Unseen Things Are Still There
Riverside Arts Center
32 East Quincy Street, Riverside, Illinois

Opening Reception: Sunday, February 27, 2022 3-6pm
Artists’ Talk, Saturday, April 2, 2022 2pm
Exhibition On View: February 27 – April 9, 2022

The Riverside Arts Center is pleased to announce the opening of Unseen Things Are Still There, a group exhibition featuring the art of Alexandra Antoine, JB Daniel, Kate Ingold, Esau McGhee, and Elsa Muñoz. Curated by Interim Gallery Director, Joanne Aono, the exhibition will be shown in the Freeark Gallery + Sculpture Garden.

STARS AND DANDELIONS
Deep in the blue sky,
like pebbles at the bottom of the sea,
lie the stars unseen in daylight
until night comes.
You can’t see them, but they are there.
Unseen things are still there.

The withered, seedless dandelions
hidden in the cracks of the roof tile
wait silently for spring,
their strong roots unseen.
You can’t see them, but they are there.
Unseen things are still there.

– Misuzu Kaneko

Whether masked by layers of material, embedded with story, or encased in symbolism and metaphor, these visually powerful artworks contain concepts that remain despite concealment or absence.

Alexandra Antoine is an interdisciplinary visual artist and cultural apprentice based in Chicago. Her art is influenced by Haitian culture, traditional artistic practices of the African diaspora, and her interests in portraiture, food, farming and physical labor. She has held solo exhibitions at boundary, Chicago Art Department, and Rootwork Gallery in Chicago. Group exhibitions include Southside Community Art Center, Haitian American Museum, Stony Island Arts Bank, and Acre in Chicago as well as Flux Factory (NY) and Arts in Embassies Program, Port-au-Prince, Haiti. Antoine has completed residencies at Spudnik Press, Hyde Park Art Center, and Urban Growers Collective in Chicago in addition to Acre (WI), Ox Bow (MI), and Fabric Workshop and Museum (PA). She received her BFA in Fine Arts and Arts Education from the School of the Art Institute of Chicago.

JB Daniel is a multidisciplinary conceptual artist living and working on the south side of Chicago. In addition to his studio work and public art projects, Daniel runs Mosnart, an artist exhibition project space and residency in Pullman. His Chicago area solo exhibitions include Cultivator, NAB Gallery, Harper College, and Riverside Arts Center. Daniel’s group exhibitions include Evanston Art Center, Bridgeport Art Center, and Lipa Gallery in Chicago, South Shore Arts (IN), as well as venues in France. His art has been reviewed in The Chicago Tribune, The Art Newspaper, Bad At Sports, DNA Chicago, and was featured on Chicago Tonight. He has received a Department of Cultural Affairs and Special Events Individual Artist Grant and was distinguished as a Pullman National Monument Artist in Residence.

Kate Ingold is an artist and poet, living in Pasadena, California. Touching on aspects of loss and repair, her work often begins with “damaged goods” – torn and discarded hand-sewn quilts, broken porcelain figurines and other objects, vintage publications, as well as her own photographs. Her solo exhibitions include Brentwood Art Center (CA), Illinois State Museum, Terrain Biennial (IL), in addition to Mana Contemporary and Mosnart in Chicago. Two-person and group exhibitions include USC Fisher Museum of Art (CA), Roy Boyd Gallery, Hofheimer Gallery, Carlos and Dominguez Gallery in Chicago, and The Blockhouse (Cuba). Ingold’s art has been reviewed in Art Ltd Magazine, Forbes, Newcity, and Art Talk Chicago. Her poetry and essays have been published by Poetry Society of America, Journal of Ordinary Thought, and Bad At Sports. Her work is in the permanent collections of the USC Fisher Museum of Art and the Illinois Art Museum, and a number of private collections. She received her MFA from the School of the Art Institute of Chicago.

Esau McGhee’s interdisciplinary artistic practice is a critique of image construction found in landscape. Utilizing photography, found objects, collage and sculpture the works physically embody conventional strategies of representation, class and race construction. His Chicago area solo exhibitions include Goldfinch Gallery, Harper College, Elastic Arts, and the Union League of Chicago, as well as the Viewing Station (NY). Group exhibitions include Chicago’s Cleaner, Heaven, and Glass Curtain Galleries, the Chicago Artists Coalition, Jenkins Johnson Projects (NY), Art League Houston (TX), Holsum Gallery (MO), and Eastside International (CA). McGhee has curated numerous exhibitions for Tiger Strikes Asteroid, where he served as Director, and The Silver Room, Chicago. His art has been reviewed by Newcity Art, Sixty Inches From Center, and Inside Within. He obtained a BFA from the School of the Art Institute of Chicago and an MFA from Northwestern University.

Elsa Muñoz is a Mexican-American artist born and raised on the south side of Chicago. She credits her interest in both nature and healing, to her experience growing up in an underserved and often unsafe community with little access to green spaces. Since receiving her BFA in oil painting from the American Academy of Art in Chicago, Muñoz has had eight solo exhibitions including the National Museum of Mexican Art, the Union League Club of Chicago, SugarCube Gallery (CO), and Zygman Voss and Dubhe Carreno Galleries in Chicago. Group exhibitions include Glow (Chicago), La Luz De Jesus Gallery (CA), Brandt-Roberts Galleries (OH), and Gold Gallery (MA). Her art has been reviewed in Newcity Art, Chicago Reader, Sixty Inches from Center, and CBS News. She is a recipient of the Helen and Tim Meier Foundation For The Arts Achievement Award. Notable collections include the National Museum of Mexican Art (Chicago), North Park University (Chicago), and numerous private collections.

www.riversideartscenter.com

image: Alexandra Antoine | Hibiscus, 2021, Screenprint and mixed media on paper, 19 x 12.5 inches

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Tags: Alexandra Antoine, Elsa Muñoz, Esau McGhee, Freeark Gallery, JB Daniel, Kate Ingold, Riverside Arts Center, Riverside Illinois, Unseen Things Are Still There