With 8 custom exhibitions and 19 public events under our belt we are thrilled to move forward with this community! Thank you Kansas City artists and cultural workers for three wonderful years of support, hard work, and pure fun! Subterranean turns 3 today!
-Ayla
By Ayla Rexroth
Paul Anthony Smith is Jamaican American, his attitude is positive, he is opinionated and his works employ traditional genre scenes. His media ranges from ceramics, paintings, drawings, collages and photography, and this gives him a wide range of visual and material strategies for communicating his ideas about cultural tradition, world politics, and race.
I was excited to meet with Paul because his work challenges me to think outside of my own cultural perspectives and I can read it on several levels. Growing up in Iowa, my hometown happened to have an amazing collection of Haitian genre paintings, and they were my favorite because they were out of place in a museum where most of the exhibits were either by regionalist painter Grant Wood or about corn production. I can easily connect much of Paul’s imagery to the Caribbean paintings I love, but there are several differences. Paul is making art in historically regionalist Kansas City, and he’s working with contemporary themes, events, and methods.
We had so much fun at the opening! The work looked awesome and we had a record # of new visitors. Special thanks to Clayton, Melaney, Paul, Molly, Garry, David, Tiffany, Amanda, Robert B, Robert H, Emily H, Jaclyn, Matt, Cory and Plug, Bread KC, and all our guests!
Read the first review of the Curatorial Studies Exhibition by Blair Schulman on Cupcakes in Regalia
See you tonight at the opening! 7 – 11pm. 4124 Warwick Blvd. Apt. B!
Visiting Jaclyn Senne’s studio reminded me of the essential questions for painters… “What should I paint?” “How do I create a studio momentum that allows me to produce a lot of work and continuously experiment?” What do I do when that momentum is broken?!What I am so excited about in Jaclyn’s work is that it she is in control of her subject matter, painting technique and color. The one thing that doesn’t follow the same command of her perfectly taped off lines is the overall composition. In her piece Backyard/beach course vacation-planked location with strand-lit courts and towels and iced coolers Senne creates a loose sketch of the images architectural structure. She then plays a strategy game of fitting together pieces and objects that don’t work together until they are just believable enough. In thinking about this, her work becomes so reflective of life. Fake it till you make it.
Exhibition Opening Reception
Friday, November 2nd from 7 – 11 pm
Open By Appointment: November 3 – 30th
Friday, November 2nd Subterranean Gallery will host a public reception from 7:00 – 11:00 p.m. showcasing work by artists: Robert Josiah Bingaman, David Ford, Amanda Gehin, Molly Kaderka, Garry Noland, Jaclyn Senne, and Paul Anthony Smith. The exhibition will feature drawings, paintings, collages, and sculpture. Curatorial Studies is viewable by appointment November 3rd – 30th. The gallery is located at 4124 Warwick Boulevard, Apartment B, Kansas City, Missouri.
Curatorial Studies is Subterranean Gallery’s first-ever group exhibition. Bringing together seven diverse Kansas City-based artists, Director Ayla Rexroth facilitates a conversation about her curatorial practice within an apartment gallery space. The exhibition stems from a stream of studio visits conducted over the past couple months where Rexroth, and the Subterranean Gallery staff exchanged with artists, encountering a range of ideas, methodologies, and media. For more information about Curatorial Studies check out articles and photo compilations of the studio visits at <subterraneangallery.com>.
Photos by Clayton Skidmore
Posted in Exhibitions
By Clayton Skidmore
What is a mid-career artist? Does it describe an artist’s income or how influential they are? Ayla and I pondered these questions over beers with Garry Noland in our recent studio visit. It became the initial topic of our conversation, an idea that Garry himself seemed confused of since he’s been a practicing artist for over 30 years. As a prerequisite to having his studio at Studios Inc., being mid-career seems to be a loose title assigned to a group of artists with widely varying years of practice. If age isn’t a variable, what does it mean to be mid-career in a city where it seems there are not enough collectors to earn a living, and to gain prestige artists have to show outside of their own city?
Recently, Ayla and I stopped by the home studio of local artist, Amanda Gehin. Amanda and her boyfriend Idris Raoufi are in the process of renovating an old book bindery in Old Hyde Park to be both a live/ work studio and a new home base for the 816 Bike Collective. Seeing the studio space in process was invigorating, all of the potential the space has is quite exciting. Amanda’s works are mostly small-scale gouache paintings that look like children’s book illustrations. They are woven with characters that reference architectural elements – stairs, walls, and turrets to name a few- and vibrant multicolored patterns. She has also worked on a larger scale and with stop motion animation.
In her studio located above the old book bindery, we were greeted by a room that featured a chevron couch. The room’s color palette reminiscent of her work; a blue floor, bright lime cabinetry, offset with neutral wood paneling. Amanda showed us more of her portfolio, we saw a timeline of her work’s growth, stemming most strongly from the playful nature of the collages she made from her stop motion animations. We could more easily see the sense of play she has when making her images. Continue reading
with the help of 58 kickstarter backers, Ayla Rexroth and Clayton Skidmore raised $2773.00 to cover the installation of a hot tub in their basement apartment, which doubles as an art gallery. The Jacuzzi, which was donated by an exhibiting artists parents, served as a wet, hot podium for a series of three discussions that included regional curators, artists, and an architect. An audience of 30 squeezed into tiny plastic folding chairs to eavesdrop on a brilliant mix of high- and lowbrow art talk. The Hot Tub Dialogues encouraged speakers to reveal a little more (skin and theory) than usual, when discussing art, life and their careers. File under Best Talent Pool.
