Lamia Abukhadra, Connor Rice, Nancy Julia Hicks
ON VIEW: MAY 24 - JULY 13, 2019
Opening Reception: Friday, May 24, 6:30 – 9 pm, gallery talk with artists at 7pm
Left to right: Connor Rice, Nancy Hicks, and Lamia Abukhadra during a critique.
With the generous support of the Jerome Foundation, the 2018-2019 Jerome Emerging Printmakers: Lamia Abukhadra, Connor Rice (CRICE), and Nancy Julia Hicks were provided nine months of access to Highpoint’s printmaking facilities, technical support, in-progress group critiques with invited arts professionals, and the opportunity to work in a studio environment that encourages experimentation and growth.
The residency, funded with a generous grant from the Jerome Foundation, is open to emerging Minnesota printmakers — defined here as artists who show significant potential, yet have not received a commensurate amount of professional accomplishment or recognition regardless of age or recognition in other fields. Residents were selected on the basis of their dedication, interest, and potential in printmaking as well as the artistic merit of their work.
Using graphic symbols and pattern with a restrained color scheme, Connor Rice’s stark compositions establish a “gritty” visual language to comment on the exploitation of the black identity and to reflect on personal experiences within a Eurocentric society. Highpoint’s Jerome Residency enabled widespread experimentation with materials and processes that yielded a collection of printed work; most notably a series of large tapestries.
Nancy Julia Hicks has mined familial history, unearthing primary source material for use in works that address neocolonialism and work to investigate the particular place that they inhabit in the resulting society. Nancy created monotypes, artist books, and screenprints on various papers and fabrics that they have made into soft sculptures and objects that also showcase a distinctive and skillful approach to stitching.
Lamia Abukhadra's interdisciplinary research-based practice challenges harmful dominant narratives which perpetuate the settler-colonial imagination, as well as acts of violence and ethnic cleansing, in Palestine and its diasporic spaces. She examines how violent colonial inventions such as archiving, urban planning, and geography affect the perception of Palestine, and Palestinian experiences and representation. The artist embeds her own frameworks which bring to light strange personal and historical connections and poetic occurrences. Her work at Highpoint ranges from re-imagined newspapers to diagrams and sculpture which investigate family history, detail experiences of loss, and explore the term "infrastructures of intimacy."
Highpoint would like to thank this year’s jurors Andrea Carlson (artist) and David Jones (artist and former Executive Director of Anchor Graphics) who selected this group of Jerome Emerging Printmakers.
Additional thanks to guest critics Fred Hagstrom, Jeremy Lundquist, Sally Johnson, and Andrea Carlson. Many thanks to Kristin Lenaburg at the Minneapolis Institute of Art for hosting the residents at the Herschel V. Jones Print Study Room and to Joe King for hosting the residents at the Walker Art Center.
Finally, Highpoint Center for Printmaking extends deep gratitude to The Jerome Foundation for its 16 years of support of this program. The Jerome Foundation, created by artist and philanthropist Jerome Hill (1905-1972), seeks to contribute to a dynamic and evolving culture by supporting the creation, development, and production of new works by emerging artists. Based in St. Paul, MN, the Foundation makes grants to not-for-profit arts organizations and artists in Minnesota and New York City.
The 2018-2019 Jerome Emerging Printmakers Residency was made possible with a grant from the Jerome Foundation.
