Prairie is pleased to present Dominion, a solo exhibition of new work by Justin Chance (b. 1993, New York, NY; lives in New York, NY), which will be on view from November 9 through December 21, 2024. The exhibition’s title refers to the biblical idea that Earth belongs to man—that we as a species are superior to others and that we control our environments. Chance reflects this with six colored pencil drawings of infants, corresponding to the number of continents that humans naturally inhabit. Each drawing is tentatively titled Untitled (Date of Acquisition) (2024) until it is acquired, at which point the parenthetical is updated to the date of acquisition. Complementing the infant drawings is a drawing of a world map rendered as a large vinyl sticker applied directly to the wall, titled Worldview (2024), where each continent is colored with fleshtones that mirror those of the infants.

The exhibition directly follows Chance’s show Motherhood at Ginny on Frederick in London, which addressed what he called the “shadowy matriarchal phantom” of England’s colonial history. At Prairie, Chance turns from mothers to infants. His interest in babies stems from both their vulnerability and their potency as political subjects. Infants are pre-lingual, yet we shape our languages, cultures, and societies around them. According to Chance, we have baby-proofed our existence for babies, through measures as extreme as censorship and as benign as rounding a sharp corner. Additionally, we have effectively baby-proofed the planet for ourselves through processes like terraforming, wetland draining, and deforestation, to the detriment of other species.

Chance’s recognition of the pervasive influence of babies and the destructive impact of humans on the planet motivates the final work in the exhibition, Straight for Nature (2024), a sculptural installation featuring screen printed t-shirts displayed on a garment rack. The front of the shirts read “Nature is a MILF,” while the backs read “Mother I’d Like to Find.” The shirts will be available to purchase throughout the run of the exhibition.

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Justin Chance (b. 1993 in New York, US) is an artist and writer based in New York. Chance earned a Bachelor of Fine Arts and Bachelor of Arts in Visual & Critical Studies from the School of the Art Institute of Chicago in 2015. Chance’s work has been the subject of solo and two-person exhibitions at the following venues: “Motherhood,” Ginny on Frederick, London, GB (2024); “Archive,” Naranjo 141, Mexico City, MX (2024); “Live,” Tara Downs, New York, US (2023); “Love is Sci-Fi,” Sydney, Sydney, AU (2023); “Winter (with Sylvie Hayes- Wallace),” Hesse Flatow, New York, US (2023); CFA, Milan, IT, presented by Tara Downs (2022); “Social (with The People of New York),” Apparatus Projects, Chicago, US (2022); “Low Life,” Smart Objects, Los Angeles, US (2021); and “Better (with Hunter Foster),” Gern en Regalia, New York, US (2021). The artist’s work has been presented in numerous group exhibitions including: “The Principal Cause of Serial Monogamy,” Tara Downs, New York, US (2024) (forthcoming); “A Study in Form (Chapter Two),” James Fuentes, New York, US, (2024); “FLESH & FLOWERS,” Made in America, NO NAME, Paris, FR (2023); “Public Life (Drawings), Chris Andrews, Montreal, CA (2023); “The Grid and the Curve,” JTT, New York, US (2022); “Material Knowledge,” Arsenal Contemporary, New York, US (2022); “Elective Affinities,” Chapter NY, New York, US (2022); “Remnant, Artifact, Flow,” Thierry Goldberg, New York, US (2021).

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