IRREGULAr
artists
Rachel Davis
Paul Keir
Christina Tenaglia
Barbara Weissberger
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organized by
Natasha Sweeten
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Open to the public:
Thursday, November 21, 2024 - Friday, January 31, 2025
Open hours:
Monday - Friday, 11am - 5pm
Holiday: closed Christmas eve & day | New Year’s eve & day
Artist Talk with Natasha Sweeten
Friday, January 17, 6-8pm
As artists, we challenge ourselves to court the unknown. The creative journey from idea to tangible object is rarely a straight shot, likely requiring us to recalibrate along the way. Irregularities are inevitable. This show brings together four artists who, each in their own way, embrace the messiness of making things. IRREGULAr is a celebration of trial and error, of flaws and accidents, and of what happens when we allow ourselves to accept the exceptions.
Rachel Davis collects prairie plants and cultivates her own homegrown specimens she then uses to concoct various dyes. Her colorful palette transforms swaths of repurposed cotton, silk, linen, hemp and wools with which she hand-stitches, folds, tears, sews and draws or prints her way to a form that meshes the natural world with the handmade.
Although Paul Keir considers his work “carefully calibrated” he admits his process is intuitive. His work is predicated on drawing and, with a focus on an economy of means, he chooses simple materials that are often found, repurposed and common to construction. Lastly, for the installation, Paul takes his time in deliberating the environment in which the work will be viewed.
Christina Tenaglia’s wood and clay constructions are tenaciously inventive. The accumulated and worked materials possess their own histories and imperfections, and with them Christina plays off notions of function/nonfunction, familiar/unnamable. Her work, intentionally simple, urges us to slow down and more carefully consider our use and understanding of the everyday.
Barbara Weissberger ‘s imaginative quilting merges a centuries-old domestic practice with the graphic world of today. Recognizable photographic images (candles, potatoes) emerge from cut and sewn shapes of clothing, the overall form irregular. Freed from their original functions, the old stitching, zippers and pockets evoke memories of the human bodies that once wore and created them.
Organizer Statement
I am drawn to the oddities in life, to the unexpected or unassumed. In art, these moments originate from vigorous, honest investigations into material and thinking. The artists in this show don’t shy away from unplanned consequences. How they choose to respond offers an invaluable glimpse into their creative processes.
