Cary Esser’s new series of intimate ceramic wall works, Minerality, explore the alchemy of glaze and the mystery of lacuna. Variations of form and the skin of surface on Esser’s book-sized structures are glazed with crystal, lusters of percious metal and vibrant color.

An ongoing connection between organic and geometric structures in my work has played a role in the creation and evolution of each new series. My early sensibilities as an artist were influenced by our built environments, and in particular by tiles and ornament with motifs of flora and fauna.

Esser is the Chair of Ceramics at the Kansas City Art Institute. Her work is in the collections of Nerman Museum of Contemporary Art, Overland Park, KS; Daum Museum of Contemporary Art, Sedalia, MO; Archie Bray Foundation, Helena, MT; John Michael Kohler Art Center, Sheboygan, WI, and numerous others.

Patty Carroll continues her exploration of every-woman in Miss Adventures a series of photographic, primarily domestic, tableaus that her anonymous women inhabit. Bad judgement and overwhelming décor choices pave the road to happiness.

The photographs of Patty Carroll are held in the permanent collections of the Nelson Atkins Museum of Art, Kansas City, MO; the Museum of Contemporary Photography, Chicago, IL; The Museum of Modern Art, New York, NY; Library of Congress, Washington, DC, Museum of Contemporary Art, Chicago, IL, Smithsonian Institution, Washington, DC and numerous others.

Wilks’ newest work consists of paintings from WITH HOLD ME – his book of poetry about love, loss, and a deep dive into highly sexualized content.

WITH HOLD ME is a one-of-a-kind, hand-printed book from Wilks and Claire Monroe, aka Clorg. Original copies will be available that evening.

On October 9, impresario Tim J Harte of Mother Russia Industries presents the second part to Wilks’ project with MANIFISTO, an audiobook on finding sexual liberation during COVID, with readings by Wilks.

Flutist Lena Danoff provides musical accompaniment to the reading.

This work is not family-friendly. They are truthful accounts by an artist who explores his sexual prowess while making himself vulnerable around lovers and other strangers.

Sexually mature adults, lovers, partners, and pickups are encouraged to attend, but leave the children at home.

The second part will also take place inside the Dungeon Gallery at Leedy-Voulkos Art Center.

Bio

[Ryan Wilks is a self-taught artist based in Kansas City, Missouri. Their work explores the various realities of queer existence. Primarily creating with oils, watercolors, sculptural assemblage, and ritual, their work sheds light on queer expression of spirituality and sexuality. Their bodies of work address and confront religion used as weapon and explores new modes of prayer through visual and participatory exhibitions. While religious and archetypal iconography such as the Devil and Lilith are seen within their figures in their paintings and used to express gender and queer ideologies, the work itself does not adopt the feeling of weighted religious rites. Instead, the work invites the viewer to participate in a modernized expression of spirit.]

Ryan Wilks

ryan@wilkspainting.com

The central investigation of the show is betrayal as a repeating artifact of life. 

It is manifest as safe passage that is homicidal, 

refuge that is not accessible, 

faith that is not requited, 

accompanied by a chorale of heavenly bird voices. 

The mockingbird on the sidewalk is a warning to us. We must all find St. Francis in our heart. 

Derek Au, Eliza Au, Yewen Dong, Sin-ying Ho, Jing Huang, Nuokan Huang, Wanying Liang, Shiyuan Xu, ChengOu Yu

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Journeys features the ceramic works of nine artists who were either born in China or are of Chinese descent. The exhibition explores themes of identity in a multicultural world, examining both the juxtapositions and intersections between Eastern and Western cultures. Duality and the vacillation between two worlds is present within each artist’s body of work as well as throughout the exhibition.

The passage of time is captured in the crumbling facades of Yewen Dong’s two large-scale wall works. These unfired clay tiles explore the residual traces of touch and memory. Memory also plays a role in the floral porcelain pieces by Wanying Liang. Liang’s works give form to her memories of childhood in China, the questions she has for her mother, and personal struggles with her own body. The physical and mental distance between past and present drives the work of Jing Huang as she constructs ambiguous landscapes that are neither here nor there. Eliza Au utilizes computer-aided methods to reference historical architecture. Au’s wireframe-like pieces explore the limits of interior and exterior space, strength and fragility, and reference both mathematics and the patterns of religious ornamentation. In his series “Simulant,” Derek Au toys with concepts of authenticity and tradition with his use of alternative materials to mimic traditional Chinese porcelain and glaze. Fragility and strength, order and chaos, simplicity and complexity are all present in the amoeba-like forms of Shiyuan Xu. Xu’s porcelain structures reference cellular organisms and the rhythms of growth in response to internal and external forces. The relationship between position and perspective is central to the work of ChengOu Yu as he explores the way experience is distorted based on location. The tiny pottery landscapes of Nuokan Huang feel both contained and limitless – delicate scenes of personal space and boundless imagination. In contrast to the minuscule works of Nuokan Huang is the human-scale vessel of Sin-ying Ho. Ho’s work is covered in cultural, religious, and economic symbolism and touches on themes of dislocation, globalization, and identity. Journeys encompasses an intense blend of imagery combined with traditional and contemporary fabrication techniques and embodies a complex collision of cultures.