“FreeHand” Exhibition

Sardine

This event has ended.

Curated by Angela Conant

Featuring work by Juan Pablo Baene, Angela Conant, Beka Goedde, Bradford Kessler, Elisa Lendvay, Rachel Ostrow, and Kiki Smith

SARDINE presents a group show titled FreeHand, curated by Angela Conant, which features a diverse range of artwork by Juan Pablo Baene, Angela Conant, Beka Goedde, Bradford Kessler, Elisa Lendvay, Rachel Ostrow, and Kiki Smith.

From curator Angela Conant:

‘FreeHand’ presents work that is made without plan or premeditation, other than a kind of bodily memory. Each work by the seven artists in this exhibition came to being not from a template, but as readily as a spoken word borne directly from a thought. Unlike verbal language, each move or mark was made ad hoc, in response to the last, as the artist’s inner thinking was assembled into visual form.

While improvisational methodology has been well traversed in drawing, notably by the surrealists, ‘FreeHand’ shows how intuition can lead in other media, such as stone, painting, and printmaking. The artists in this group see-saw from representation to abstraction, from two-dimensions to three, making real-time decisions using X-Actos, Dremmels and squeegees.

This exhibition celebrates the unique individual viewpoint as a hopeful guide forward. While consensus functions to merge and smooth diversity, these artworks delineate distinct facets of perspective. The works on view each present a progression of ideas like points to be connected, rather than didactic connective material between points. They present unassuming options and questions, and do not insist on their own correctness. Reveling in the honesty of instinct, they seek not the dull comfort of homogeneity. In a global consciousness wherein generalization has reached a dangerous zenith, ‘FreeHand’ elevates the invaluable, minute intricacies of individual thought.

Juan Pablo Baene
Originally from Bogota, Colombia, Juan Pablo Baene currently lives in Brooklyn. He received his BFA from Jorge Tadeo Lozano in Bogota and his MFA from the Universidad de Barcelona. He is a PhD candidate at the Universidad de Barcelona and is represented in Spain by La Fiambrera Art Gallery.

Angela Conant
In Angela Conant’s work, content traverses through stone, painting and video. Her larger-scale works in marble act as matrices: she takes rubbings of her marble carvings, which yield bodies work on paper. In her videos, sculpture and paintings function as props and characters, and parody politics of gender and media. Her practice encompasses curating as well as collaboration on artist-run projects. Conant’s work has been exhibited at Electronic Arts Intermix (New York City), EFA Project Space (New York City), Planthouse (New York City), SPRING/BREAK art show (New York City); Glasshouse Projects (Brooklyn, NY), Interstate Projects (Brooklyn, NY); the Delaware Center for Contemporary Art (Wilmington, DE), Neter (Mexico City, MX), The Sunview Luncheonette (Brooklyn, NY), ICA Baltimore (Baltimore, MD), La Mama Gallery (New York City), SARDINE (Brooklyn, NY), Galerie René Blouin (Montreal, QC) and Agency (Brooklyn, NY). She has spoken at Boston University’s School of Fine Art and at New York Foundation for the Arts, and was awarded a Critical Writing residency at Recess (New York City) in 2013 and an Artist Residency at the Millay Colony (Austerlitz, NY) in 2014. In 2007, she co-founded The Gowanus Studio Space, an artist-run collaborative in Brooklyn where she served as Artistic Director until 2014. She earned a BFA in Painting from Boston University in 2004 and an MFA in Art Practice from School of Visual Arts in 2013, and she is currently Fine Arts faculty at Pratt Institute.

Beka Goedde
Beka Goedde has exhibited work at American Academy of Arts and Letters, Galerie Rene Blouin, Soloway, Sunday Takeout, Inside Out Art Museum, Deborah Berke Partners, and Helen Day Art Center. Goedde received an MFA in Sculpture from Bard College, and holds a BA from Barnard College in Behavioral Neuroscience and Philosophy. Goedde has been awarded residencies at Yaddo, JTHAR, Millay Colony, and PS122. Goedde was the recipient of a 2015 Brooklyn Arts Council grant. She is currently on the Studio Arts faculty at Bard College.

Bradford Kessler
Bradford Kessler’s wide-range of works include sharply shaped canvases, customized weapons, chaotic drawings, and biomorphic figurative sculptures; all of which share a uniquely sinister vision that calls upon the animality of human nature to address conflicting impulses toward rules of behavior, civilization, technological advancements, and institutionalized theologies. Kessler’s work has exhibited internationally, including solo shows at 15 Orient, Brooklyn, Valentin, Paris; Ashes/Ashes, Los Angeles; and 247365, New York; and group shows at MonCheri, Brussels; False Flag, Queens; Springsteen, Baltimore; and Witte de With, Rotterdam. His work has been reviewed in Modern Painters, Mousse, CURA, Flash Art, Dis, Vulture, NY Post, and The New York Times.

Elisa Lendvay
Recent solo exhibitions have been at Underdonk Gallery, Brooklyn, NY, Jason McCoy Gallery, New York, NY and Fred Giampietro Gallery, New Haven, CT, and group exhibitions nationally and internationally. Lendvay holds an MFA in Sculpture from Bard College, Annandale-on-Hudson, New York, and a BFA from the University of Texas at Austin and Bennington College. Lendvay has been awarded honors from the Edward F. Albee Foundation, the New York Foundation of the Arts, the Santa Fe Art Institute, the Lower Manhattan Cultural Center, the Milton Avery Graduate School of the Arts, the Dallas Museum of Art, The University of Texas at Austin, and the Marie Walsh Art Foundation, and most recently, The Mable Residency at the Norman Bird Sanctuary in Middleton, RI. She was a visiting faculty member at Bennington, Fall 2017, and is an adjunct professor at Marist College.

Rachel Ostrow
Rachel Ostrow earned a B.A. in fine arts from Wesleyan University, a post-baccalaureate degree from the Maryland Institute College of Art, and an M.F.A. in painting from Hunter College. She has had solo exhibitions at Planthouse, 42 Social Club, Sunday Takeout, The Kenan Center, John Davis Gallery, Saffron, Todojunto Gallery, and The Plant. She has been awarded residencies at the Gowanus Studio Space, The Joshua Tree Highlands Artist Residency, The Millay Colony, The Kimmel Harding Nelsen Center and the Cill Rialag Project.

Kiki Smith
Kiki Smith has been known since the 1980s for her multidisciplinary practice relating to the human condition and the natural world. She uses a broad variety of materials to continuously expand and evolve a body of work that includes sculpture, printmaking, photography, drawing and textiles. Smith has been the subject of numerous solo exhibitions worldwide including over 25 museum exhibitions. Her work has been featured at five Venice Biennales, including the 2017 edition. She is a member of the American Academy of Arts and Letters and the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, and in 2017 was awarded the title of Honorary Royal Academician by the Royal Academy of Arts, London. Previously, Smith was recognized in 2006 by TIME Magazine as one of the “TIME 100: The People Who Shape Our World.” Other awards include the Skowhegan Medal for Sculpture in 2000; the 2009 Edward MacDowell Medal; the 2010 Nelson A. Rockefeller Award, Purchase College School of the Arts; the 2013 U.S. Department of State Medal of Arts, and the 2016 Lifetime Achievement Award from the International Sculpture Center, among others. She is an adjunct professor at NYU and Columbia University. Kiki Smith has been represented by Pace Gallery since 1994.