each painting can be seen as a reflection of Lou’s self-representation or an extension of her identity. This form of “selfobjectification” embodies her cognition of collective experience and social freedom.

2025

MFA candidate, University of California, Los Angeles, Los Angeles, CA

2020

BFA, School of Visual Arts, New York, NY Selected Group Exhibitions

2023

The MFA’s of LA, Good Mother Gallery, Los Angeles, CA Reverie Retrouvée, Unveil Gallery, Irvine, CA

Umbilical Cord oil on canvas, 52 x 48 inches

186

LOU

Qiqi oil on canvas, 40 x 30 inches Softness oil on canvas, 30 x 24 inches

187

188

LOU

189

Untitled oil on canvas, 40 x 60 inches

190

AMADEO MORELOS FAVELA

718.510.5427 amorel1@amadeomorelos.com amadeomorelos.com @amadeo_mf Columbia University

b. 1992 Morelia, Mexico | lives in New York, NY Education

My work is an imprint of an ongoing dialogue between myself and the medium, nurtured by the surrounding environment. Inspired by the convergence of scientific research, philosophy, religion, and everyday experiences, I seek the underlying patterns that shape our collective meaning-making and understanding of place.

2023

MFA, Columbia University, New York, NY

2016

BFA, School of the Art Institute of Chicago,

From a process akin to attentive listening—to materials, emotions, and ideas—a craft emerges. It forms an evolving language that blurs boundaries between the magical and the mundane, the artificial and the natural, unveiling the symbiotic relationship between embodied sensation and reason.

2023

The Birds and the Bees…, Half Gallery, New York, NY

2021

Providence, Unit London, London, UK

2019

Reps, LPHK Gallery, Chicago, IL

I challenge deep-rooted ideas about reality, portraying time and creation as dynamic processes intertwined within the natural world. In this way I aim to expand our understanding of the ideological and sensorial frameworks that shape our distinctions between subjects and objects; to make way for a new awareness of the blurry boundaries between ourselves, the environment, and other individuals. Ultimately, I hope for my work to serve as an instrument of wonder that invites curiosity and facilitates exploration and discovery.

2018

Deo, Comfort Station, Chicago, IL

Chicago, IL Solo Exhibitions

Semisilvestre, Alessandro Albanese, Milano, Italy

Evergreen, GreenDoor, Chicago, IL Selected Group Exhibitions 2023

Press Release V, Storage, New York, NY Hat Trick, Rusha & Co, Los Angeles, CA Stand-outs: Selections from the Columbia MFA, Fredric Snitzer Gallery, Miami, FL MFA Thesis Exhibition, Wallach Art Gallery, Columbia University, New York, NY

2022

Stiltsville, Half Gallery, Miami, FL (Re-)Birth of Venus, PULPO GALLERY, Murnau, Germany

FireFlight oil on canvas, 40 x 30 inches

192

MORELOS FAVELA

193

Candy Monster oil on canvas, 30 x 24 inches Sun Dance oil on canvas, 20 x 24 inches

194

JESSE ZUO

chxzuo@gmail.com @chxzuo School of Visual Arts

b. 2000 Beijing, China | lives in New York, NY Education

Jesse Zuo is a New York-based Chinese oil painter and illustrator. Through figurative images, she expresses her take on femininity, physicality, emotions, and precious moments in life. She practices detail-focused traditional realism and explores contemporary expression in chromatic colors.

2022

MFA, School of Visual Arts, New York, NY Selected Group Exhibitions

2023

The Collective, High Line Nine, New York, NY Everything But the Kitchen Sink, La Luz de Jesus Gallery, Los Angeles, CA Small Works, Soft Times Gallery, San Francisco, CA NUDE, Manifest Gallery, Cincinnati, OH (be)longing, Latela Curatorial, Washington, D.C. Collections Artemizia Foundation, Bisbee, AZ Represented by

La Luz de Jesus Gallery, Los Angeles, CA Gallery 818, Bisbee, AZ

Lush oil on panel, 14 x 11 inches

196

ZUO

197

Rain oil on panel, 16 x 12 inches Warmth oil on panel, 16 x 16 inches

198

ZUO

199

Safe Place oil on panel, 6 x 12 inches

200

PRICING GUIDE New American Paintings is not intended to be a catalog of offerings per se, but, given that many of our readers are collectors, it has been a tradition to offer pricing information for the artists included in each issue. The ranges published below offer guidance as to the current retail pricing for each artist’s work. Works reproduced herein may or may not be available for acquisition. For information on a specific work, we encourage you to reach out to the artist and/or gallery via the contact information provided in each artist’s spread.

The pricing of artwork is, perhaps, the most enigmatic component of the art market. For artists who have a record of secondary market sales that the public can easily view, arriving at an appropriate price point becomes somewhat easier. For emerging artists, such as the majority of those featured in New American Paintings, determining price points can involve a number of considerations, including: the scale and medium of a work; an artist’s exhibition history and the collections in which their work is held; and an artist’s educational background. Layered on top of these factors is the subjective notion of an artwork’s perceived “quality.” All of these elements will ultimately determine the demand for a given artist’s work and help inform pricing.

201

GRACE BROMLEY

HEEJO KIM

KATHRYN MECCA

JINGQI WANG STEINHISER

p15–20 $2,220–$6,000

p59–62 $3,000–$12,500

p103–106 $3,000–$5,000

p153–156 $1,000–$10,000

KEVIN COBB

JI WOO KIM

IVAN DAVID NG

TAEKYUNG SUH

p21–24 $5,000–$25,000

p63–66 NFS

p107–112 $4,000–$6,000

p157–160 NFS

ALYSSA EBLE

KYUNG KIM

SARA NICKLESON

KHALIF TAHIR THOMPSON

p25–28 NFS

p67–70 NFS

p113–116 NFS

p161–166 NFS

JOSIAH ELLNER

JACOB LITTLEJOHN

SANGUN PARK

ELLERY THOMPSON

p29–32 NFS

p71–74 NFS

p117–122 $2,000–$8,000

p167–170 $1,500–$5,000

RACHEL HAKIMIAN EMENAKER

ALEXIS MABRY

SABRINA PIERSOL

JI ZOU

p33–36 NFS

p75–78 $500–$4,000

p123–128 NFS

p171–174 $800–$6,000

YUAN GE

NOUR MALAS

MIRANDA PIKUL

JAMES PARKER FOLEY

p37–40 NFS

p79–82 NFS

p129–132 NFS

p177–180 NFS

ABRAHM GUTHRIE

LOUISE MANDUMBWA

GABRIEL ARTURO ROJAS

LIZZY GABAY

p41–44 $1,200–$5,000

p83–86 $3,500–$6,000

p133–138 $1,000–$8,000

p181–184 NFS

MADELEINE HERISSON-LEPLAE

SARAH MARTIN-NUSS

BRYAN ALI SANCHEZ

YEZI LOU

p45–48 NFS

p87–92 NFS

p139–142 NFS

p185–190 NFS

SHABNAM JANNESARI

WILLIAM MAXEN

DANA SCHEIN

AMADEO MORELOS FAVELA

p49–52 NFS

p93–96 $2,750–$8,000

p143–146 NFS

p191–194 NFS

BENJAMIN KAITA

EVAN MAZELLAN

SKYLER SIMPSON

JESSE ZUO

p53–58 NFS

p97–102 NFS

p147–152 NFS

p195–200 $500–$5,000

202

$25