Darger HQ’s upcoming offering, actor setting figure ground, features the work of two artists preferring industrial and domestic building materials in the service of figurative abstraction and poetic expression.
Michael Ian Larsen (Lincoln, NE) and Kristina Estell (Duluth, MN), sculptors with a preference for site-responsive installation, will team up for this show opening on October 14.
Larsen, a graduate of Nebraska Wesleyan and the School of the Art Institute of Chicago, works primarily in ceramics, creating irregular organic forms into which he often incorporates found and altered objects. These conjunctions extend the artist’s intended narratives regarding innocence, growth, curiosity and exploration.
Estell, an MFA grad from the University of Minnesota, is known for her installations responding to encounters with natural and constructed environments. Her non-traditional uses of industrial materials, such as silicone rubber made into gossamer sheets, or addition of art media, such as gold leaf, to natural objects, reveal her interest in the dynamics of spatial context and material interactions.
The exhibition reception begins at 6pm with an artist talk, and is open until 9pm.
actor setting figure ground: Kristina Estell and Michael Ian Larsen opens on October 14 and runs through December 4 at Darger HQ, 1804 Vinton Street. The gallery is open on Saturday from noon-5pm, on Sunday from noon-3pm and by appointment. For more information, visit www.dargerhq.org or call 402/209-5554.