Owen McHugh and Abstraction in the Permanent Collection
CHICAGO, IL—The Ukrainian Institute of Modern Art is delighted to announce Owen McHugh and Abstraction in the Permanent Collection. This exhibition highlights abstract, non-representational works in UIMA’s Permanent Collection alongside Owen McHugh’s most recent works from 2017 to the present. Artists exhibiting from the Permanent Collection include Corey Postiglione, Kathie Shaw, John Hoyland, Alexander Hunenko, Martin Hurtig, Lida Petruniak-Colucci, Michael Mandziuk, Irma Osadsa, William Pura, and David Samila.
At Home
Cindy Bernhard, Ellen Greene, Ann Toebbe, Gwendolyn Zabicki
OCTOBER 8- DECEMEBR 4, 2022
This exhibition presents works by four Chicago artists with a focus on paintings. As the exhibition title suggests, the show's premise is about the artist's exploration of the layered emotional resonance of the concept of home. We have been living in a pandemic when most people have spent an unusually long time in their homes.Conversely, around the world, refugees have been forced to leave their homes, some with the hope of returning and others seeking a new life and home. We are asking the question; what does home mean? Is it a familiarity with the environment, or is home just an abstract place in our minds?
Naturally
CHICAGO, IL—- The Ukrainian Institute of Modern Art is delighted to announce Naturally opening on February 5th, 2022 featuring works by Judith Roston Freilich and Lilach Schrag who have come together for their first joint exhibition.
Fascinated by forces of nature and mind, Judith Roston Freilich and Lilach Schrag examine, each in her own way, essence, energy, and evolution. Judith Roston Freilich’s works on paper and textiles were inspired by her aspirations to integrate the arts into everyday life. Throughout her life, Roston Freilich’s home and works have always centered around the cycles of life and the natural offerings of every season. The vital consequences of climate change and the COVID-19 virus have impacted the artist’s work, and aspires that her artistic creation will act as a springboard for awareness towards scientific ways that aim to heal our planet. With images and materials drawn from both her natural and domestic environment, Lilach Schrag uses organic found objects, fabric, paper, enamel, and acrylic paints, charcoal, graphite, threads, pins, and staples in making large-scale energy-packed paintings with epic figures and creatures transforming into each other and into vegetation. Layered, camouflaged, and not immediately identified, they convey a sense of awe, urgency, determination, and vulnerability. The natural materials rich with texture, meaning, and previous life sends Schrag on a fantastic flight, and at the same time keeping her grounded in this physical world.
Rituals
CHICAGO, IL—The Ukrainian Institute of Modern Art is pleased to announce the opening of Rituals on December 4th, 2021 featuring works by artists Brenton Good, Mandy Cano-Villalobos, and Marissa Voytenko who have come together for their first joint exhibition. The present age has been defined by shirking customs, breaking traditions, and celebrating the informal. Yet it is through formal, practiced and ceremonial-like actions that contemporary artists Good, Cano-Villalobos, and Voytenko have found their expression. Though their work is varied in medium and approach, the three artists regard ritual as an integral part of their work. Hailing from Amish country in western Pennsylvania, Good’s hard-edged, checkerboard woodcut prints draw heavily from traditional quilt patterns. Meticulously planned and executed, his prints display multiple layers of historical color combinations. Cano-Villalobos honors her personal history, and our broader human history, through the collection of mementos assembled into shrine-like sculptures. Looking at these assemblages one can spot objects that connect the viewer with their own memories. With waxy encaustic paint, Voytenko creates images that are lyrically structured through the use of repeated shapes and lines.
Wassily Kandinsky's 1922 Sketchbook: A Selection
Kandinsky’s 1922 Bauhaus Sketchbook: A Selection
CHICAGO, IL—Chicago - The Ukrainian Institute of Modern Art is pleased to announce Kandinsky: The Rediscovered Bauhaus Sketchbook, an exhibition featuring 15 pages of a newly authenticated sketchbook used by the artist Wassily Kandinsky in 1922, when he was teaching at the Bauhaus in Weimar, Germany. On view from October 16 through November 7, 2021, the exhibition will make available to the public the only loose pages from the 43-page sketchbook possible, without damage to the sketchbook itself. Kandinsky: The Rediscovered Bauhaus Sketchbook is presented in partnership with the National Museum “Kyiv Art Gallery” in Kyiv, Ukraine and is made possible through the generosity of the Khodorkovsky Family, the sketchbook’s owner.
Wassily Kandinsky (Moscow, 1866 - Neuilly-sur-Seine, France, 1944) is one of the most noted artists of the 20th century. An artist, art theorist and educator, he is often credited as a pioneer of abstraction. Kandinsky spent his youth in Odessa, Ukraine, graduating from the Grekov Odessa Art School. He then attended the University of Moscow, where he studied law and economics, from 1886-1892. He declined a teaching position in his field in Dorpat, today Tartu, Estonia in 1896 and moved to Munich to study art, first with Anton Azbe, followed by Franz von Stuck. While in Munich, Kandinsky began to move towards abstraction. He is widely known for his work with German artist Franz Marc (1880-1916) for the publication of the Blue Rider Almanach and its related exhibitions. His 1911 treatise Concerning the Spiritual in Art continues to be an important resource explaining the inner life of the artist and its relationship to non-objective forms. His forced return to Russia at the onset of World War I in 1914 was short-lived. He returned to Germany after the war and assumed a teaching position with the Bauhaus, where he remained until its closure by the Nazi government in 1933. Kandinsky then left for France, where he remained until his death. The sketchbook’s rediscovery corrects previous issues concerning the absence of known personal sketchbooks by the artist from 1922-1927. Provenance history suggests the existence of additional sketchbooks, as yet to be found.
For further inquiries, a book (hardback) documenting the authentication process will be available for purchase for $35 with an introduction by Nuno Viana. In addition to reproductions of all the sketches themselves, expert reports by Lisa Florman, Reinhold Heller, Dmytro Horbachev, and Maria Valyaeva, are reprinted. A technical examination and analysis report from the Conservation Department at the Metropolitan Museum of Art (NYC.) is also included.
The Horizon is a Circle: Ricardo Manuel Díaz and Margarita Fainshtein
The Ukrainian Institute of Modern Art is honored to present paintings by Chicago based artist Ricardo Manuel Díaz and printed works by Nova Scotian artist Margarita Fainshtein in The Horizon is a Circle, a two person exhibition that contemplates displacement, a sense of place, and what home means across geographic borders and cultures. Díaz, a longtime Cuban political refugee, reflects upon the nuances and challenges associated with coping with family left behind, adjusting to a new way of life, economic distress, and degrees of acceptance. Fainshtein, thrice transplanted from Ukraine, to Israel, to Nova Scotia invites visitors to assume active roles as an 'observer' or 'participant', paralleling conditions of the seeming acceptance of official political citizenship and the reality of cultural discrimination. How welcome can one feel in a country tainted with disdain for those unlike the majority? How do deep-seated attitudes embedded in history continue intergenerationally and affect family? Both artists bring awareness to these and other issues as they explore what it means to bridge past and present across cultures - gathering information about how one exists in the world, what gets internalized with time, and what gets fixed in one's memory. The Horizon is a Circle will be on view through August 22, 2021 and a catalogue will be published in conjunction with the exhibition.
Abstraction as Metaphor
Painting, including abstraction, has probably been around too long to hold surprises, at least in the area of pictorial innovation, which was its hallmark historically. This could be regarded as the current challenge for abstraction in particular. Whereas painting continues unabated with no signs of disappearing, the question remains how to make it vital, not only in terms of pictorial seduction, but also in the area of content. This is one of the particular dilemmas for abstraction.
Postiglione and Shaw's work is not only about itself and the sheer formal optical experience uncomplicated by any outside issues. Their use of abstract imagery readily embraces issues such as themes of globalization and the resultant dynamics of societal, cultural, and environmental degradation. All of this metaphoric content is represented in the language of abstract art.
Corey Postiglione and Kathie Shaw have been fortunate to share a studio, where they interact around ideas, techniques and motivations. Although different stylistically, the consequence of a shared space are essential to both artists.
Work, People, Art: Selections from the Works Progress Administration Collection of the Illinois State Museum
The Ukrainian Institute of Modern Art is proud to present Work, People, Art in partnership with the Illinois State Museum. The exhibition features 38 paintings, prints, and photographs made under the Federal Art Project (FAP) from the Illinois State Museum’s permanent collection.
Michel Andreenko and Ukrainian artists in Paris
Michel Andreenko and Ukrainian Artists in Paris is curated by Adrienne Kochman, in anticipation of the exhibition Michel Andreenko:Revisited. A survey of his career – from theatrical set designs and non-representational work of the 1920s, surrealistic naturalism, his Vanishing Paris series of the 1940s-1950s and return to non-representation in the mid-1950s will be represented through the largest collection of his work in the United States, loaned by Drs. Alexandra and Andrew Ilkiw. The exhibition, postponed a year due to the pandemic, will open in Spring 2021. A catalogue is already available through UIMA.
Not Afraid
In their two-person exhibition, Not Afraid, Janice Elkins and Gina Lee Robbins have created a symphony of canvases, sculptures and installations that render the human experience in abstracted, yet vividly emotional ways. Using bold imagery, fractured form, and rich layers of texture, Elkins and Robbins have captured an uncensored psychological response to these restrictive and bewildering times.
On view February 20- April 18, 2021
Chicago Sculpture International Biennial 2020
Moving Forward in a time of Change: Our New Relationship to the World We Live In is a juried member exhibition addressing newfound issues generated by the pandemic. The absence of human activity has created noticeable improvements from clearer skies, breathable air quality and less noise to increased movement of wildlife into human frequented areas. Works are sought relating to how these shifts have changed our relationship to the world we live in, such as our sense of space – open and contained, the passing of time, and the un- or over-availability of some materials.
Work will be selected by Ukrainian Institute of Modern Art Curator, Adrienne Kochman.
October 30, 2020 - February 7th, 2021
IN PARTNERSHIP WITH CSI
Chicago: Selections from the Permanent Collection
Selections from our permanent collection that include aspects of Chicago. Works included from Morris Barazani, Harold Hayden, Thomas Kapsalis, Marcos Raya, Yvette Kaiser Smith, Stanley Tigerman, Gillian Wise.
July 24th - October 10th 2020
External Eye
This exhibition brings together two artists engaged with color and the manner in which its inherent properties – hue, value, saturation, intensity for example, offer a vehicle for understanding the outside world. This is not to say color is the only visual element at play, but employed as the primary element with which to draw the viewer’s attention – the first glance. Once there, in front of the artwork/painting, we look more carefully – following how each color is contained by lines, then shifts with light upon it, and then, we notice perhaps with what shapes each artist defined/created their form. Why did the artist make these choices, for what purpose?
Yana Bystrova and Paula Henderson present two varying pathways for approaching abstraction in painting. Bystrova seeks answers to larger philosophical questions about how cultural context and perceptions of reality shape our understanding of the world we live in. As a Ukrainian artist living in Paris for almost three decades, she is keenly aware of the impact of the surrounding environment and, to that end, offers a ‘sampling’ - of landscapes, nature, organic elements using the traditional practice of en plein-airor painting outdoors. Their immediate, fresh, less calculated expression could be said to both embrace the phenomenon of ambiguity, and offer a mechanism for overcoming it, by focusing on the painting’s formal elements.
Henderson concentrates on social constructs and traditions of representation. Her series Groundwork(s)operates at the intersection of formal abstraction and social engagement, by developing patterns from the soles of shoes, encountered while walking. Found universally, on the sidewalk, imprinted into the earth, for example, their temporary existence is a reminder of change through space and time, if not hieroglyphics of our collective history. Additional works puzzle the social impact of representations of women’s bodies in commercial media. As personal narratives and identities are invited to be shaped by the promotion of desire and allure, how much do they truly distract from a truthful representation of the self and, how much do we invest in our own objectification?
Wild Fragility
December 13th, 2019 — February 9th, 2020
FEATURING BONNIE PETERSON & BETH SHADUR
Wild Fragility features painted works by Beth Shadur, and fiber works by Bonnie Peterson, addressing the impact of man’s footprint on natural lands. Through their research, both artists convey in image and text the fragility of various lands, our most pristine environments, threatened by climate change, industry, tourism and overuse. Shadur exhibits works from her National Park Project, while Peterson exhibits geoscience embroideries.
Through the Lens: Unbending Life
DECEMBER 13TH, 2019— MARCH 6TH
Through the Lens: Unbending Life features well known Ukrainian artists Yevgeniy Pavlov (Kharkiv, Ukraine), Sergey Melnitchenko (Mykolaiv, Ukraine) and recently discovered Sophie Yablonska who traveled around the world with a camera in hand in the 1920-1930s. Three artists breaking the boundaries of accepted norms in order to connect with new and deeper insights into the human condition.
The show is a collaboration between UIMA and Rodovid press
Image: Sophia Jablonska, from the series Southeast Asia, ca. 1932
Forgotten Forms
October 11 - December 8, 2019
Forgotten Forms is a collaborative exhibition between members of the Chicago Cultural Alliance, the National Museum of Puerto Rican Arts & Culture (NMPRAC), and the Ukrainian Institute of Modern Art (UIMA).
Investigating seemingly everyday objects to reveal a much greater story about neighborhood identity, placemaking and city life, the exhibition highlights the work of two emerging artists, both of whom explore structural elements of urban landscapes. Edra Soto revisits Puerto Rico’s vernacular architecture through her GRAFT installations and architectural interventions, and Yhelena Hall touches on the history of Chicago and explores a marginal state of detritus becoming artifacts through her series Polished Remnants.
Yhelena Hall was born in Ukraine and studied painting and graphics at the Kharkiv State Art College when she became fascinated by iconography and folk art. In 2003-2007, she had her graphic series exhibited in solo and group shows in galleries of Kyiv, Ukraine. In 2007, Yhelena was awarded Fulbright Scholarship to obtain her MFA degree at the State University of New York at New Paltz. Concentrating in Sculpture, she developed a number of nature-based performances and process-driven sculptures, some of which were exhibited in the Samuel Dorsky Museum in New Paltz and the Ukrainian Institute of America in New York City. After her graduation in 2009, she participated in several art residencies throughout the Eastern Europe. In 2011, she received Rinat Akhmetov’s Foundation Grant to execute her piece focusing on the consumer identity and Ukrainian entertainment industry. Currently, based in Chicago, Yhelena continues working with sculptural media utilizing a broad range of materials with mechanical and electric elements.
Edra Soto was born in Puerto Rico and is a Chicago-based interdisciplinary artist, educator, curator, and co-director of the outdoor project space THE FRANKLIN. She is invested in creating and providing visual and educational models propelled by empathy and generosity. Her recent projects are motivated by civic and social actions focus on fostering relationships with a wide range of communities. Most recently, Soto was awarded the Efroymson Contemporary Arts Fellowship and DCASE for Individual Artist Grant from the City of Chicago. Soto has attended residency programs at Skowhegan School of Painting and Sculpture (ME), Beta-Local (PR), and Ragdale Foundation (IL), amongst others. She is a lecturer for the Contemporary Practices Department at The School of the Art Institute of Chicago, where she holds an MFA, and a bachelor’s degree from Escuela de Artes Plásticas de Puerto Rico.
Blue Collar
Opening Reception: 6-9pm, August 9th, 2019
On display from August 9th-October 6th, 2019
Blue Collar is an exhibition that has its roots in construction both physically and theoretically. Labor lends to an appreciation of the result of the task at hand. It is a dedication. The act of “putting in work” results in something being built to further our progression. That “work” translates not only into the physical task but also influence, investigation, perspective and trust in understanding. The works of both Cleveland Dean and Anthony Adcock envelop themselves in history, a dedication to mastery and a result that reflects not only aesthetic enjoyment but deep contemplation.
Blue Collar will feature new works from both artists’ catalogues inclusive of painting, sculptures and installations. The works of Cleveland and Anthony have a symbiotic relation to each other in how both artists explore the outward perceptions of the same unconventional materials yet explore the presentation of such in vastly different ways.
Raw Reckoning
Opening Reception: 6-9pm, June 7th, 2019
On display from June 7th-August 4th, 2019
Raw Reckoning is veteran Chicago artist Michael K. Paxton’s one-person exhibition of large-scale paintings and works on paper that derive their structure from the study of slide sections of the effect of black lung disease on coalminers. Paxton, a sixth generation West Virginian creates pillar size fields of chalk, charcoal, gesso and acrylic on raw canvas that embrace this ongoing devastation from coal in an effort to point to a place and people not heard from often in contemporary art. Through a well ingrained working process of size and materials, the open-ended approach of how each painting is developed produces a colorful and awkward work of aggressive mark making that refuses to stand still. Pushing hard against expectations an otherness surrounds his work as he looks for the exact point where his bone deep Appalachian heritage can carve out a place for a heart’s desire to speak of something important, personal and yet as common as dirt.
Michael K. Paxton many awards include a grant from the Adolph & Esther Gottlieb Foundation, Inc., New York; Illinois Arts Council Fellowship in Visual Art Award and two Professional Development Grants; Fellowships with both Air le Parc, Project and Research Center, Pampelonne, France and Jentel Artist Residency Program, Banner, Wyoming; a Marshall University Alumni Award of Distinction; five Professional Development Grants from Columbia College, Chicago and the documentary film “Work at Hand, Michael K. Paxton” Official Selection of the 17thAnnual Great Lakes International Film Festival. Major one-person exhibitions include Miami University Museum of Art, Oxford, Ohio; Chicago Cultural Center, Chicago, IL; Linda Matney Gallery, Williamsburg, VA.; Heuser Art Center, Bradley University, Peoria, IL, Linda Warren Projects, Chicago, IL; Laura Mesaros Gallery, West Virginia University, Morgantown, WV. He has been published in New American Paintings; featured artist/educator in issue 8 of Line Work; been the subject of both radio and television features on NPR, Chicago and WVPBS and selected and published in Art and Soul, highlighting fifty of the most noted West Virginians in the Arts.
He is an adjunct faculty member of Columbia College, Chicago since 2005 and has BA in Art from Marshall University, 1975 and an MFA in Drawing and Painting from The University of Georgia, 1979.