This week, Monya Rowe Gallery opens a two-person exhibition of new paintings featuring Kate Klingbeil (Juxtapoz Projects alumni) and Rebecca Ness titled On the Inside.
Kate Klingbeil's sculptural paintings depict the body as a landscape. Populating her work with tiny figures, Klingbeil investigates the psychological landscape as a personified place where emotions are represented as figures that coexist. Sometimes the landscapes are symbiotic, with a joyful, productive feeling, where the figures help the landscape to thrive, and other times they are draining the land of its' life force. Klingbeil adds to the emotional complexity of the work by using an assortment of medium: acrylic, black sand, oil stick, oil paint, metal chains, false eyelashes, press on nails, pumice and watercolor. Like decorating a cake, Klingbeil squeezes acrylic medium through pastry bags, shaping the paint with her fingers and a palette knife.
Continuing to investigate the emotional obstacles surrounding the inner Self, but different in execution, Rebecca Ness presents a new series of paintings exploring the unexpected intimacy surrounding mundane everyday tasks such as tying a pair of shoes, riding the subway or reading a newspaper. “The anonymous closeness of being within a crowd is another form of intimacy, with our bodies so close with those of people of whom we don't even know their name,” says Ness. Influenced by textiles, the work is heavily patterned and vibrant. Ness examines how our sartorial choices can act as a metaphor for our internal landscape.
Rebecca Ness (b. 1992, Salem, MA) received an MFA from Yale School of Art, New Haven, CT and a BFA from Boston University, MA. She has completed residencies at The Chautauqua Institution, Chautauqua, NY and the Venice Studio Arts Program (Boston University), Venice, Italy. Her work was recently included in group exhibitions at Richard Heller Gallery, Los Angeles, CA and Danese/Corey Gallery, NY. Ness lives and works in New Haven, CT.
Kate Klingbeil (b. 1990, Grosse Pointe, MI) received a BFA from California College of the Arts (CCA), Oakland, CA. Her work was recently exhibited at Spring Break Art Show in Spiritual Art Advisory curated by Caroline Larsen and Sarah Potter; Situations, NY; Seed at Paul Kasmin Gallery, NY, curated by Yvonne Force; The Hole, NY; and Ed. Varie, NY. Klingbeil lives and works in Brooklyn, NY
“On the Inside” is on view at Monya Rowe Gallery from June 20th through July 19, 2019.
