A Summer Painting Show

PSM is pleased to present seven painters, most of whom have not shown in the German capital before. The summer months in Berlin are warm, with long days and short nights, and are characterized by a light-hearted atmosphere. It’s not uncommon to find people sitting on the curb or in some makeshift bar with a cold beer in their hand—after the gray winter everyone enjoys a bit of sun… Following this welcoming spirit, PSM invited Cleopatra’s and Aaron Bogart to curate a show of painters from the US. The group represents a variety of painting styles and urges, and includes both established and emerging artists. Some work with the traditional rectilinear canvas, while others shape the canvas; some work with figurative or loosely figurative compositions, while others paint purely abstract works.

Mary Ann Aitken (b. 1960, Detroit, d. 2012, Brooklyn) grew up in Detroit and attended Wayne State University, receiving a Bachelor of Fine Arts in 1983 and Master in Art Therapy from WSU in 1989. During those years she maintained a studio in the Cary Building in downtown Detroit. In the 1980s, she depicted her environment with a heavy palette. Thick layers of paint consumed whatever material she could get her hands on, including linoleum tile, newsprint, cardboard, and used paper. Her rough impressions recorded unconsidered objects and mundane street scenes. Posthumous solo shows include Cleopatra’s, Brooklyn; What Pipeline, Detroit; Trinosophes, Detroit; and Urban Institute of Contemporary Art, Grand Rapids, MI. Group exhibitions include Tomorrow Gallery, NY; and Marianne Boesky, NY. Upcoming 2016 exhibitions include Marlborough Chelsea, NY; PSM, Berlin; and What Pipeline, Detroit.

Lucky DeBellevue (b. 1957), originally from Louisiana, is a long time New York-based artist, well-known for his bright, abstract sculptures. But has always made paintings, including those like the checkered ones at PSM.
Selected solo exhibitions include Yoga Mat Bread at Hacienda, Zurich; Open Concept at Kai Matsumiya, New York; NGBK (Berlin); Feature Inc., NY; Björkholmen Gallery (Stockholm, Sweden); Whitney Museum of American Art at Philip Morris; and a site-specific project at The Museum of Contemporary Art (Chicago, USA). His extensive group exhibition history at museums and galleries include, Museum Ludwig (Cologne, Germany); Emmanuel Perrotin (Paris, France); the Wexner Center for the Arts (Columbus, USA); The Dalarnas Museum (Falun, Sweden); MoMa PS1 (Long Island City, NY); and White Columns, NY.

Marley Freeman (b. 1981) is a Brooklyn-based artist whose work draws on a history with textiles. Her paintings can be considered a marginal type of abstraction born of a desire and pursuit of difference. After working in the decorative arts in Southern California and New York, Marley went on to pursue painting, earning a Bachelor of Fine Arts from the School of the Art Institute of Chicago and a Master of Fine Arts from Bard College’s Milton Avery School of the Arts.
Recent selected exhibitions include Post Cards for Porcino at Chert/Porcino, Berlin, organized by David Horvitz; Onion by the Ocean at Underdonk Brooklyn, NY; Syntagma, curated by Natasha Lorens, at the New School, NY; Triangle Arts Association, NY (residency); Franklin Works, NY; 247365, NY; and Kansas Gallery, NY, among others.

Sadie Laska (b. 1974) makes paintings that are meditations on the fog of contemporary communication and the pleasurable agonies of trial and error of painterly expression. The fuzz of electronic meanings in the crowded field of visual information that compete for our collective attention supply the imagery that Laska employs to create paintings of pulsing energy and release.
Laska’s recent solo exhibitions include A Foot, Some Guns, A Boot, Some Hands, Some Lips, A Breast, & A Snail, at 56 Henry, NY; Plain Air, at Galerie Bernard Ceysson, Luxembourg; I Clouded, at CANADA, NY; and SAROJANE, at Kerry Schuss, NY. Group shows include Justin Aidan/Sadie Laska/Leo Fitzpatrick, at United Artists, Ltc., Marfa, TX; Feed the Meter, curated by Wallace Whitney, at Galerie Bernard Ceysson, Luxembourg; and Call and Response, at Gavin Brown Enterprise, New York, NY.

Monique Mouton (b. 1984) lives and works in New York, NY. Mouton paints faint, washed-out compositions, typically on shaped wooden panels or paper, which evince a sense of movement through a cloud-filled world. The colors float on their material support, but nevertheless seem to be part of it, experienced “as a single manifold,” as Barry Schwabsky has written. She received Bachelor of Fine Arts at Emily Carr Institute in Vancouver, BC and a Master of Fine Arts at Bard College in Annandale-on-Hudson, NY. Mouton has exhibited widely in the US and Canada with exhibitions at Blanket Gallery, Vancouver; Macaulay Fine Art, Vancouver; Regina Rex, NY; Fourteen30, Portland; Ottawa Art Gallery, Ottawa; Andrew Edlin Gallery, NY; Cleopatra’s, Brooklyn; Wallspace, NY, and many more.

Pieter Schoolwerth (b. 1970) often reworks images—be they of an old master painting or of an old vacuum cleaner—into abstract, eye-catching configurations. Inkjet prints appear alongside deliberate, thick brushstrokes. Schoolwerth animates the canvas with a wonderfully weird and thought-provoking imagery. He has exhibited internationally with solo shows at Thread Waxing Space, Greene Naftali, American Fine Arts Co., Elizabeth Dee Gallery, and Miguel Abreu Gallery, New York. His work has been included in group exhibitions at The Museum of Modern Art, New York, Centre Pompidou, Paris, The Aldrich Museum of Contemporary Art, Ridgefield, CT, the Institute of Contemporary Art, Boston, 303 Gallery, and Gavin Brown’s enterprise, New York. From 2003 to 2013, Schoolwerth ran Wierd Records and the Wierd Party at Home Sweet Home on the LES of NYC. (www.wierdrecords.com)

Alice Tippit (b. 1975) lives and works in Chicago, Illinois. In her paintings and works on paper, Tippit works with a graphic style that uses simple and recognizable shapes. Her images operate as ciphers, where color and form interact to produce paintings that elude complete specificity, but that also remain identifiable enough to prompt further inquiry. Solo and group exhibitions include: Carrie Secrist, Chicago, IL; Nicelle Beauchene, New York, NY; 47 Canal, New York, NY; Paris London Hong Kong, Chicago, IL; Greene Exhibitions, Los Angeles, CA; Night Club, Chicago, IL; Roots & Culture, Chicago, IL; Devening Projects, Chicago, IL; Jancar Jones, Los Angeles, CA; and Important Projects, San Francisco, CA.