Debra Kayes:
I seem to be a verb.
Mar 7 – Apr 18, 2026
Opening Reception: Sat, Mar 7, 1 – 4 pm
Exhibition Walk-Through / Cardboard Painting Workshop: Apr 18, 2 – 3 pm

Tiger Strikes Asteroid, Chicago is pleased to present I seem to be a verb., a solo exhibition by Debra Kayes that packs the space from floor to ceiling with paintings on recycled cardboard, found materials, and canvas. Developed over several years, these works are rooted in lived experience, bodily rhythms, and cycles of repetition and care.

The project began in May of 2020 during lockdown, following the birth of Debra’s second child, when an accumulation of delivery boxes became a studio resource. What started as “crappy art on crappy cardboard,” made in brief moments between caregiving, has continued as a sustained practice. Through both sudden loss, including the death of her brother, and personal gains, such as finding steadiness and purpose in a family and a profession she loves, Debra uses small gestures to make a web of interactions.

Debra’s work centers on bodily action and repetition—caregiving, repairing, grieving, building, and picking up—expressed through recurring imagery of eyes, hands, webs, patterns, and layered surfaces; these works additionally suggest a broader community struggling. The exhibition takes its title from R. Buckminster Fuller’s idea of life as a process rather than an object. In I seem to be a verb., Debra Kayes considers how meaning accumulates through repeated motion, adaptation, and persistence over time.

Program:
Exhibition Walk-Through / Cardboard Painting Workshop: April 18, 2-3 PM

Please join the artist and curator while they discuss influences, process, and the background on the exhibition. Following the conversation in the gallery, there will be a cardboard art-making workshop for participants to create your own works. All are welcome! Feel free to bring any additional materials since supplies will be limited.

Debra Kayes is an artist, designer, curator, and educator. She is a tenured professor of art and design foundations at Waubonsee Community College, outside of Chicago, and a former TSA_CHI member and co-director, Chicago Artists Coalition HATCH resident, and Convergence Academies Research Fellow. Her work has been exhibited nationally and internationally, including at the MCA Chicago and the Illinois State Museum, and she has curated exhibitions in Chicago and Berlin. Kayes holds a B.S. from Skidmore College and an MFA from the University of Wisconsin–Madison.

@debrakayes
debrakayes.com

I seem to be a verb. is organized and curated by Holly Cahill, a Chicago-based visual artist, independent curator, and arts worker. Her process-oriented, sculptural abstractions, combining painting and collage, gather impressions of natural phenomena that navigate themes of biodiversity, transformation, and sensorial experience. Holly received her MFA from the University of Cincinnati (2004) and a BFA from Syracuse University (1998). She is a former director, co-director, and current member of Tiger Strikes Asteroid, where she has curated exhibitions alongside other venues in Chicago, Miami, and Berlin, such as Weinberg Newton Gallery, Mana Contemporary, The Glass Curtain Gallery, and Scotty Enterprises.

@ hollyacahill
hollycahill.com

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Tags: Debra Kayes, I seem to be a verb., Tiger Strikes Asteroid