KN GALLERY DEBUTS THEIR SUMMER CONTEMPORARY SERIES WITH EIGHT EMERGING ARTISTS

RAW BOUNDARIES
Contemporary Summer Show
July 18 – August 23, 2008
Opening Reception: Friday, July 18, 5:30-7:30p

Chicago, IL (June 19, 2008) — KN Gallery presents Raw Boundaries, the first installment in a series of contemporary exhibitions KN Gallery will showcase each summer.  The exhibition introduces the work of eight cutting-edge, diverse and provocative interdisciplinary artists from across the nation—each invited to expand and redefine the gallery space.  Site-specific installations crossing the boundaries of space, society, politics, or their medium will extend across each corner of the gallery and will feature sculpture, video, photography, painting and installations.

“We’re thrilled to bring eight young and innovative artists to our space. We look forward to continuing the tradition of the summer contemporary show annually in the hopes that it will intrigue our current clients, while also appealing to a wider audience, “ says Lara Niemira, Director of KN Gallery.

KN Gallery and Raw Boundaries present: Val Britton, Sarah Cain, Amy Chaloupka, Ana Teresa Fernández, Sarai Givaty, Chris Natrop, Jen Pack and Melissa Jay Craig.

A brief description of each artist follows:

Val Britton

Using the language of maps, Britton’s collaged drawings piece together the longing for her father who was frequently absent due to travel throughout much of her childhood.  Unplanned up until the moment of inspiration, her works are built layer by layer with drawing and collage.  Britton’s review of mapping serves as a metaphor for searching, an implication of the unknown in wide, open spaces, and a trace of how one can see where they have been.

Sarah Cain

Cain investigates movement and various forms of space—physical, psychic and emotional.  Through color and shape alone, she creates a push within the composition—moving back and forth around the frame. 

Amy Chaloupka

Chaloupka’s site-specific installation begins with her cutting and separating paper maps into the two major elements—land and water.  By carefully selecting placement for the two elements onto the wall and floor, a ‘land side’ and a ‘water side’ is created—beginning on opposing walls the elements flood down onto the floor and join at the middle of the work upon the gallery floor. 

Melissa Jay Craig

Chicago artist Craig’s work is books, sculptural book works, and objects that communicate through images or by their presence alone.  As an individual who is nearly deaf and relies on reading lips, her work addresses ‘other’ forms of reading, highlighting the intense perceptions available to our senses when we cease our reliance on linear, conventional language.

Ana Teresa Fernández  

Ron Coca y Limon debuts Fernández’s video performance, a minimalist abstraction of her reflection on Cuban gender interactions and their interactions with the people that penetrate their island. In addition, through performance-based paintings, Fernandez explores, emotional, and psychological stereotypes and boundaries.

Sarai Givaty

Givaty explores the beautiful but haunting vulnerability of female Israeli soldiers and the controversial notion of mandatory conscription.  Featuring luxuriantly colored images of security x-rayed luggage cradling female bodies in the fetal position, these boldly graphic, yet uncannily expressive, works are peppered with personal objects, military objects, medicinal objects, and fashion objects: all undeniable accoutrements of the late-capitalist information age.

Chris Natrop

His compositions are influenced by his fascination with the intricacies of everyday forms encountered in his direct surrounding.  Natrop’s process reveals the negative space by removing the “emptiness” in between forms.  Without any preconceived pattern or preliminary sketch, he allows the work to shape itself with each cut and sets the shapes in motion. Natrop works on enormous sheets of paper that are stretched out on self-healing mats. Wielding a standard utility knife, he spontaneously cuts away at the paper to create his organic room-sized installations where day-to-day practices are reexamined to find the elements unnoticed. 

Jen Pack

Using commercially available hand dyed silk, Pack collages color to transform space beyond a flat 2D surface.  Thread has taken over some of the works as the subject rather than acting purely as a construction element. It is a process of accumulation and build up of mass through repetition, order and chronic technique—calling attention to the contrast between the natural and inorganic.

Together these eight artists reexamine their medium and redefine boundaries within the perimeter of the gallery space.  Boundaries formed from politics, history and familiarity are pushed and pulled for the debut of our summer series, Raw Boundaries.

ABOUT KN GALLERY

Located in the world-renowned John Hancock Center on Chicago’s “Magnificent Mile,” KN Gallery celebrates the very best in modern, post-war and contemporary American and European art and offers visitors a museum-quality experience. Run by noted art expert Lara Niemira, KN Gallery is dedicated to showcasing outstanding, critically acclaimed exhibitions that contribute to the study and understanding of 20th century modern and contemporary art. KN Gallery welcomes collaborations with artists, private collectors, and other museums and institutions for loans of works and special projects.

KN Gallery is open Monday to Friday from 10 a.m. – 6 p.m. and Saturdays from 11 a.m. – 5:30 p.m.  Summer hours (July–August) Monday to Friday from 10a.m. – 5 p.m. and Saturdays from 11a.m. – 4:30 p.m. For more information about KN Gallery, please call 312-640-5550 or visit www.kngallery.com.