The Chicago Artists Coalition is pleased to present “Hiding in Plain Sight,” a HATCH Projects exhibition featuring works by Soheila Azadi, Hannah Givler, Leander Mienardus Knust, Raul De Lara, B. Quinn, and Hillary Wiedemann, and is curated by George William Price.

Expurgation, even when it subtracts or omits, adds a space for contemplation that allows us to read both the secondary authority and the original beneath. Walking through the gallery space, this exhibition reveals that it and its components are simply vision, rather than an absolute given. Paradoxically, we enlarge that vision—as we traverse the space—through the formation of a new universe. The physical specificity of the works in “Hiding in Plain Sight” enter into a comparative methodology with their gallery surroundings. In doing so these works—made of the visual, physical, and sonic—exist always on the cusp of becoming sculpture; they are actions rather than static symbols.

Our presence in the space amplifies this collective field of vision, which through an erasure of presence or an embrace of the peripheral brings attention to itself. Push and pull, material and immaterial, freedom or control, “Hiding in Plain Sight” asks us to orient our bodies in response to the creation of its own system, situating itself simultaneously within and outside of the world. Engaging with the bodies that activate them, the works breathe outward, intersecting with the architectural container they inhabit. Within these sculptural “actions”—temporally infinite and inexhaustible—it is our self that endures.

THIS EVENT IS FREE AND OPEN TO THE PUBLIC.

ARTIST BIOS

Soheila Azadi is an interdisciplinary visual artist and lecturer based in Chicago and Iran. Born in the capital of Islamic cities, Esfahan, Azadi absorbed story-telling skills through Persian miniature drawings since she was nine. Azadi’s inspirations come from her experiences of being a woman while living under Theocracy. Now residing in the U.S. Azadi is dedicated to transnational feminism with a passionate devotion to the ways in which race, religion, gender, sexuality, and ethnicity intersect. Azadi uses performance art and performative installations as methods to both materialize and narrate stories about women’s everyday struggle in the world. Her use of fabric in her works is deployed critically and sensually to amplify customs that serve to classify, separate, oppress, and potentially / unknowingly liberates those obfuscated by such a tradition. Azadi currently teaches at SAIC while she is an artist-in- of HATCH Projects.

Hannah Givler received a BFA in sculpture from The Ohio State University, and an MFA in Fiber and Material Studies from the School of The Art Institute of Chicago. She was resident artist at Umoja Arts Center in Arusha Tanzania, Vermont Studio Center, Visitor Center Artist Camp, and 8550 Ohio. Her work has been exhibited in the US and internationally including: The Banff Center for the Arts, The Cultural Center in Arusha Tanzania, Fourth Ward Gallery, Logan Exhibitions, Southside Hub of Production, and Hyperlink Exhibitions in Chicago, The Mills Gallery in Iowa, and Helen Day Art Center in Vermont. Hannah Givler’s studio practice is based between the south side of Chicago and the University of Iowa, where she teaches sculpture.

Leander Mienardus Knust is an artist, musician and maker based in Chicago. His sculptural works invite us to question relationships to the material world while remaining honest to their personal histories. His music, often employed to reflect ideas behind physical works, combines disparate elements to produce new potentials and expand genre convention. Leander is a co-founder of Fat City Arts, a non-profit, community driven project space and venue located in Chicago’s Bridgeport neighborhood. He has exhibited work and played shows throughout Chicago’s bustling DIY arts and music scene, including spaces such as the Archer Ballroom, the Archer Beach Haus, Slumber Room, Kruger Gallery, Pinky Swear, and the Plant. Leander currently works for Archistoric Products building and restoring lighting fixtures and further supports his practice through commissions for custom stringed instruments, furniture, and arts related fabrication projects. He received his BFA from the School of the Art Institute of Chicago in 2015.

Raul De Lara is a sculptor, former professional athlete, and a Mexican immigrant. His work weaves the allusive dialectical relationships between physical humor, seduction, and the uncanny. He foregrounds the inches between the viewer and the object as foreplay to unmask the distance that keeps them apart. His principal appetites are the inexhaustible formal qualities of hand-carved wood, suspicious lexicons, and a willing audience. De Lara is a co-founder of Fat City Arts, a community driven project space and venue located in Chicago’s Bridgeport neighborhood. De Lara has worked as a studio assistant for Nick Cave, and received his BFA from The University of Texas at Austin in 2015.

B. Quinn is an artist whose interdisciplinary practice addresses the constraints of language, the sensibilities of painting, and a combination of research and idiosyncratic making that emphasizes the duality within materials themselves. Quinn was born in Pittsburgh, PA, and earned her BA from Chatham College for Women, later receiving her BFA and MFA in painting and drawing from the School of the Art Institute of Chicago. She has participated in exhibitions and projects internationally, as well as within the U.S.—most recently in A.I.R. Gallery’s 12th Biennial Exhibition Sinister Feminism, New York City.

Hillary Wiedemann is a Chicago based multi-media artist. Using glass, light, reflective/refractive materials, and audio, her work explores the subtle differences between passive and active states of perception, and the translation of light into object and experience. She received an MFA in sculpture from California College of the Arts, and a BFA in glass from Rhode Island School of Design. She has exhibited her work in Chicago, the San Francisco Bay Area; Los Angeles, Brooklyn, Belgium and Iceland. She has taken part in residencies at ACRE (Chicago/Wisconsin), Hatch Projects (Chicago), and SÍM (Iceland).

CURATOR BIO

George William Price is an arts administrator and curator invested in artistic and political expressions that engender alternative, avuncular, and non-hierarchical histories. Price currently works as Video Data Bank’s Development and Marketing Manager, where he leads VDB’s promotional and development efforts, manages the submissions and acquisitions process, and is responsible for the organization’s external community relations. Price has curated and administered numerous exhibitions and moving image programs for institutions such as Conversations at the Edge, Chicago Urban Art Society, Rapid Pulse International Performance Festival, and University of the Arts London. He has also worked for a number of arts organizations in both the USA and UK including Matt’s Gallery, London; Electronic Arts Intermix, New York City; and PAHC / studio, Chicago. Price is the current Gaylord and Dorothy Donnelley Foundation Curatorial Fellow.

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Tags: B. Quinn, Chicago, Chicago Artists' Coalition, George William Price, Hannah Givler, Hiding in Plain Sight, Hillary Wiedemann, Leander Mienardus Knust, near west side, Raul De Lara, Soheila Azadi