Kathleen Henderson: What if I Could Draw a Bird that Could Save the World?

Press Release

The Drawing Center presents Kathleen Henderson: What if I Could Draw a Bird that Could Change the World? in the Drawing Room. The Selections Fall 2008 exhibition departs from past Selections shows by featuring the work of a singular Viewing Program artist.

enderson works in the studio with the radio on, the sounds of talking pundits and news reports filtering through her onto the page. While not a direct representation of the stories she hears, Henderson’s work ruminates on issues that infiltrate our lives and inform our respective viewpoints. Using her chosen medium of oil stick on paper, Henderson creates a sparse, tense, and energetic line to make drawings that are at turns comic, perverse, poignant, and brutal. She presents ambiguous scenarios where seemingly innocent interactions between people hold implications of violence, or where brutality lurks behind a potentially playful situation. By offering up disquieting representations of patterns of human behavior, Henderson’s work asks us to consider our own complicity in, and capacity for, violence as well as benevolence. This exhibition is curated by Nina Katchadourian, Viewing Program Curator.
Gallery Talk: Friday, September 12, 12:00 pm 

ABOUT THE ARTIST
Kathleen Henderson (b. 1963, Boston, MA) lives and works in Canyon, CA. She received her B.F.A. from Boston University in 1985 and attended the M.F.A. Program at Queens College in 1986. Henderson’s work has been included in group exhibitions in California, Massachusetts, and New York, as well as solo exhibitions at Rosamund Felsen Gallery, Santa Monica, CA (2007), Ashby Stage, Berkeley, CA (2005), and Stephen Wirtz Gallery, San Francisco, CA (2002). She is a recipient of an award from the National Endowment for the Arts for Works on Paper.


PUBLICATION
The exhibition will be accompanied by Drawing Papers 81: Kathleen Henderson: What if I Could Draw a Bird that Could Change the World?, a 48-page publication featuring 20 black-and-white reproductions of the works exhibited in the show as well a transcription of a conversation between the artist and curator Nina Katchadourian.