New American Paintings Midwest Issue 179

179

Aug/Sept

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The Cleveland Museum of Art Amanda Morgan Institute of Contemporary Art, Miami Bana Kattan Museum of Contemporary Art, Chicago Bill Powers Half Gallery Dominic Molon RISD Museum of Art Lauren R. O’Connell Scottsdale Museum of Contemporary Art Hannah Klemm St. Louis Art Museum Molly Boarati Nasher Museum of Art, Duke University Lauren Haynes Nasher Museum of Art, Duke University Liz Munsell Museum of Fine Arts, Boston Anna Katz The Museum of Contemporary Art, Los Angeles Suzanne Weaver San Antonio Museum of Art Henriette Huldisch

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CONTENTS

7

EDITOR’S NOTE Steven Zevitas

9

COMMENTS Stephanie Fox Knappe PhD, Sanders Sosland Senior Curator of Global Modern and Contemporary Art, Head of American Art, The Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art, Kansas City, MO

11

NOTEWORTHY Juror’s and Editor’s Picks

13

JUROR’S SELECTIONS Midwest Review 2025

165

EDITOR’S SELECTIONS Midwest Review 2025

197

PRICING GUIDE Asking prices for selected works

179

Constantine p52

Aug/Sept

EDITOR’S NOTE

Issue #179 of New American Paintings was curated by Stephanie Fox Knappe, Sanders Sosland Senior Curator of Global Modern and Contemporary Art and Head of American Art at The Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art. Over the course of two weeks, Stephanie meticulously reviewed more than five hundred submissions, ultimately selecting a diverse group of artists featured in this issue. While Chicago remains the cultural epicenter of the Midwest, it’s worth noting that only twenty-five percent of the chosen artists reside in the Windy City, reflecting a growing trend of artists building their practices outside major urban centers.

I am frequently asked about how artists are selected for New American Paintings, and it’s a topic I haven’t addressed in quite some time. From the publication’s inception, our jurying process has been entirely blind. This approach reflects the core values of the publication: We strive to minimize bias and ensure that all artists, regardless of gender, age, ethnicity, or career stage, have an equal opportunity to be featured. Jurors are only given visual materials: four images of each artist’s work, along with captions. Admittedly, this isn’t an ideal scenario. In a perfect world, jurors would be able to view the artworks in person.

It’s fair to say that each juror brings their own approach to the selection process, along with their own inherent biases. One thing is certain: Reviewing hundreds of applications requires a significant amount of work.

To streamline the process, we’ve developed a jurying system that enables

7

jurors to sort through submissions in various ways and organize them into different categories. On average, it takes about ten days to complete the selection for the main section of the publication. Once the juror’s review is finished, our editorial team takes over. At that stage, all applications are reviewed again to determine which artists will be featured in the Editor’s Section.

My hope is that every Issue of New American Paintings will be as aesthetically diverse as possible, while accurately reflecting prevailing trends in the art world. To this end, I ask our jurors to cast the broadest net possible when making their selections and to consider work which might normally be in their realm of interest. This rigorous and collaborative effort is what results in New American Paintings.

Enjoy the issue!

Steven Zevitas Publisher & Editor

“ONE OF THE MOST POWERFULLY

AFFECTING CONTEMPORARY ART EXPERIENCES I’VE EVER HAD.” — MURR AY WHY TE, THE BOSTON GLOBE

Steve Locke: the fire next time On view through November 8

N O R T H A DA M S , M A SS .

|

massmoca.org

Steve Locke: the fire next time, as installed at MASS MoCA. Photo: Jon Verney

8

COMMENTS

STEPHANIE FOX KNAPPE, PHD Sanders Sosland Curator of Global Modern and Contemporary Art, Head of American Art, The Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art, Kansas City, MO

As the juror for this Midwest issue of New American Paintings—one of their five annual publications dedicated to painters making their lives and their art in a designated region of this country—I have been thinking a great deal about the significance of place. Prior to pouring over the submissions, I wondered whether I, a native Midwesterner and curator at a midwestern museum, would be able to detect any hint of a middle-of-the-map-specific genius loci. Rather, what I discovered and what this exhibition-in-print reveals is a rich engagement with a multifaceted potentia loci, or power of place, that offers possibilities both expected and surprising through a range of form and idioms.

Many of the artists selected for inclusion in this issue harness the power of place in overt and subtle ways, adeptly wielding its complexities to serve a multitude of ends. A number of them, including painter Rhonda Gates, whose sensitive and highly personal distillation of sensorial experiences with place earned her this year’s midwestern artist of noteworthy distinction, claim the designation of landscape artist—either in a traditional or less customary sense of the timeless genre. Strongly hewing to the latter, the Chicago artist Curtis Anthony Bozif creates enveloping, large-scale and mysterious, minimalist abstract paintings that pulse and shimmer. In his canvases, place is not something still or static; rather, it is imbued with flux. Stemming from close observation, his paintings evoke those elements of place that are fleeting and flicker such as atmosphere and light. Their glittering gradients also elicit the long-duration transformations of place inherent in natural processes over time.

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Beginning with titles such as Just Before the Ripples Break, When the Air is Thick with Thoughts, and Everything Stands Still as the World Holds its Breath for Just a Little Longer, Waiting for Something to Stir Beneath the Surface of the Unbroken Water and Somewhere Unseen, Wrapped in the Stillness of Air and the Soft Passing of Time, the Weight of the Body Dissolves; All that Remains is a Quiet Presence Drifting Somewhere Between Nothing and Everything; Such Simple Medicine, the paintings of the Detroit-based artist Gretchen Adel immediately place us. These titles each offer a lyrical conjuring redolent of the natural world, the lush, chromatic landscapes into and out of which Adel’s fragmented, nude, female figures rhythmically appear and disappear, separate and merge, and provide sanctuary where renewal and resilience are nurtured.

The manner with which Adel’s vibrant, foliage-filled settings protectively ensconce her figures in their process of self-actualization stands in marked contrast to the callous and unsympathetic way that place functions in the canvases of fellow Detroit painter, Andre Barker. Situated in sketchily rendered environments devoid of color—literally and figuratively largely “white spaces”—the solitary figures who populate Barker’s paintings are distinctly set off from the places they occupy. Alienation, as opposed to integration, dominates these scenes. The figures are in, but not a part of, these places, exposed. We confront them—full color and fully imagined, highly visible, and pushed forward close to the picture plane—while they, heads covered in disposable plastic take-away bags, contend with what the

“Even the seemingly place-less paintings within this issue, place has the power to quietly creep in and play a role.”

artist describes as “environments marked by hate, misunderstanding, and fear.”

Even in the seemingly place-less paintings within this issue, place has the power to quietly creep in and play a role. It does so in artist Samantha Haring’s intimate still-lifes, or portraits, as she deems them, of convincingly pop-able rolls of unfurling bubble wrap. Set against non-descript junctions of a table, shelf, floor, and wall, Haring renders the air-filled pockets of plastic film with the care and close attention befitting the items it might serve to protect. Often the very purpose of this ubiquitous packing material is to securely hold precious objects in one place over time or to ensure their safe passage from one place to the next. With White Noise, Enough, and Trailing Off we may wonder where the used portion wound up and to where the remainder is destined.

Particles of place, each charged with their own site-specific associations, are literally embedded in the Dubuque, Iowa-based artist E. E. Kono’s eggtempera paintings that merge the mythological with the modern to create sites where culture, symbols, and meaning are fluid. Global travel and an interest in geopolitical histories and storytelling inform her precisely detailed, whimsical works, the ground earth pigments for which she sources from places laden with the significance of time and history across the world. Likewise, place impacts the materiality and content of the work of multidisciplinary artist Alice Pixley Young. In her Cincinnati-area studio located on a Superfund site, Young creates pieces that carry messages of

environmental exploitation and resilience, along with distinctive markers of place through her repurposing of, among other things, coal slag, a byproduct of coal-burning power plants. A painting like Moccasin Bend (Swamp Portal), with its flowing crystalline intricacies achieved through the combination of gouache, salt, and ink, holds the multivalent significance of the place that inspired it: the Blue Blazes Trail near Chattanooga, Tennessee, located in what is now an archeological district.

Wherever you happen to spend time with the art celebrated by this issue, consider the power of place and the nuance with which these midwestern artists leverage it. Whether geographical, psychological, liminal, or completely fantastical, place in the paintings on the pages that follow informs narrative and shapes identity. It underpins abstraction; it evokes the familiar, invites us into, or conjures, the strange, and holds us at a distance. It signals personal, cultural, and sociopolitical meaning, holding memories and offering portals of possibility.

Bozif Adel Kono

p41 p16 p102

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NOTEWORTHY

JUROR’S PICK: RHONDA GATES

p81

Rhonda Gates sets you up with certain expectations when she begins her artist statement with “As a landscape artist . . .” These assumptions abruptly fall away in the face of her elegant and eloquent geometric abstractions. Her paintings distill through sensuous surfaces and an economy of magical means the intangibles of her experiences and nuanced impressions of transitory moments in the natural world. After an encounter with her piece Glimpse of Rain, watching raindrops cascade down a windowpane will cease to be the same as before.

EDITOR’S PICK: JAMES MORSE

p185

It is difficult to precisely define the emotional tone of Morse’s constrained paintings, but words like “spiritual,” “mystical,” and “melancholy” inevitably rise to the surface. Morse’s work is centered around the familiar terrain of northern Michigan, where he lives and works, capturing its forests, waters, and rural life. However, his paintings transcend straightforward representation; they are less acts of geographic documentation and more meditative explorations of nature’s elusive, transformative power. The physical world in Morse’s paintings often seems to hover between visibility and abstraction, evoking a sense of memory, loss, or quiet revelation. In this way, his work straddles the boundary between the real and the intangible, drawing us into a vision of the natural world that feels both personal and mythic.

SELECTED ARTISTS: MIDWEST REVIEW 2025

JUROR’S SELECTIONS: GRETCHEN ADEL MARTYNA ALEXANDER JO ARCHULETA ANDRE BARKER DILLON BECK CURTIS ANTHONY BOZIF CHRISTOPHER BURK HOLLY CAHILL ANTONIA CONSTANTINE JAY CONSTANTINE JENNIFER CRONIN SALVADOR DOMINGUEZ JONATHON DOWNING SCOTT ESPESETH GRACE FECHNER RHONDA GATES SAMANTHA HARING JOSIAH JAMISON DAVID NAJIB KASIR TRAVIS KELLER E.E. KONO KAYLA MAHAFFEY CHLOE MCELDOWNEY MEG LIONEL MURPHY SONG WATKINS PARK MARCUS ROBINS EMIL ROBINSON FARËNA SABURI DAUN SUH BRANDOM TERRES-SANCHEZ AARON TROYER PEDRO TRUEBA RAMÍREZ SAMUAL WEINBERG MEGAN WOLFKILL ALICE PIXLEY YOUNG

EDITOR’S SELECTIONS:

CECILIA BEAVEN ABIGAIL LACROIX MELISSA LEANDRO JAMES MORSE RYAN RICHEY

Robinson p129

JUROR’S SELECTIONS

Artists are presented in alphabetical order.

Artist biographies have been edited to prioritize recent highlights.

Pricing Guide can be found on p197.

GRETCHEN ADEL

248.252.6562 gretchenadelart@gmail.com @gretchenadel

b. 1998 Toledo, OH | lives in Detroit, MI Education

Through an intricate process of layering and fragmentation, my work explores the interplay between creation and dissolution, where figures, landscapes, and symbols emerge and dissolve in a state of perpetual flux. Each painting becomes an environment where the tangible and intangible coalesce, reflecting complexities of memory, experience, and time.

I am drawn to the tension between what is seen and unseen and the idea that finding oneself often requires self-loss, a willingness to surrender to forces beyond our control. As I intuitively paint, rearranging figures and chromatic planes to resolve compositional challenges, unexpected visual pathways emerge, unveiling a deeper sense of wholeness and reflecting broader existential cycles of creation and destruction.

Through the female figures in my work, I see the convergence of personal history and collective memory. These figures, entwined with their surroundings, make visible the porous and ever-shifting boundaries between other and self, past and present, and life and death. Ultimately, my practice grapples with these dualities in an effort to accept and surrender to their necessary coexistence; through loss, possibility emerges.

2021

BFA, College for Creative Studies, Detroit, MI Solo Exhibitions

2025

Salon Highlight, Louis Buhl & Co., Detroit, MI Selected Group Exhibitions

2025

Fracture Flourish: The Arduous Process of Reinvention, VSG Contemporary, Chicago, IL

2024

Art Fair | Detroit, ArtClvb, Detroit, MI

2021

Gilda Snowden Memorial Exhibition, Scarab Club, Detroit, MI

Just Before the Ripples Break, When the Air is Thick with Thoughts, and Everything Stands Still as the World Holds Its Breath for Just a Little Longer, Waiting for Something to Stir Beneath the Surface of the Unbroken Water. oil on canvas, 36 x 24 inches

16

ADEL

Twice Seen, Never Known oil on canvas, 30 x 30 inches

17

The Leaves Remembered Every Shade of Light That Ever Touched Them oil on canvas, 30 x 40 inches

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ADEL

19

Somewhere Unseen, Wrapped in the Stillness of Air and the Soft Passing of Time, the Weight of the Body Dissolves; All That Remains is a Quiet Presence Drifting Somewhere Between Nothing and Everything; Such Simple Medicine. oil on canvas, 30 x 40 inches 20

MARTYNA ALEXANDER

tomartyna@gmail.com martynaalexander.net @martyna_alexander

b. 1989 Ann Arbor, MI | lives in Detroit, MI Education

Alexander’s mixed ethnic background as the daughter of a Polish immigrant with Korean ancestry and a Michigan local with European ancestry profoundly shapes her perspective on connection to place as well as how identity is influenced by culture and biology. She examines the natural behaviors and landscapes that each of us are drawn to and the hidden reasons for which they form connections.

As a designer, Alexander has used her longtime practice of painting as a way to explore more subjective forms of understanding. In her practice she allows her design skills to inform her visual vocabulary and channel that very analytical process into creating abstract, anti-solution-based artworks.

Her paintings live somewhere in the space between rational thought and a sense of fantasy. Exploring how ancient connections to ourselves and the contemporary frameworks we apply to our lives, environments, and culture created containers reminds us of the many man-made systems that make up our lives and that they can be unmade and changed with collective will.

2012

BFA, Stamps School of Art & Design, University of Michigan, Detroit, MI Residencies

2024

Vermont Studio Center, Johnson, VT

2022

Almost Perfect, Tokyo, Japan Solo Exhibitions

2024

Courts, PLAYGROUND DETROIT, Detroit, MI

2022

Tokyo Series, Almost Perfect, Tokyo, Japan

2020

Galaxy Series, Fisher Building, Detroit, MI Selected Group Exhibitions

2024

Detroit <> Tokyo, Art Clvb, Tokyo, Japan

2023

Beta, Art Clvb, Detroit, MI

2022

Geometric Gestures (online), Dodomu Gallery,

2021

The Grandeur of Color, Modern Visual Arts Gallery,

2020

Small Works, PLAYGROUND DETROIT, Detroit, MI

New York, NY Bethlehem, PA

Represented by PLAYGROUND DETROIT, Detroit, MI Art Clvb, Detroit, MI

Test Court acrylic on cotton canvas, 15 x 12 inches

22

ALEXANDER

Luz Marina’s Mud acrylic and pigment stick on cotton canvas, 11 x 9.5 inches

23

New Rules, Old Ecosystems acrylic and pigment stick on cotton canvas, 8 x 6 inches

24

JO ARCHULETA

joaarchuleta@gmail.com joarchuleta.com @joarchuletaart

b. 2000 Taos, NM | lives in Kansas City, MO Education

My work explores the complexity of identity and mythology of womanhood found within leisure, desire, pleasure, and the specificity as a state of being. By acknowledging rules within the landscape of femininity, gender roles, and their societal expectations, I have found that there are multiple approaches to transgressive and transformative definitions of these identities.

My specific approach to this critique has been to use humor, jokes, and satire. I am interested in exploring how the figure is perceived and how she sees herself, a constant battle between self awareness and self sabotage. Tension within the color palette and subject matter is materially driven, using texture as a tool for attraction. The figures seduce and confront complexities within the vapidness of beauty, vanity, and ego while also using self-consciousness as repulsion. The women in my work wear masks, perform softness, weakness, shallowness, and confidence, all while cowering in the insecurities within themselves.

2024

BFA, Kansas City Art Institute (KCAI), Kansas City, MO Solo Exhibitions

2024

MIDDLE DAUGHTER, Gallery Bogart, KCAI, Kansas City, MO Selected Group Exhibitions

2025

One Bedroom Apartment, Gallery Bogart, KCAI,

2024

BFA Exhibition: In Assemblage, KCAI Gallery, KCAI,

Kansas City, MO Kansas City, MO Benefit Art Auction Exhibition, Bemis Center for Contemporary Arts, Kansas City, MO

Family Portrait acrylic, acrylic gouache, oil pastel, colored pencil, gems, and glitter on canvas, 60 x 48 inches

26

ARCHULETA

27

Me & Pookie acrylic, acrylic gouache, oil sticks, glitter, colored pencil, and ribbon on canvas, 60 x 48 inches Flimflam, Hornswoggle & Other Solacing gouache, acrylic gouache, acrylic, watercolor, and colored pencil on paper, 14 x 11 inches

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ARCHULETA

29

Passenger Princess acrylic, acrylic gouache, colored pencil, one shot, foam, glitter, ribbon, and collaged paper on canvas, 47 x 59 inches

30

ANDRE BARKER

347.665.7011 (M Contemporary Art) andrebarker.com @andrebarkerart

b. 1997 Detroit, MI | lives in Detroit, MI Education

By utilizing visual motifs such as color, lighting, and symbolism, I highlight the surreal quality of being Black, focusing on the aftermath of trauma rather than the trauma itself. I aim to convey vulnerability rather than strength, humanizing my subjects by distilling their essence in each painting. The performance and frequent repression of Blackness in environments marked by hate, misunderstanding, and fear enable my work to visualize the surreal and alienating core of the Black experience. My paintings expose the stress and anxiety that result from the weight of the performance and Black excellence that causes a state of heightened awareness of self.

In my new series, I explore the experience of Black identity using symbolic elements.

Specifically, I incorporate a plastic “Thank You, Come Again” bag, placing it partially over the subject’s head or in the environment as a metaphor for the feelings of disposability and discomfort that can arise in predominantly white spaces.

2024

MFA, Columbia College Chicago, Chicago, IL Residencies

2024

Ragdale, Lake Forest, IL Solo Exhibitions

2024

Glimpse of Us, M Contemporary Art, Ferndale, MI Selected Group Exhibitions

2024

Atlanta Art Fair, Atlanta, GA Interpersonal, M Contemporary Art, Ferndale, MI

2022

MEGA 2022, Alluvium Gallery, Kendall College of Art and Design, Grand Rapids, MI BIPOC Is the Theme!, Buckham Gallery, Flint, MI Art in B & W, 3 Square Art, Fort Collins, MI Represented by M Contemporary Art, Ferndale, MI

Y’all like art? acrylic on canvas, 60 x 48 inches

32

BARKER

Blockbuster Night acrylic on canvas, 30 x 40 inches

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D.N.A. acrylic on canvas, 30 x 40 inches 34

DILLON BECK

hi@dillonbeck.com dillonbeck.com @dillonpaintsthings

b. 1987 Columbus, OH | lives in Columbus, OH Selected Group Exhibitions

Dillon Beck is a painter, muralist, and designer based out of Columbus, Ohio.

He fuses design elements with traditional painting, following and breaking the rules of the former to create a unique visual vocabulary. Hard-edged, regulated forms like stairs, tunnels, roadways, and homes are rendered in shifting gradient colors, providing formal movement and cadence to otherwise ambiguous scenes. His artistic pieces regularly explore the concepts of space and time, and often times the intention behind his artwork is to allow viewers to feel as though they can enter his paintings and explore the worlds within them. His work has always found its footing somewhere in the realm between analog and digital, between the real and the impossible—a place you’ve never been that somehow feels oddly familiar.

2025

Vibrancy, Mansfield Art Center, Mansfield, OH

2024

Ekistics, Columbus Museum of Art, Columbus, OH Unearthed, Brandt Gallery, Columbus, OH

2023

Walled Gardens, 934 Gallery, Columbus, OH

2022

Organized Escape, Blockfort, Columbus, OH

Detour aerosol on cradled wood panel, framed, 24 x 24 inches

36

BECK

Density aerosol on cradled wood panel, framed, 72 x 48 inches Sprawl aerosol on cradled wood panel, framed, 72 x 48 inches

37

38

CURTIS ANTHONY BOZIF

curtisanthonybozif.com @curtisanthonybozif

b. 1982 St. Louis, MO | lives in Chicago, IL Education

While I employ languages of abstraction, minimalism, and process-based and conceptual art, my paintings are deeply rooted in observation. My art can be described as environmental, ecological, or as non-traditional landscape painting; yet, my interests lie not with the picturesque, but with light, atmosphere, texture, the fractal geometry of nature, and deep time.

To this end, erosion and sedimentation, growth and decay—geological and biological processes that help shape what we call the landscape—greatly inform my work. I find these natural processes—of increase and decrease, of concentration and dissipation, of transformation by repeated addition and subtraction—analogous to the act of painting itself and a metaphor for incomprehensibly vast time scales and ecologies.

2008

MFA, Northwestern University, Evanston, IL

2006

BFA, Kansas City Art Institute, Kansas City, MO Solo Exhibitions

2024

Shore, Real Tinsel, Milwaukee, WI

2023

In the Mist of a Great Fall, Oliva Gallery, Chicago, IL

2018

Accumulations, St. Louis Community College, St. Louis, MO Selected Group Exhibitions

2025

The Vapours So Whiten and Thicken the Air, Studio Break Gallery, Chicago, IL

2020

Objects and Environs, Oliva Gallery, Chicago, IL

Number 12 (Fire Trilogy) oil, ash, and charcoal on canvas, 70 x 50 inches

40

BOZIF

Number 11 (Vespers) (Sun Painting) oil on canvas, 54 x 78 inches

41

Number 10 (Vespers) oil on canvas, 54 x 78 inches

42

CHRISTOPHER BURK

614.216.1858 christopherburkartist@gmail.com christopherburk.com @christopherburk_artist

b. 1978 Columbus, OH | lives in Columbus, OH Residencies

If I were to classify myself into one category as an artist, it would be a landscape painter whose work fluctuates back and forth between the representational and the abstract. Ultimately, the practice has become about exploration for me as a painter. My work as an observer is about discovering the unorthodox, often overlooked beauty seen within the landscape and presenting it to the viewer.

2022

Greater Columbus Arts Council, Columbus, OH Anni Albers Foundation, Bethany, CT

2018

Vermont Studio Center, Johnson, VT Solo Exhibitions

2024

There’s A Light Somewhere, Hawk + Hive, Andes, NY

2021

Quiet Setting, Brandt-Roberts Galleries, Columbus, OH

2018

Christopher Burk: Illuminating the Everyday, Deer Gallery, Springfield Museum of Art, Springfield, OH Selected Group Exhibitions

2025

Tabula Rasa, Brandt Gallery, Columbus, OH

2024

Wilderness V, Antler Gallery, Portland, OR

Amuse-Boche, Hashimoto Contemporary, New York, NY I will tell you mine, Tyger Tyger Gallery, Asheville, NC Represented by Brandt Gallery, Columbus, OH SN Macarena Gallería, Bogotá, Columbia The Bonfoey Gallery, Cleveland, OH

Nocturne in Indigo with Yellow Square 1 oil on panel, 20 x 20 inches

44

BURK

Nocturne Coral Square 1 oil on panel, 20 x 20 inches Nocturne in Indigo with Yellow Square 2 oil on panel, 24 x 24 inches

45

46

HOLLY CAHILL

312.618.8648 hollyacahill@gmail.com hollycahill.com @hollyacahill

b. 1976 Ft. Thomas, KY | lives in Chicago, IL Education

As a child, I often disappeared into the forest for hours and still find the experience of wandering generative. Through an expansive painting practice that combines fibers, sculpture, and collage, my work is aroused by moments of awe and wonder in everyday encounters within our lived ecology. I translate observations within the natural world into hybrid works that focus on the roles biodiversity, sensorial experience, and transformation play in building a more verdant future in order to deepen connection, sensitivity, and care for our environment.

Pairing improvisation with labor-intensive processes, I invite the evolution of my work with slow and intentional efforts tied to marginalized histories of craft. I often create by repurposing remnants from past and present works, merging fragments of paintings and dyed fabrics into stitched, pieced, sculptural configurations that accumulate multiple impressions of the landscape. Contrasting various perspectives and dimensions that distill and extend fleeting moments in nature, my works additionally bulge and pool out from the picture plane, encouraging viewers to consider their place within the imagery.

2004

MFA, University of Cincinnati, Cincinnati, OH Residencies

2025

Ragdale, Lake Forest, IL

2018

Chicago Artists Coalition, Chicago, IL

2014

Vermont Studio Center, Johnson, VT Solo Exhibitions

2021

Silver, 65GRAND, Chicago, IL Selected Group Exhibitions

2024

COSMIC GEOMETRIES: The Prairie’s Edge, Secrist | Beach, Chicago, IL

2023 2020

Beneath the Visible, Hyde Park Art Center, Chicago, IL Scry til you know why, Gaylord & Dorothy Donnelley Foundation, Chicago, IL Inter-Flux, Epiphany Center for the Arts, Chicago, IL Collections Smart Museum of Art, Chicago, IL

Elemental Interplay acrylic on canvas and linen, natural dyes on silk and cotton, and velour, 47.5 x 45 inches

48

CAHILL

49

Piercing the Storm acrylic on canvas and velvet, 87 x 58 x 21.5 inches Night Fall: anywhere/everywhere ink and acrylic on canvas and velour, 57 x 38 x 2.5 inches

50

ANTONIA CONSTANTINE

antoniaconstantine@gmail.com antoniaconstantine.com @antoniaconstantine

b. 1993 Grand Rapids, MI | lives in Bloomington, IN Education

My paintings explore introspection, anxiety, and connection through a playful bending of space, time, and bodies. I create ambiguous narratives set in claustrophobic residential architecture that feature figures who oscillate between stagnation and acting out. The characters I depict are desperate to break cycles and self-actualize, often sabotaging themselves in the process. Moments of wonder twist with apprehension in scenes that attempt to capture life’s intensity and tenderness.

These situations are born from my fascination with existential dread and the tendency to obsessively turn inward when the world spins out of control. Although I find this deeply human, it is ultimately dysfunctional and slightly humorous. My work examines the pitfalls of this compulsion, as well as the desire to connect with something beyond oneself. This results in the organized compositions, ecstatic with saturated color, rhythmic shapes, and vivid light, evoking feelings that are familiar yet strange and telling stories that are unreal yet true.

2024

MFA, Indiana University, Bloomington, IN

2016

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

2025

Arts Letters & Numbers, Averill Park, NY Solo Exhibitions

2024

Inside Job, Grunwald Gallery of Art, Bloomington, IN Selected Group Exhibitions

2024

AXA Art Prize US 2024 Exhibition, New York Academy of Art, New York, NY Untold Stories (online), Artsin Square

2023

Mind Mirror, Racecar Factory, Indianapolis, IN National Society of Arts and Letters Exhibition, FAR Center for Contemporary Art, Bloomington, IN

2022

Recess, John Waldron Arts Center, Bloomington, IN

2019

Home is Where the Art Is, Jeffrey Breslow Gallery, Chicago, IL

Underdog oil on panel, 60 x 48 inches

52

CONSTANTINE

53

Note to Self oil on shaped panel, 84 x 40 inches In Your Dreams oil on panel, 60 x 72 inches

54

CONSTANTINE

55

Scarcity Mindset oil on panel, 48 x 132 inches

56

JAY CONSTANTINE

616.401.7381 constanj@ferris.edu jayconstantineart.com

b. 1953 Cleveland, OH | lives in Grand Rapids, MI Education

My work examines historical and biographical subject matter. Researching history helps to anchor my work in nonfiction and often provides stories that are more interesting than fiction. There is a long tradition of narrative painting, and I would like to think that I add my own unique approach to that tradition.

1980

MFA, Northern Illinois University, Dekalb, IL

1976

BFA, Cleveland Institute of Art (CIA), Cleveland, OH

My art might be characterized as a kind of history painting with an emphasis on stylized realism. I reference many visual sources such as graphic novels, storyboards for films, and narrative art in general. However, the most consistent visual device I have used has been the multiple and shaped picture plane. The multiple picture plane hints at storytelling and the shaped picture plane provides alternatives to traditional formats. In addition, structure, pattern, and repetition are often employed in my compositions as a way of unifying the many diverse components in my work.

2025

Solo Exhibitions Keeler Gallery, Fountain Street Church, Grand Rapids, MI 2023

Paul Collins Art Gallery, Grand Rapids Community College, Grand Rapids, MI

2020

Holland Area Arts Council, Holland, MI Selected Group Exhibitions

2024

Alumni Exhibition: Are We There Yet?, Reinberger

2022

More is More, Akron Art Museum, Akron, OH

Gallery, CIA, Cleveland, OH 2021

We’re Doing It ALL Wrong, Edward A. Dixon Gallery, Dayton, OH

2020

Art2Life (online), Los Angeles, CA Collections Grand Valley State University, Grand Rapids, MI Muskegon Community College, Muskegon, OH Kalamazoo Institute of Arts, Kalamazoo, MI

Scenes from the Life of Friedrich N. alkyd on panel, 42 x 54 inches

58

CONSTANTINE

59

The Discovery of Caligula’s Sunken Pleasure Barge alkyd on panel, 40 x 50 inches The Whitmer Kidnap Plot alkyd on panel, 38 x 64 inches

60

JENNIFER CRONIN

jennifer.anne.cronin@gmail.com jennifercronin.com @jennifercroninart

b. 1986 Oak Lawn, IL | lives in Chicago, IL Education

When the world began to feel a little too gray, I started walking. Sometimes on these otherwise ordinary walks I would notice something that felt special.

Mundane pieces of the landscape, arranged just so, beckoned me to come closer, to look longer. These seemingly ordinary spaces became portals to something extraordinary: the space between day and night, between known and unknown, and between here and there. In these liminal spaces, I found magic. I decided to let go of my rules and I dove into this world of magic. I let myself remember what it felt like to play outside as the sunlight faded away; I let myself linger in the space between reality and imagination, delighting in symphonies of color and bursts of neon brushstrokes. I saw that even here and now, there is beauty to relish in, joy to surrender to, and magic hiding in plain sight.

2009

BFA, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, Urbana-Champaign, IL Solo Exhibitions

2024

Star Stuff, Elephant Room Gallery, Chicago, IL

2023

In Plain Sight, The Admiral at the Lake, Chicago, IL

2022

There Is Still Magic Here, Elephant Room Gallery, Chicago, IL Selected Group Exhibitions

2025

Elemental, Grove Gallery, Evanston, IL

2024

ExtraOrdinary, Beverly Arts Center, Chicago, IL Hydrological Shift, Governors State University, University Park, IL Represented by Elephant Room Gallery, Chicago, IL

Ends and Beginnings pastel, charcoal, and carbon pencil on board, 27 x 19.5 inches

62

CRONIN

63

One in a Billion Trillion acrylic on canvas, 44 x 44 inches Pieces of It Everywhere acrylic and graphite on canvas, 38 x 38 inches

64

SALVADOR DOMINGUEZ

213.293.7495 (de boer) info@salvadordominguez.com salvadordominguez.com @salvador_dominguez_

b. 1985 Zacatecas, Mexico | lives in Chicago, IL Education

I am an interdisciplinary artist working with materials and processes that reflect my cultural heritage and personal experiences. Born in Mexico and raised in Southern California, my work draws from the traditional crafts of indigenous peoples in Mexico and the labor of immigrant communities. Currently, I weave pipe cleaners and paint with encaustic wax, exploring themes of labor as currency and the inherent value in everyday materials.

Through mixed media painting and sculpture, my art practice seeks to create objects that connect people through shared experiences and open up opportunities for art engagement across socioeconomic backgrounds. A key part of my artistic process involves examining and cataloging childhood memories, which have become important in tracing my assimilations across two cultures.

2008

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

2024

Cultura de Domesticidad, de boer, Los Angeles, CA

Solo Exhibitions Mano de Obra, Andrew Rafacz, Chicago, IL Selected Group Exhibitions 2024

A Prologue for Chicago, de boer, Los Angeles, CA Agency: Craft in Chicago from the 1970s-80s and Beyond, Ukrainian Institute of Modern Art, Chicago, IL

2023

Back of Our Hands, de boer, Los Angeles, CA Invisible Architecture, Ralph Arnold Gallery, Loyola University, Chicago, IL

2022

Space to Say, Heaven Gallery, Chicago, IL LatinXAmerican, DePaul Art Museum, Chicago, IL

2019 2018

Discomfort Zones, Carroll University, Waukesha, IL Día de Muertos, Where the Past is Present, National Museum of Mexican Art, Chicago, IL

2016

Dissecting Signifiers, Ukrainian Institute of Modern Art, Chicago, IL Represented by de boer, Los Angeles, CA

Atrayendo a las Aves (La ultima escena) mixed media and encaustic on panel, 53 x 118 x 2 inches

66

DOMINGUEZ

Jarrón de cristal mixed media and encaustic on panel, 50 x 37 x 2 inches El Florero mixed media and encaustic on panel, 50.5 x 37 x 2 inches

67

68

JONATHON DOWNING

jodownin@umich.edu @jonathondowning

b. 1997 Town and Country, MO | lives in Westland, MI Education

My portraits aim to be comprehensive representations of a singular character through the use of visual multiplicity. My process employs digital and physical processes as I utilize images from fashion lookbooks to create compositions in Photoshop, then render them in oil paint to depict the complexities of each subject.

Themes of my work include the juxtaposition of internal emotion and external image, the way that fashion and popular culture contribute to this dichotomy, measurements of success, idolization, and the idea of celebrity, wrapped up in layers of color and gloss varnish. I utilize my own personal experiences and interests, most prominently my love for Basketball. The themes in my work are shown through the lens of the Basketball fan, exploring their relationship to the athletes who become icons that are worshiped by millions of people.

The characters I paint inhabit a unique world, where six eyes are something one is born with and the cracks in the mask they wear are as prominent as the beautiful image they show to the public.

2020

BFA, University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, MI Residencies

2025

Better Go South, Berlin, Germany Solo Exhibitions

2024

Deee-troit Basketball, Art Clvb, Detroit, MI Appearances, Aspirations, and Allusions, VLAB Gallery, Madrid, Spain

2023

Laced Up, Glass Rice, San Francisco, CA Checks Over Stripes, Bridge Mogura Gallery, Tokyo, Japan Inseparable, IRL Gallery, New York, NY

2022

Countryside Jumpshot, NYCH Gallery, Chicago, IL Selected Group Exhibitions

2025

Late Checkout, Zepster Gallery, Brooklyn, NY

2024

13-A-DOZEN, Better Go South, Stuttgart, Germany Beyond Portraiture, Allouche Gallery, New York, NY

Opposites Attract oil on cotton canvas, 30 x 24 inches

70

DOWNING

Prizefighter oil on cotton canvas, 48 x 36 inches

71

Courtside Seats oil on cotton canvas, 72 x 60 inches

72

SCOTT ESPESETH

scottespeseth@gmail.com scottespeseth.com @scottespeseth

b. 1975 Bowie, MD | lives in Madison, WI Education

These works are drawings made with black watercolor on paper. For me, drawing is about transparency, the most direct route from an idea to the paper. Watercolor pushes back on my obsessive tendencies, requiring me to make compromises and to not lose the forest for the trees.

2000

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

1997

BFA, West Virginia University, Morgantown, WV

The drawings are inspired by chance encounters with objects, spaces, or events that trigger moments of clarity, where they suddenly appear to be intensely strange or intensely beautiful. I attempt to stage these moments either on-site or in the studio, but inevitably I end up making changes.

Through the process of careful setup and sustained looking, measuring, and drawing, I find a new clarity in the act of making. The images are animated by a consciousness lurking in the atmosphere, as though the membrane between two worlds has worn thin. My subconscious seems to be trying to tell me something through the choices I make in the studio as I watch themes emerge—of memory, loss, change, and the fantastic.

2025

Solo Exhibitions Dwell Time, ECC Art Gallery, East Central College, Union, MO Grey Matters, Annex Gallery, University of Wisconsin-Oshkosh, Oshkosh, WI 2023 2022

Grey Haunts, Main Gallery, UWM, Madison, WI Finding Strangeness, Hartnett Gallery, University of Rochester, Rochester, NY Selected Group Exhibitions

2024

Roots, Manifest Gallery, Cincinnati, OH Wisconsin Artists Biennial, Museum of Wisconsin Art, West Bend, WI TMA Contemporary, Trout Museum of Art, Appleton, WI

2023

Drawing Discourse, S. Tucker Cooke Gallery, University of North Carolina, Asheville, NC Collections Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts, Philadelphia, PA DePaul Art Museum, DePaul University, Chicago, IL

Knees watercolor on paper, 35 x 27 inches

74

ESPESETH

Stack watercolor on paper, 16 x 16 inches

75

Two Wads, One Dusted watercolor and gouache on paper, 16 x 16 inches

76

GRACE FECHNER

gracefechner@gmail.com gracefechner.com @grace.fechner

b. 1990 Edina, MN | lives in St. Paul, MN Education

My current work explores implied narratives inherent in single moments in time. Employing illustrative clarity in attention to color, line, and detail, I am attempting to capture sensory experiences—light, heat, sound, smell, and taste—along with visual cues that allow the viewer to interpret and judge what each scenario implies. The perspective creates an ambiguity of subject, leaving it up to the viewer to decide whether or not they are an active participant inside the painting. There is an implied ideal, both in aesthetic and situation, and things are either going relatively well or slowly slipping into chaos. Ultimately, the work analyzes one’s relationship to the self, to others, and to the material and natural world.

2013

BFA, University of Wisconsin-Eau Claire, Eau Claire, WI Residencies

2015

Art Students League of New York, Orangeburg, NY Creative Centre, Stöðvarfjörður, Iceland Solo Exhibitions

2018

Tattersall Distilling, Minneapolis, MN

2017

Show and Tell, Volume One Gallery, Eau Claire, WI Selected Group Exhibitions

2024

Open Call 2024 (online), MEPAINTSME

2023

Wide Open: A Showcase of New Perspectives, North Suburban Center for the Arts, Fridley, MN 112th Fine Arts Exhibition, Minnesota State Fair, Falcon Heights, MN Frequency Volume 3, MirrorLab, Minneapolis, MN

2021

Issue #149, NAP Gallery (online), Boston, MA AFTERLIGHT, Field Projects, New York, NY

New ‘Do, New You acrylic and India ink pen on paper, 18 x 13.5 inches

78

FECHNER

79

Stay Hydrated acrylic, graphite, and India ink pen on paper, 18 x 13.5 inches With All My Heart acrylic and India ink pen on paper, 17.5 x 13.5 inches

80

RHONDA GATES

312.944.1990 (Zolla/Lieberman Gallery) rhondagates.com @rhondagatespaints

b. 1966 Zeeland, MI | lives in Rockford, MI Residencies

As a landscape artist, I seek places in the environment where I can submerge myself in the sensory experiences of those places: listening, seeing, smelling, and feeling the inherent qualities of the landscape. Then, I analyze and deconstruct the sensations and curated elements from those places to present them as reorganized impressions of atmospheric abstractions of light, space, and place.

I use paint and graphite as tools to create delicately balanced depictions of spatial depth and flatness of surface as I lean into my engagement with memories of those places. The resulting paintings provide intimate glimpses of my immersion in the landscape and encourage sublime experiences with contemporary landscape painting. In my paintings, the poetry of air and light blend into tangible material—the alchemy of abstraction—as my experiences coalesce as memories and are transformed, culminating in elegant, conceptual abstractions that are stabilized within a geometric organization.

My ephemeral memories of experiences within the landscape, with different weather, light, and flora/fauna/shapes, become transformed into lyrical, simplified works of art.

2021

Ragdale, Lake Forest, IL Solo Exhibitions

2024 2020

land(e)scape, Zolla/Lieberman Gallery, Chicago, IL Rockford Midwestern Biennial, Rockford Art Museum, Rockford, IL Distillation of Space, Zolla/Lieberman Gallery, Chicago, IL

2019

Polychromiscape, Zolla/Lieberman Gallery, Chicago, IL Selected Group Exhibitions

2021

Summer Invitational, Sherry Leedy Contemporary Art, Kansas City, MO

2020

The Anniversary Show: Celebrating 35 Years of Art with Friends, Sherry Leedy Contemporary Art, Kansas City, MO Collections Grand Valley State University, Allendale, MI Represented by Zolla/Lieberman Gallery, Chicago, IL Sherry Leedy Contemporary Art, Kansas City, MO

Glimpse of Rain acrylic and oil pant with graphite on panel, 20 x 16 inches

82

GATES

Deluge acrylic and oil paint with graphite on panel, 24 x 20 inches Ships in passing acrylic and oil paint with graphite on panel, 24 x 18 inches

83

84

SAMANTHA HARING

212.366.5368 (Kathryn Markel Fine Arts) sam.haring@gmail.com samharing.com @samantha.haring

b. 1989 Des Plaines, IL | lives in Cincinnati, OH Education

I make quiet paintings in a noisy world. My work is an intimate meditation on humble objects and the detritus of studio life. I aim to promote a reengagement with the mundane while creating a moment of reflection for the viewer.

My current work is a series of single-object portraits of packing materials and other containers. I am interested in contemplating the things we use to fill empty space. Bubble wrap, air pockets, and other kinds of recycled paper are temporary objects by design; they are intrinsically important while something is in transit, but immediately disposable once the destination is reached.

These objects offer a literal form of cushioning, protection, or armor, yet, when seen in isolation, they become as much about the space around them and the unseen things as they are about themselves. I am forever striving to make the invisible visible. Emptiness is an illusion. Even in silence, there is a tremendous amount of noise.

2014

MFA, Northern Illinois University, DeKalb, IL

2011

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

2016

Manifest Gallery, Cincinnati, OH Solo Exhibitions

2025

Safe Havens, Studio Break, Chicago, IL Holding Space, GumTree Museum of Art, Tupelo, MS

2023

Still, Southside Gallery, Oxford, MS

2022

Empty Vessels, Pilsen Arts & Community House, Chicago, IL Selected Group Exhibitions

2025

Reprieve, Kathryn Markel Fine Arts, New York, NY

2024

Delicate Ecologies, Indian Hill Gallery, Cincinnati, OH

2022

Midwestern Biennial, Rockford Art Museum, Rockford, IL Drawn, Manifest Gallery, Cincinnati, OH Represented by Kathryn Markel Fine Arts, New York, NY Southside Gallery, Oxford, MS

White Noise oil on paper on panel, 20 x 20 inches

86

HARING

Enough oil on paper on panel, 20 x 20 inches

87

Trailing Off oil on paper on panel, 20 x 20 inches

88

JOSIAH JAMISON

josiahjamison3640@gmail.com josiahjamison.com @josiahjamison

b. 1999 Blacklick, OH | lives in Columbus, OH Education

I am a Black trans-femme artist whose practice explores identity, kinship, and resilience through painting, installation, and multimedia storytelling. My work is rooted in the lived realities of trans-femmes of color—those navigating love, trauma, beauty, and survival in a world that often refuses to see us fully. I use figurative imagery, symbolic landscapes, and textured materials to hold space for stories that are often erased or flattened. Central to my practice is the vision of a trans utopia—a space where joy, serenity, and resistance coexist. I’m interested in the emotional residue of being hyper-visible yet unseen, and how anger, intimacy, and community shape our becoming. Recent works like You Won’t Be Alone, If I’m Here (2025) reflect a shift toward softness and collective care, honoring trans bodies not as symbols but as whole beings.

Influenced by academic painting but resisting spectacle, my work creates room for reflection—for those of us told we’re too much, and for those willing to unlearn. Each piece is a gesture toward healing, kinship, and future-making.

2025

MFA candidate, The Ohio State University (OSU), Columbus, OH

2022

BFA, Columbus College of Art and Design, Columbus, OH Solo Exhibitions

2023

Lean into the Uncomfortableness: Act 1, Parlor Suite, Columbus, OH Selected Group Exhibitions

2025

MFA Thesis Exhibition: Desire Lines, Urban Arts Space, OSU, Columbus, OH

2024

33rd Annual Edith Fergus Gilmore Scholarship

2023

Irrepressible Soul!, Urban Arts Space, OSU,

2022

Mind, Body, Spirit, and Sooouuul, Streetlight Guild,

Exhibition, Hopkins Hall Gallery, OSU, Columbus, OH Columbus, OH Columbus, OH

You Won’t Be Alone, If I’m Here acrylic, silver leaf, charcoal, and stretched paper on panel, 48 x 120 inches

90

JAMISON

don’t mind me oil on canvas, 30 x 40 inches

91

Sleeping Wildgrass oil on canvas, 30 x 30 inches

92

DAVID NAJIB KASIR

414.336.9771 (Var Gallery) davidnkasir@gmail.com davidnajibkasir.com @davidnajibkasir

b. 1977 Chicago, IL | lives in Milwaukee, WI Education

My work interrogates the role Western media plays in constructing cultural narratives, while centering a caring and concerning lens on the destruction of Syria and its people through large-scale paintings. The works start from a personal place. Iraq is my father’s country and Syria is my mother’s, as well as the second home of my youth. It is where my aunts, uncles, and cousins were living. It is where there are buildings I slept in and streets where I played tag and other games as a child.

I’ve witnessed the years of destruction of my countries from US invasion with very little regard from Western mainstream media to civilian casualties.

The intent is to make visible what happens to civilians by placing them within larger context of cultural significance through the use of Arab design elements. I entrap these Middle Eastern landscapes and families in Arab mosaic patterns, not as a backdrop, but as a culture of people trying to hold up their structured environment as best as they can with little to no help from others.

2001

BFA, Milwaukee Institute of Art & Design, Milwaukee, WI Residencies

2024

Golden Foundation, New Berlin, NY Solo Exhibitions

2025

Math of Four Minute Warnings, ARC Gallery,

2023

Neighborhoods in Subtraction, Var Gallery,

Chicago, IL Milwaukee, WI Addition of Tremors by Remainder of Years of Fires, Lawrence University, Appleton, WI Selected Group Exhibitions 2024

Tears Shaped Like Watermelon Seeds, Hawthorn Contemporary, Milwaukee, WI

Collections Baird Center Milwaukee, WI Represented by Var Gallery, Milwaukee, WI

A Pattern of Families Divided by the Greater < Than/Less > Than oil on canvas, 96 x 60 inches

94

KASIR

The Average Number of Broken Hearts in Occupied Diameter oil and acrylic on panel, 48 x 56 inches

95

Linear Equations of Children Divided by the Commutative Property of God oil and acrylic with mixed media on panels, 44 x 57 inches

96

TRAVIS KELLER

479.220.0555 traviskellerartist@gmail.com traviskellerart.com @traviskellerpaints

b. 1991 Las Vegas, NV | lives in Urbana, IL Education

In my series, Finding the Light, painting is a time-based medium. It is a strategy of searching for meaning and hope in the rituals and memories of my daily life. Through the practice of painting, I examine and maintain connections to my chosen family even when space and time keep us apart.

The process of constructing these paintings involves the collection and collaging of pictorial references from videos, photographs, and my own memory, all of which have varying degrees of clarity. Some of the scenes for these references are reenacted or staged, while others are captured as they happen; yet, none of the images ever represent the feeling of the moment as I remember it. By drawing, painting, and writing narratives, I excavate these often blurred, dim, or dull images to find the light that is already there.

2024

MFA, University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign (UIUC), Champaign, IL

2015

BFA, University of Arkansas, Fayetteville, AR Residencies

2015

Chautauqua Institution, Chautauqua, NY Solo Exhibitions

2025

Domesticated, Giertz Gallery, Parkland College,

2024

Finding the Light, Krannert Art Museum,

2021

Amalgam, Buffalo Art Movement, Buffalo, NY

Champaign, IL Champaign, IL

Selected Group Exhibitions 2025

School of Art & Creative Media Faculty Biennial,

2024

Art and Design Faculty Exhibition, Giertz Gallery,

Perkinson Gallery, Millikin University, Decatur, IL Parkland College, Champaign, IL Half Donut, The South Studios, Champaign, IL Munchies, Analog Wine Library, Urbana, IL 2023

RAGS, Link Gallery, UIUC, Champaign, IL

2022

A Jellyfish & A Stop Sign, The South Studios, Champaign, IL

the spaces in between oil on canvas, 96 x 82 inches

98

KELLER

Studio Reflections: crunch-time oil on canvas, 66 x 96 inches

99

Distractions: Herm loved belly rubs oil on canvas, 65 x 95 inches

100

E.E. KONO

eekono.com @e.e.kono

b. 1973 Oshkosh, WI | lives in Dubuque, IA Education

My practice explores history both real and imagined. I use geographically and historically relevant materials to explore the relationship between place, culture, and storytelling.

I am deeply interested in the connections between diverse cultures and disparate times; specifically, the intersection between East and West and how the legacies of early modernity continue to shape contemporary American society.

I paint primarily in egg tempera, an ancient medium made by combining egg yolk with powdered pigments sourced from places as diverse as Mount Vesuvius and 19th Century factory ruins. Egg tempera is a technique closely associated with the transition between medieval and renaissance Europe—a period that parallels our own—when the introduction of new technologies induced rapid societal transformation.

1999

Certificate in Computer Graphics, University of California, Los Angeles, CA

1995

BA, University of Iowa, Iowa City, IA Residencies

2025

The Wassaic Project, Wassaic, NY Solo Exhibitions

2024

Drift: Recent Works by E.E. Kono, Dubuque Museum of

2022

Apotrope, La Luz de Jesus Gallery, Los Angeles, CA

2021

Curio, Gallery 825, Los Angeles, CA

Art, Dubuque, IA

Selected Group Exhibitions 2025

Future Fair, Elijah Wheat Showroom, New York, NY A Room Just So, Bergdorf Goodman, New York, NY

2024

Feminine Divine, FORMah, New York, NY Field Trip, Modern Eden Gallery, San Francisco, CA

Passing egg tempera on shaped panel, 36 x 24 inches

102

KONO

Manifest egg tempera on shaped panels, 24 x 38 inches

103

Momento Mori egg tempera on shaped wood panels, 36 x 52 inches

104

KAYLA MAHAFFEY

kaylamahaffeyart@gmail.com kaylamahaffey.com @kaylamay_art

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

My work explores the beauty of self-discovery and celebrates the hopeful spirit and the journey many of us take to find ourselves and learn things along the way. When we were young, we had a sense of adventure, boundless energy, and imagination that could create the most wondrous things. As we grow, we experience many tribulations of life, and those influences can cause those glorious attributes to dwindle.

My acrylic paintings visualize the contrasting worlds between our whimsical imagination and reality, which can bring many obstacles. My colorful and vibrant backdrops appear more two-dimensional, inspired by the days of morning cartoons and comics. At the same time, the figures in the foreground are handled with a rendered approach that keeps them grounded in the setting and represents the real world. The subject matter can range from growing up in a tumultuous environment to learning to deal with your emotions and how that can be challenging. Still, we must carry on by veiling ourselves or creating a beautiful illusion for protection from our sometimes-harsh reality.

2012

American Academy of Art College, Chicago, IL Solo Exhibitions

2024

Harmony, 833 N Milwaukee Ave, Chicago, IL

2021

Remember the Time, Thinkspace Projects,

2020

Adrift, Lancaster Museum of Art and History,

2019

Off to the Races, Line Dot Editions, Chicago, IL

2018

Cherish the Days, Line Dot Editions, Chicago, IL

Los Angeles, CA Lancaster, CA

Selected Group Exhibitions 2023

In Plain Sight, Richard Beavers Gallery, Soho, NY Emerging to Established Annual Winter Group Exhibition, Krause Gallery, New York, NY

2022

SHARED EXPERIENCE, with Thinkspace Projects, STRAAT Museum, Amsterdam, Netherlands Across the Pond, Thinkspace Projects, London, England

2021

Small Works 2021, Beinart Gallery, Victoria, Australia

2019

SCOPE Miami, Line Dot Editions, Miami, FL

2018

12x12 Group Exhibition, The Stockroom Gallery, Victoria, Australia

Seekers acrylic on layered panel-board, 48 x 60 inches

106

MAHAFFEY

A Sorrowful Tune acrylic on linen, 60 x 48 inches A Sweet Melody acrylic on linen, 60 x 48 inches

107

108

CHLOE MCELDOWNEY

chloemceldowney@gmail.com chloemceldowney.com @chloemceldowney

b. 1991 Russia, OH | lives in Columbus, OH Education

After the birth of my son, my painting habits were forced to change. I often found myself painting the same plant over several days and at different times of the day, watching the plants move through their tireless process of becoming more closely than I had before. Leaves wilted and drooped and roots drank and they stood tall again. Watching these changes in what seems like stop motion, and then integrating that flux into my work, gave me a sense of ease as I waded through the constant, sometimes chaotic changes to my child, my body, and my life.

2014

BFA, University of Dayton, Dayton, OH

2021

Held in Bloom, Chris White Gallery, Wilmington, DE

2020

Tart, Mezzanine Gallery, Wilmington, DE

Drawing on dual roles as an artist and mother, my work explores these tensions and triumphs that exist in the worlds of nurturing what you love.

Through painting plants and people, I explore the dual needs for solitude and connection; for self-sacrifice and self-care; and for growth as excitement about newness and grief for what is lost. Reflecting those dissonances, my paintings are a fragmented, disrupted environment lovingly crafted by an endless pursuit of understanding.

2025

Flourish: Nature Versus Nurture, Sims Contemporary,

2024

Super Fresh!, Jen Tough, Santa Fe, NM

2023

16 x 20, Harman Projects, New York, NY

Solo Exhibitions

Selected Group Exhibitions New York, NY

Chroma, Paradigm Gallery, Philadelphia, PA Kaleidoscope, Arc Gallery & Studios, San Francisco, CA 2021

Appearances, The Delaware Contemporary,

2020

Award Winners: XX, Biggs Museum of American Art,

2019

3rd ANJE, Wausau Museum of Contemporary Art,

2018

AIFI Emerging Artist Show, Anne Irwin Fine Art,

Wilmington, DE Dover, DE Wausau, WI Atlanta, GA Collections University of Dayton, Dayton, OH

Romaine oil on panel, 30 x 24 inches

110

MCELDOWNEY

Sweetbay Magnolia oil on panel, 20 x 16 inches Unraveling Chartreuse oil on panel, 20 x 16 inches

111

112

MEG LIONEL MURPHY

414.870.9930 (Portrait Society Gallery) hello@meglionelmurphy.com meglionelmurphy.com @meglionelmurphy

b. 1986 Worcester, MA | lives in Madison, WI Education

I paint a far, far away land where violence magically transforms femmes into monstrous size; their pain must be seen, felt, and reckoned with. I want to bring the viewer to the lowest lows and highest highs, to mirror what it feels like to live with post-traumatic stress disorder, something I struggle with daily since surviving extreme domestic violence.

As a girl, my favorite stories were about unicorns, rainbows, fairies, and angels. Every fairytale ended in marriage. But as an adult, marriage was the most dangerous thing I ever did to myself. Picasso said women are either doormats or goddesses; my work charts the path from doormat to goddess.

2028

MA candidate, University of Minnesota, Twin Cities, MN

2009

BA, University of Minnesota, Twin Cities, MN Solo Exhibitions

2024

Ecstasy and Escape at the Swan Song Motel, Museum

2022

Dreams of Dragons, with The Untitled Space,

of Wisconsin Art, Milwaukee, WI SPRING/BREAK Art Fair, Los Angeles, CA 2021

Once fully grown, the giants in my work search for a safe place to hold their new bodies. They find each other and travel in packs, trying to outpace an army of angry soldiers. As sightings of these giants in battle grow, so does the myth around them. My paintings are offerings to these new deities.

SPRING/BREAK Art Fair, with The Untitled Space, New York, NY Traumatica Dramatica, The Untitled Space, New York, NY Selected Group Exhibitions

2024

UNTITLED Art Fair, with Portrait Society Gallery, Miami, FL Talk Back Chapter 2: Collection, Charles Allis Art Museum, Milwaukee, WI

2023

Ten at Ten, Museum of Wisconsin Art, West Bend, WI Collections Minnesota Museum of American Art, St. Paul, MN Represented by Portrait Society Gallery, Milwaukee, WI

Exit Seraphim acrylic and acrylic gouache on Fabriano paper, 33 x 30 inches

114

MURPHY

115

Mad Girls Love Song acrylic and acrylic gouache on Fabriano paper, 72 x 48 inches Let Go acrylic, acrylic gouache, on Fabriano paper, 22 x 18 inches

116

SONG WATKINS PARK

songwatkinspark.art@gmail.com songwatkinspark.com @songwatkinspark

b. 1991 Changwon-si, South Korea | lives in St. Louis, MO Education

My work explores the relationship between narrative, identity, and the human psyche through figurative painting. Centering myself as the nude subject, I reclaim the female body as a site of strength, introspection, and authorship, moving beyond objectification to craft personal, emotionally resonant narratives. These images often revisit childhood memories and literary influences that shaped my sense of self when growing up in Korea, while also expanding into broader themes of Asian identity and cultural reflection.

Color is a crucial emotional and symbolic tool in my practice. Cool tones evoke calm, distance, or melancholy; warm hues suggest intensity, curiosity, or vitality. I place my figures in quiet, liminal spaces—natural or ambiguous environments that feel both intimate and infinite. These settings function as psychological landscapes, drawing the viewer inward while leaving room for interpretation.

In blending the personal with the universal, my work opens a dialogue between the internal and external, inviting viewers to consider how memory, culture, and emotion shape the ways we see ourselves—and how we see each other.

2018

MFA, Sam Fox School of Design & Visual Arts, Washington University, St. Louis, MO

2016

BFA, University of Iowa, Iowa City, IA Selected Group Exhibitions

2023

Winter Group Show, Houska Gallery, St. Louis, MO Faculty Show, Saint Louis University, St. Louis, MO Life’s A Beach: Group Show, Angad Arts Hotel, St. Louis, MO

2020

Hit Me, Baby, One More Time, St. Louis Community College Florissant Valley, Ferguson, MO Women Speak 1920-2020, Jacoby Arts Center, Alton, IL Layered Place, Intersect Arts Center, St. Louis, MO

2019

Honor Awards 2019, Art Saint Louis, St. Louis, MO

2018

MFA Thesis Exhibition, Mildred Lane Kemper Art Museum, St. Louis, MO 29th International Juried Exhibition, Viridian Artists, New York, NY Celebrating Women, Location 1980, Costa Mesa, CA CSPS Hall, Cedar Rapids, IA

2017

MFA First-Year Exhibition, Des Lee Gallery, St. Louis, MO

History oil on linen, 54 x 40 inches

118

PARK

Empty House oil on linen, 24 x 24 inches

119

Imposter oil on linen, 24 x 24 inches

120

PARK

121

Dream oil on linen, 40 x 54 inches

122

MARCUS ROBINS

@marcus_robins_art

b. 1992 Chicago, IL | lives in Indianapolis, IN Education

Marcus Robins is an oil painter who explores the intersection of Black identity and classical fine art traditions. He draws inspiration from the techniques of Baroque artists of antiquity and his proud First-generation Nigerian American heritage. By incorporating oil painting methods honed over centuries, Robins seeks to elevate Black subjects within the historical canon of fine art spaces, where these subjects have often been overlooked or excluded. Blending classical realism with the visionary aesthetics of Afro-futurism, he seeks to both pay tribute to the past and make a statement on the future, where Black subjects are not only represented but celebrated contemporarily.

2022

BFA, Herron School of Art + Design, Indianapolis, IN

2018

SCM, Embry Riddle Aeronautical University, Daytona Beach, FL Solo Exhibitions

2025

What These Eyes Have Seen, StorageSpace, Indianapolis, IN

See No Evil oil on canvas, 60 x 48 inches

124

ROBINS

Perennial oil on canvas, 48 x 36 inches In The Garden oil on canvas, 48 x 36 inches

125

126

EMIL ROBINSON

216.820.1260 (Abattoir Gallery) emil.robinson@gmail.com emilrobinson.com @emiljrobinson

b. 1981 Cincinnati, OH | lives in Cincinnati, OH Solo Exhibitions

The transformative action of light compels me to paint, and my work results from what I notice. I have no romantic attachment to autobiographical, grand, or dilapidated subjects. Instead, I choose spaces where mystery and presence come from attention not prescription.

2025

Paintings, Robin Katz Fine Art, London, England

2024

Interiors, Abattoir Gallery, Cleveland, OH

2022

Evidence, Weston Art Gallery, Cincinnati, OH

Each painting is a subtle interpretation, realism exacting in inventory, yet is carefully reimagined as a painted composition. I make geometric drawings to arrive at the most distilled version of my compositions before beginning to paint.

I work on-site during particular hours and weather to maintain atmospheric consistency, and the paintings can take unpredictable amounts of time to resolve.

2021

Familiars, Taymour Grahne Projects, London, England Flex Warrior, Essex Flowers, New York, NY Selected Group Exhibitions 2024

Moreover: 50 more paintings, Green Gallery, Milwaukee, WI Nocturne, Andrew Rafacz Gallery, Chicago, IL

2022

Inside Out, Scroll NYC, New York, NY Represented by Abattoir Gallery, Cleveland, OH

Early and Late oil on panel, 20 x 24 inches

128

ROBINSON

129

Pan with two brushes oil on panel, 40 x 32 inches Fifth Floor Fountain oil on panel, 20 x 24 inches

130

FARËNA SABURI

saburi.farena@gmail.com farenasaburi.com @farenasart

b. 1997 Dushanbe, Tajikistan | lives in Columbia, MO Education

My work examines sociopolitical confinement and immobility through the visual and material exploration of painting. These concerns are influenced by my ongoing experience of immigration and the social constructs of gender that control and limit my social and physical mobility. Using references to architectural barriers and silhouettes of bodies, I create spaces that function as both entrances and escapes. Cut-outs, tears, frays, and threads of canvas unravel and spill outward from the fixed and bounded picture plane, allowing physical and visual spaces to clash, merge, and blend.

2024

MFA, University of Missouri (UM), Columbia, MO

2020

BFA, Columbia College (CC), Columbia, MO Residencies

2025

Columbia College, Columbia, MO

2021

Orr Street Studios, Columbia, MO Solo Exhibitions

2024

Disturbed Horizons, Sidney Larson Gallery, Columbia, MO held in place, Bingham Gallery, UM, Columbia, MO

2022

June Exhibit, Sager Reeves Gallery, Columbia, MO Post-Demure, Greg Hardwick Gallery, CC, Columbia, MO Selected Group Exhibitions

2024

Material Study, Memorial Union, UM, Columbia, MO

2023

Family Ties, Old Stone House of Brooklyn, New York, NY Figure or Faces, Las Laguna Art Gallery, CA Taut/Taught, Montminy Gallery, Columbia, MO

хона биё (come home) oil on unstretched canvas, door hinges, and wallpaper background, 60 x 42 inches

132

SABURI

мағзи (black velvet lining) oil on stuffed canvas, velvet ribbon, and Tojik textile backing, 60 x 132 inches 133

public privates (хонаи ман) acrylic and oil on unstretched canvas, canvas threads, 78 x 90 inches 134

SABURI

135

heaviest surface (қолин) acrylic and oil on unstretched canvas, 78 x 90 inches

136

DAUN SUH

daunsuhstudio@gmail.com daunsuh.com @daunsuh

b. 1997 Daegu, South Korea | lives in Chicago, IL Education

Life, for the most part, was unfathomable. Relationships between imperfect beings only deepened my confusion. News of death served as a reminder that all living things carry the seed of their own end. In my solitude I turn to painting as a way to confront these thoughts, immersing myself in the quiet depths of darkness.

2023

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

To me, darkness is light. It neither clamors nor overwhelms me. Instead, it quietly illuminates only what I wish to see, hear, and feel. My paintings begin in darkness. As I question life and existence, I build darkness layer by layer, letting paint accumulate like a thought itself. This process is a meditative act, allowing me to focus my mind entirely and observe through stillness and distance. Within it, I slowly uncover subjects that emerge in a delicate glow.

2025

Graduate Exhibition One, SAIC Galleries, SAIC,

2024

Enigma, Maclean Center, Chicago, IL

2020

Liquor on my feet, Kookmin Gallery, Seoul, South Korea

Chicago, IL 2016

BFA, Kookmin University, Seoul, South Korea Selected Group Exhibitions Chicago, IL

Landscapes and figures waver between appearing and disappearing on the canvas as if passing through the threshold of being and non-being. They linger as echoes, neither fully formed nor entirely lost—just as existence itself can only be sensed, never fully grasped.

A ruin that fell without a sound acrylic, pastel, and charcoal on panel, 8 x 8 inches

138

SUH

Rooted Vapor oil on canvas, 62 x 46 inches

139

This is not here oil on canvas, 50 x 48 inches

140

BRANDOM TERRES-SANCHEZ

art.bts8@gmail.com brandomterressanchez.com @bden.1721

b. 2001 Las Vegas, NV | lives in Milwaukee, WI Education

The innate feeling of comfort is what draws us in, but the unwelcoming replication of home is what keeps us out.

My oil paintings are an uncanny visual representation of home, not least through the addition of audio, found objects, and writing that directly reference my own home. My work derives from this longing and yearning of the home and the memories associated with it. I am attempting to revitalize that home we once knew by recreating memories that provided me comfort, but now only remind me of what’s been lost. The viewer is meant to feel the absence and presence of family through the sounds of our mothers or the physical representation of a door.

Home is universal, whether bad or good. My body of work is connected to those feelings we have surrounding our homes, attempting to be a form of which people can process their own feelings about this complicated word and maybe find some relief in the knowledge that we all feel homesick at times.

2023

BFA, Milwaukee Institute of Art and Design (MIAD), Milwaukee, WI Selected Group Exhibitions

2025

Wherever Home Is, James Watrous Gallery,

2024

Of Our Time, Frederick Layton Gallery, MIAD,

Madison, WI Milwaukee, WI Annual Members Show, Walker’s Point Center for the Arts (WPCA), Milwaukee, WI Emerging Artists Exhibition, Var Gallery, Milwaukee, WI 2023

¡Chicano Power!, Milwaukee Artist Resource Network, Milwaukee, WI Cine Arte, La Gente Art, Milwaukee, WI Backyard Bash, Some Fools, Milwaukee, WI TMA Contemporary, Trout Museum of Art, Appleton, WI 50th Annual Juried Exhibition, Union Art Gallery, University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee, Milwaukee, WI

2022

Family Portraits, Gray Area, Milwaukee, WI Steadfast, Unbound, MeltWater Studios, Milwaukee, WI Ambition a POC Experience, Hawthorn Contemporary, Milwaukee, WI

Protecion perfecta oil on canvas, 48 x 24 inches

142

TERRES-SANCHEZ

Recuerdo de memoria oil on canvas, 30 x 40 inches

143

Distance between us oil paint on canvas, 40 x 30 inches

144

AARON TROYER

614.223.1655 (Brandt Gallery) aarontroyer82@gmail.com aarontroyer.com @aaron.troyer.art

b. 1982 Mansfield, OH | lives in Columbus, OH Education

I am interested in exploring themes of desperation and confusion through a playful and slightly humorous lens. I seek to depict plants and biomes that embody moods and traits usually reserved for human subjects. Flowers are often presented as symbols of natural beauty, or in many cases, as benign decorations meant to “tie the room together.” My work challenges this notion by placing an emotional weight on the plants that centers them as the protagonist in a surreal conflict with both natural and unnatural forces. By pushing ourselves to assign human emotions to plants, we can better understand the devastating toll that we often unknowingly inflict upon the natural world.

2006

BFA, Ohio State University (OSU), Columbus, OH Solo Exhibitions

2024

Brandt Gallery, Columbus, OH

2023

Wilderness of False Firs, No Place Gallery,

2020

Golden Myth, Teros Gallery, San Diego, CA

Columbus, OH

Selected Group Exhibitions 2025

Deep into the Forest, James Gallery, OSU,

2024

Flora, Concept Art Gallery, Pittsburgh, PA

Columbus, OH Spatial Harmony, HEDGE Gallery, Cleveland, OH Unearthed, Brandt Gallery, Columbus, OH 2022

Tin Whistle Art Gallery, Austin, TX Represented by Brandt Gallery, Columbus, OH

A Selection of Solstices acrylic and ink on canvas, 36 x 36 inches

146

TROYER

Perhaps the Lapse in Judgement was a Dream? acrylic and ink on canvas, 30 x 24 inches

147

Refracted Memory acrylic and ink on canvas, 40 x 40 inches

148

PEDRO TRUEBA RAMÍREZ

312.918.6293 ptruebar@gmail.com pedrotruebaramirez.com @estaeslacuentadepedrotr

b. 1999 México City, Mexico | lives in Chicago, IL Education

My work explores how the spaces I inhabit shape my perspective, particularly through everyday interactions with objects, friends, and family. I am interested in how these relationships influence the creation of an artwork and reflect a deeper curiosity about how my identity is continuously molded by my surroundings.

Influenced by Benedict Anderson’s Imagined Communities, I consider how cultural belonging is often constructed through shared experiences. After migrating from Mexico to the United States, I began questioning the idea of national identity, realizing that what separates or connects us often stems from perception rather than physical borders. Through this lens, I examine how consumption, language, and aesthetics blur cultural lines.

Drawing from personal memory, I build pictorial stages filled with people and objects I feel connected to, often omitting faces to universalize the figures.

Humor and sincerity are central to my practice, which involves material experimentation and responsiveness to my environment. Ultimately, my work invites viewers to reconsider what home, belonging, and identity mean in a shifting, globalized world.

2025

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

2023

Post-Bacc, SAIC, Chicago, IL

2022

BoC, Universidad Iberoamericana, México City, Mexico Residencies

2025

Artist Communities Alliance, Steuben, WI

2021

Común cotidiano, Casa Equis, México City, Mexico

Solo Exhibitions

Selected Group Exhibitions 2025

Master Class, Secrist | Beach, Chicago, IL Graduate Exhibition One, SAIC Galleries, SAIC, Chicago, IL

2024

Auto Portrait Spectacular, National Museum of Mexican Art, Chicago, IL

2023

Post-Baccalaureate Annual Exhibition, SAIC Galleries, SAIC, Chicago, IL Collections Colección Casa Roja, Monterrey, Mexico

Escándalo oil and acrylic on canvas, 24 x 30 inches

150

TRUEBA RAMÍREZ

Quién dice que no es verdad oil and acrylic on canvas, 56 x 63 inches

151

Alta Noche oil and acrylic on canvas, 54 x 60 inches

152

SAMUAL WEINBERG

+44.1603.628523 (Moosey) samualweinberg@gmail.com samualweinberg.com @samual_weinberg

b. 1989 Minneapolis, MN | lives in St. Paul, MN Education

These paintings are from a body of work where my recurring cycloptic alien protagonist has lost his pet bird, leaving him to alternate between searching for his friend and finding solace in distraction. Seemingly fascinated by anything, no matter how mundane, to the point of being transfixed, his search often takes a back seat to his short attention span, yet even his frivolous endeavors remain shrouded in a vague, bird-shaped melancholy.

However, the search for his bird serves to underline what seems to be the character’s more important search: for meaning—presumably, he just wants to know why he is here, where he comes from, and if he can find happiness regardless of the inquiry’s result. So, although his bird has gone missing, the narrative is left purposefully loose, allowing him to wonder over his purpose and place in a confusing world, which in turn presents the opportunity for me to use him as an avatar in wondering over our own.

2013

BFA, University of Wisconsin-Stout, Menomonie, WI Residencies

2023

Moosey, Norwich, England Solo Exhibitions

2024

Los Heron, Moosey, Norwich, England

2018

Free Swim, Detour Gallery, Red Bank, NJ Unprecedented Flurry, HAIR + NAILS, Minneapolis, MN

2017

Pink Man Origins, FOGSTAND Gallery & Studio, Xincheng Township, Taiwan

2016

Project Room, Thierry Goldberg Gallery, New York, NY Selected Group Exhibitions

2024

Paper View 2, The Hole, New York, NY

2023

Storage Wars, The Hole, Los Angeles, CA

2020

Second Smile, The Hole, New York, NY

2019

Paper View, The Hole, New York, NY While Supplies Last, Mount Analogue, Seattle, WA Represented by Moosey, Norwich, England

Back About The Bird oil on canvas, 60 x 48 inches

154

WEINBERG

Morning Shift oil on canvas, 48 x 36 inches Searching Sky oil on canvas, 48 x 36 inches

155

156

MEGAN WOLFKILL

mwolfkill1@gmail.com meganwolfkill.com

b. 1996 Knoxville, TN | lives in Cincinnati, OH Education

To deeply know something or someone outside of yourself is intimate. Knowing requires you to put yourself aside and engage with the realities of another world through curiosity, intentional listening, and an openness to ideas that may be antithetical to your worldview or lived experience. I am interested in the minute details of a body moving in space, the specificity of how paint dries based on what’s underneath it, the alchemy of combining logistically incompatible art materials, and the multifaceted nuance of human emotion.

The desire for knowledge and understanding is a bid for intimacy with the people in my life and the environments I occupy. Intimacy appears in my work through the forms I use, how they’re assembled compositionally, and how I apply paint to surfaces. Unprimed canvases soaked with translucent layers of paint create a worn-in softness, while forms with rounded edges slope gently towards each other. My paintings are opportunities to experience tenderness with the physical world while exploring the visual language of intimacy and softness.

2024

MFA, University of Tennessee (UT), Knoxville, TN

2018

BFA, Tulane University, New Orleans, LA Residencies

2024

Manifest Drawing Center, Cincinnati, OH

2020

Penland School of Crafts, Penland, NC

2019

The Hambidge Center, Rabun Gap, GA Solo Exhibitions

2024

Back-to-Back, Ewing Gallery of Art + Architecture, UT, Knoxville, TN Selected Group Exhibitions

2025

Studio Break Professional Competition, Studio Break Gallery, Chicago, IL Juicy, Purple Window Gallery, Chicago, IL

2024

MASTER PIECES, Manifest Gallery, Cincinnati, OH Yeck Young Painters Competition Exhibition, Miami University, Oxford, OH

2023

Dogwood Regional Exhibition, Emporium Center x Dogwood Gallery, Knoxville, TN

Again Again Again Flashe and oil pastel on canvas, 55 x 39 inches

158

WOLFKILL

159

Fast Slow Flashe, oil pastel, and chalk pastel on canvas, 80 x 68 inches Huddle Flashe and colored pencil on paper, 9 x 6 inches

160

ALICE PIXLEY YOUNG

alicepixleyyoung.com @alicepixley

b. 1972 Washington, DC | lives in Cincinnati, OH Education

My studio sits on the Ordovician fossil bed within the Rust Belt, the homelands of the Myaamia people and a nuclear Superfund site. This layered landscape of deep time, displacement, industry, and contamination directly informs my drawings and immersive multimedia installations. Recurring motifs of bell jars, trees, mirrors, transmission towers, and fire move fluidly across these bodies of work. By documenting compromised landscapes— brownfields, industrial ruins, and wildfire-scarred sites—I explore vulnerability and resilience.

1998

The materials I employ speak to cycles of resource exploitation drawn from the traditions of land art and the Hudson River School. They include handcut tar paper, ashes, salt, coal slag, ink, and gouache to create crystallized surfaces. The use of video and mirrors evoke the idea of portals connecting personal and cultural memory to the geologic record; the fossil age and the nuclear age serve as conceptual bookends to our current moment. These juxtapositions prompt questions about history, labor, and our relationship to the environment.

2024

What lies beneath us? What was here before us? What will remain after us?

MFA, University of Maryland, College Park, MD Residencies

2024

Stove Works, Chattanooga, TN

2021

Jentel Foundation, Banner, WY Solo Exhibitions Time Tripper, Hartnett Gallery, University of Rochester, Rochester, NY Vernal, Bolivar Gallery, University of Kentucky, Lexington, KY Selected Group Exhibitions

2025

SuperNatural 2.0, 21c Museum, Louisville, KY

2024

Sunshowers, A.I.R. Gallery, Brooklyn, NY Collections University of Cincinnati, Cincinnati, OH University of Dayton, Dayton, OH

Garden gouache and ink on paper, 42 x 30 inches

162

YOUNG

Cauldron gouache, ink, and salt on paper, 22 x 30 inches

163

Moccasin Bend (Swamp Portal) gouache, ink, and salt on paper, 30 x 22 inches

164

LaCroix p178

EDITOR’S SELECTIONS

Artists are presented in alphabetical order.

Artist biographies have been edited to prioritize recent highlights.

Pricing Guide can be found on p197.

CECILIA BEAVEN

ceciliabeaven.com @ceciliabeaven

b. 1986 México City, Mexico | lives in Chicago, IL Education

Cecilia Beaven’s art practice, which encompasses painting, murals, graphic narrative, sculpture, and moving images, develops a ludic personal mythology with unique visual narratives, while addressing questions of institutionalization and culture-making. Beaven affirms her creative agency by modifying existing tales and mythology, seamlessly adding fiction and personal anecdotes.

The artist’s mythological, ethnographic, and introspective explorations, in which intriguing mythical creatures and primordial landscapes stage monstrous, fragile, and introspective settings, bring a new perspective on Mexican identity that goes beyond folklore and mainstream ideas of Mexico. Beaven’s artwork, a cartoonish organism that conveys restlessness, embraces the uneasy feeling of what it means to exist within our contemporary mythologies.

2019

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

2009

BFA, La Esmeralda: National School of Art, México City, Mexico Residencies

2024

Chicago Artists Coalition, Chicago, IL

2021

Hyde Park Art Center, Chicago, IL Solo Exhibitions

2024

Semilla, National Museum of Mexican Art, Chicago, IL Flickering Cocoon, Hyde Park Art Center, Chicago, IL

2022

Piece of Consciousness, Glass Curtain Gallery, Columbia College, Chicago, IL Selected Group Exhibitions

2025

Master Class: Inside the Last American Museum School with SAIC Painting Alumni, Secrist | Beach, Chicago, IL put a bow on it., Tiger Strikes Asteroid, Chicago, IL Collections Billboard, with Scribe, Museo del Juguete Antiguo México, México City, Mexico

Close to the Ground acrylic on canvas, 72 x 60 inches

168

BEAVEN

Sprouting Shadows I acrylic on canvas, 72 x 60 inches Sprouting Shadows II acrylic on canvas, 72 x 60 inches

169

170

BEAVEN

171

Swampglass acrylic on canvas, 36 x 60 inches

172

ABIGAIL LACROIX

abigailacroix@gmail.com abigailacroix.com @g0nkdroid

b. 2001 Suamico, WI | lives in Chicago, IL Education

Abigail LaCroix’s paintings occupy a realm where magic and meditation coexist in playful harmony. Familiar forms are abstracted and the boundaries of light, pleasure, and ornamentation are explored without searching for answers. LaCroix’s compositions are reminiscent of landscapes and stained glass, emitting a quiet vibration through the dynamics of color and layers of transparency. Luminous portals are crafted that oscillate between spiritual and sensual, playing with the idea of touch (or the absence of it).

2023

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

2024

Phototaxis, 4th Ward Project Space, Chicago, IL

2023

Daydreams & Dreamscapes: A Pleasure Trip, VSG

Selected Group Exhibitions Contemporary, Chicago, IL Undergraduate Exhibition, SAIC Galleries, SAIC, Chicago, IL 2022

Age of the Bimbo, Woman Made Gallery, Chicago, IL

Yaga oil and acrylic on canvas, 28 x 22 inches

174

LACROIX

Cucumis Melo oil and acrylic on canvas, 28 x 22 inches Ephphatha oil and acrylic on canvas, 28 x 22 inches

175

176

LACROIX

Murmuration oil and acrylic on canvas, 36 x 48 inches

177

For Nancy oil and acrylic on canvas, 36 x 48 inches 178

MELISSA LEANDRO

312.404.9188 (Andrew Rafacz Gallery) melissaleandro89@gmail.com melissaleandro.com @melissaleandro89

b. 1989 Miami, FL | lives in Chicago, IL Education

In my practice, I explore my cultural identity and family memories, creating vibrant, layered textile works that are rich in topographical texture and infused with both drawn and collected imagery. My pieces are crafted using a blend of traditional and non-traditional techniques, including needlework, quilting, weaving, and dyeing. Through these processes, I reflect personal moments from daily life while channeling thoughts of family history, childhood fantasies, and nostalgic cultural ephemera.

My work is shaped by both past and present experiences, particularly memories of my mother’s work as a housekeeper in Miami, my grandparents’ rural farm in Costa Rica, and my father’s career as a construction worker and builder. I view my practice as a platform for expressing my hybrid culture as a first-generation US Latinx artist, navigating between Miami, Chicago, and beyond. My pieces serve as embodiments of an imaginary oasis, often depicting lush, flourishing landscapes of grasslands, rainforests, and blooming wild plants. I see them as a refuge that exists between reality and disillusionment, offering a temporary escape from the social frustrations I observe in my urban environment.

2017

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

2012

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

2024

Ox-Bow School of Art, Saugatuck, MI Solo Exhibitions

2025

Auto Alejamiento, Andrew Rafacz, Chicago, IL

2024

Astor Club, Chicago, IL Selected Group Exhibitions

2024

Agency: Craft in Chicago from the 1970s-80s and Beyond, Ukrainian Institute of Modern Art, Chicago, IL Houston Art Fair, with Andrew Rafacz, David Shelton Gallery, Houston, TX Collections Federal Reserve Bank of Chicago, Chicago, IL Estée Lauder Companies Inc., New York, NY Represented by Andrew Rafacz Gallery, Chicago, IL

Let Me Stay Here (Déjame Quedarme Aquí) jacquard woven cloth, hand and machine stitching, foil, couching, and embroidery, 50 x 73 inches

180

LEANDRO

Rip to Pieces (Romper en Pedazos) jacquard woven cloth, hand and machine stitching, and foil, 54 x 52 inches

181

Look in the Mirror (Mirate en el Espejo) jacquard woven cloth, hand and machine stitching, and foil, 51 x 51 inches

182

LEANDRO

183

See Me (Verme) jacquard woven cloth, hand and machine stitching, and foil, 44 x 76 inches

184

JAMES MORSE

studiomorse.com @jamespmorse

b. 1982 Hinsdale, IL | lives in Northport, MI Education

Walking, sailing, ice skating, canoeing, and swimming within the coastal landscape of the rural peninsula where Morse lives is fundamental to his painting practice. It is a process that emphasizes being in, and interacting directly with, the rural landscape and small villages that surround the artist’s studio. Morse’s practice focuses on oil painting and wooden sculpture. A natural mystic, he listens to the land and contemplates our relationship with it. His works embrace the interpretive nature of being, rather than the mechanical nature of seeing.

2005

BA, Hope College, Holland, MI Solo Exhibitions

2025

Forthcoming, M+B, Los Angeles, CA

2024

The Hands That Comb The Hills, Cob Gallery,

2022

Because There Are Stars, Philip Martin Gallery,

2021

Eastfield, Philip Martin Gallery, Los Angeles, CA

2020

Looking At Leelanau, Cooks’ House, Traverse City, MI

London, England Los Angeles, CA

Selected Group Exhibitions 2025

In Tandem, Cob Gallery, London, England Forget-Me-Nots, 1969 Gallery, New York, NY

2024

MOONLIT, Galerie Elsa Meunier, Paris, France The Remains of the Day, Alzueta Gallery, Barcelona, Spain Alright Alright Alright, Eric Firestone Gallery, East Hampton, NY Arcadia and Elsewhere, James Cohan Gallery, New York, NY

2023

New Landscapes, Alzueta Gallery, Barcelona, Spain

2022

Necessity, Galleri Magnus Karlsson, Stockholm, Sweden

Dockside oil on wood, 7 x 8 inches

186

MORSE

187

Believe In Your Pleasure oil on linen, 24 x 26 inches Canoe Prayer oil on linen, 12 x 14 inches

188

MORSE

Kinloch oil on linen, 40 x 48 inches

189

On The Lake oil on linen, 40 x 48 inches

190

RYAN RICHEY

317.525.9716 ryanbrichey@gmail.com ryanrichey.com @ryanbrichey

b. 1979 Bloomington, IN | lives in Rushville, IN Education

Ryan Richey’s works are honest and direct, concerned with connecting with the viewer and communicating without pretense. He depicts both the intimate and the mundane, the traumatic and the joyous, utilizing straightforward compositional strategies, relatable perspectives, and humor to build common ground with audiences and explore vulnerability, shared experiences, and life in America.

2008

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

2018

In Between Daydreams, ADDS DONNA, Chicago, IL

2010

Gathering Smoke, Rowley Kennerk Gallery, Chicago, IL Selected Group Exhibitions

2018

Mixed Emotions, Various Small Fires, Los Angeles, CA

2016

Chicago and Vicinity, Shane Campbell Gallery, Chicago, IL Collections The University of Chicago Booth School of Business, Chicago, IL

The Family Quilt oil on panel, 36 x 24 inches

192

RICHEY

Midnight Movers oil on panel, 30 x 40 inches

193

Slow Dance oil on panel, 36 x 36 inches

194

RICHEY

The Wind oil on panel, 36 x 48 inches

195

School of Athens oil on panel, 30 x 40 inches

196

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.

197

GRETCHEN ADEL

JENNIFER CRONIN

E.E. KONO

AARON TROYER

p15–20 $1,200—$2,250

p61–64 $1,000—$6,000

p101–104 $2,500—$15,000

p145–148 $2,000—$5,000

MARTYNA ALEXANDER

SALVADOR DOMINGUEZ

KAYLA MAHAFFEY

PEDRO TRUEBA RAMÍREZ

p21–24 $800—$3,000

p65–68 POR

p105–108 NFS

p149–152 $500—$3,200

JO ARCHULETA

JONATHON DOWNING

CHLOE MCELDOWNEY

SAMUAL WEINBERG

p25–30 NFS

p69–72 $3,000—$6,500

p109–112 $1,000—$3,000

p153–156 POR

ANDRE BARKER

SCOTT ESPESETH

MEG LIONEL MURPHY

MEGAN WOLFKILL

p31–34 $1,000—$4,000

p73–76 $1,000—$4,000

p113–116 $1,600—$12,000

p157–160 NFS

DILLON BECK

GRACE FECHNER

SONG WATKINS PARK

ALICE PIXLEY YOUNG

p35–38 $1,000—$5,000

p77–80 $80—$1,000

p117–122 $600—$7,000

p161–164 NFS

CURTIS ANTHONY BOZIF

RHONDA GATES

MARCUS ROBINS

CECILIA BEAVEN

p39–42 NFS

p81–84 $3,200—$5,000

p123–126 POR

p167–172 $2,500—$10,000

CHRISTOPHER BURK

SAMANTHA HARING

EMIL ROBINSON

ABIGAIL LACROIX

p43–46 $850—$5,500

p85–88 $1,400—$2,250

p127–130 $4,500—$9,500

p173-178 NFS

HOLLY CAHILL

JOSIAH JAMISON

FARËNA SABURI

MELISSA LEANDRO

p47–50 NFS

p89–92 $2,000—$15,000

p131–136 $1,000—$5,000

p179–184 $10,500—$12,500

ANTONIA CONSTANTINE

DAVID NAJIB KASIR

DAUN SUH

JAMES MORSE

p51–56 $3,000—$6,000

p93–96 $9,000—$15,000

p137–140 $500—$5,000

p185–190 POR

JAY CONSTANTINE

TRAVIS KELLER

BRANDOM TERRES-SANCHEZ

RYAN RICHEY

p57–60 $6,000–$9,000

p97–100 NFS

p141–144 NFS

p191–196 $5,000—$10,500

$25