Wassup Painters



Wassup Painters
Curated by Pavan Segal
June 8 - July 20, 2013

Kerstin Brätsch
Paul Cowan
Cynthia Daignault
Liam Everett
Henrik Olai Kaarstein
Molly Zuckerman-Hartung

Anat Ebgi is pleased to present Wassup Painters, a group show organized by Pavan Segal featuring work by Kerstin Brätsch, Paul Cowan, Cynthia Daignault, Liam Everett, Henrik Olai Kaarstein, and Molly Zuckerman-Hartung. The show will open on June 8, and will be on view until July 20. A reception will be held at the gallery on Saturday, June 8 from 6-9pm, at 2660 La Cienega Blvd in Culver City.

Wassup Painters brings together contemporary artists who approach painting through the use of nontraditional materials and innovative processes as a way of exploring new conceptual ground. Painting as a medium has a long and rich history and recent trends have focused on exploring and reinterpreting what has come before. In some contrast to this, Wassup Painters highlights artistic practices that push the possibilities of the medium into unexpected realms, blurring the boundaries between painting and other forms of object making.

The exhibition title references Larry Clark’s 2005 film Wassup Rockers, which features a group of Latino teenagers searching for identity in the racially diverse and ever changing South Central neighborhoods of Los Angeles. In the film, the teens are often mislabeled as “rockers” due to their long hair and black clothes even though they primarily self-identify as “skaters,” making them feel misunderstood in their own community. While many of the works in Wassup Painters have leanings toward painting, they could easily be perceived or labeled as other forms entirely, such as glasswork, photography, signage, deconstructed material, collage, sculpture, and fabric art. This show offers the opportunity to view works that have direct points of intersection with these forms of object making as a way of contemplating what comprises and defines painting, while asking what role context, intention, and expectation play in this process. 

Kerstin Brätsch was born in Hamburg, Germany. She received Her MFA in 2007 from Columbia University. Solo exhibitions include Gavin Brown, New York and Balice Hertling, Paris. Select exhibitions include Kölnischer Kunstverein, Cologne (with DAS INSTITUT), Kunsthalle Zurich (with DAS INSTITUT), The 54th Venice Biennial (with DAS INSTITUT), MoMA/ PS1 (with DAS INSTITUT), Sculpture Center, New Museum, New York, Museum of Contemporary Art, Chicago, and Museum of Contemporary Art, Los Angeles (with DAS INSTITUT). She lives and works in New York.

Paul Cowan was born in Kansas City, MI. He received His MFA in 2012 from University of Illinois at Chicago. In 2012, Cowan mounted a solo exhibition at the Museum of Contemporary Art, Chicago. Solo exhibitions include Clifton Benevento, New York, and Shane Campbell, Chicago. Recently, his work has been included in group exhibitions at Kavi Gupta, Berlin, James Cohan Gallery, New York, and Thomas Duncan Gallery, LA. His work has been reviewed in Modern Painters, Kaleidoscope, Mousse Magazine, and Art Forum. He currently lives and works in Milwaukee.

Cynthia Daignault was born in Baltimore, Maryland. She attended Stanford University, and was a MacDowell Colony Fellow in 2010. She was invited for a solo exhibition at White Columns in 2011, which received a review in the October 2011 issue of Artforum. Solo shows include Lisa Cooley, New York and group shows at American Contemporary, New York, and Bureau, New York. Daignault is a recipient of the 2011 Rema Hort Mann Foundation Grant. She currently lives and works in New York.

Liam Everett was born in Rochester, NY. He has had solo shows at Altman Siegel, and Romer Young Gallery in San Francisco, Paul Kasmin Gallery, New York, and White Columns, New York. He has been included in group shows at 303 Gallery, New York, Canada, New York, Josh Lilley Gallery, London, and Wattis Institute, San Francisco, CA. In 2012, he received the Fellowship Award for the Artist in Residence program at Headlands Center For the Arts. He currenty lives and works in San Francisco, CA.

Henrik Olai Kaarstein was born in Oslo, Norway. He currently lives and works in Frankfurt, Germany. Solo exhibitions include T293, Rome, FIAC Paris, Holodeck, Oslo, D’Amelio Gallery, New York, and Leonhardi Kulturprojekte, Frankfurt. His work has been written about in New York times, Flash Art (Italy), and Artforum. He currently studies at Staatliche Hochschule fur Bildende Kunste Staedelschule, in Frankfurt Germany.

Molly Zuckerman-Hartung was born in Olympia, WA. In 2012, she presented her first solo museum show the Museum of Contemporary Art, Chicago. Recently, she was invited to participate in the group show, Painter Painter at the Walker Art Center. Molly is represented by Corbett vs Dempsey, Chicago. She teaches painting and drawing at the school of the art institute, and Northwestern University, and is co-founder of Julius Cesar, an artist run exhibition space in Chicago. She currently lives and works in Chicago.

Pavan Segal, M.D. is a child and adolescent psychiatrist that specializes in working with mentally ill teenagers and is a professor of clinical psychiatry based in Chicago. He has broad interests in contemporary art and is an independent curator, collector, and has collaborated with a number of artists on various projects. His interest in art focuses primarily on the role that experience, context, ideas, and personal psychology play in the production and interpretation of art. He most recently organized a group exhibition in the Summer of 2012 involving fourteen artists working across all mediums at D'Amelio Gallery, New York. This exhibition entitled, "Idea is the Object" focused on the early philosophical writings of John Locke and examined the role that experience plays in the conception of ideas and how this functions to facilitate the production of art objects and the perception of such works. This exhibition received a number of very favorable reviews including a large review in the New York Times by Roberta Smith. The next show that he is working on is entitled, "The Atlantic Effect" and will aim to compare and contrast the role and influence that regional histories play in artistic practices within the United States and Western Europe. This exhibition is slated for 2014 and will take place in Berlin.

http://www.thecompanyart.com/pages/wassup-painters-june-8-july-20-2013/

2660 S. LA CIENEGA BLVD
LOS ANGELES, CA 90034

Gallery Hours:
Tuesday - Saturday, 11 - 6PM