Al Benkin

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Jamie Kelty

Al Benkin and Jamie Kelty

April 2 – April 23
Opening April 2, 6 – 8pm

Gallery Hours: Tue – Sat, 11am – 6pm

Art: Raw Gallery is pleased to present a two-person show in the front gallery with paintings by Al Benkin and Jamie Kelty. The two female artists both share an interest in assembling and painting on found objects. Through operating in different media, both artists’ work is concerned with using materials as fragments of visual communication.

Al Belkin is interested in the representation of non-normative women in contemporary society. Being born with a missing right forearm, she made up a term “otherly abled” to describe herself. Belkin’s semi-biographical paintings often place “otherly abled” female protagonists in chaotic dreamscapes. She uses different materials as painting supports and employs bottle caps, shells, utensils, metal scarps and other debris to construct urban landscapes. The cynical and yet fantastical situations that she portrays in her work is charged with psychological and erotic tension.

In Jamie Kelty’s Oil Constructs series, found objects are recycled into oil paintings as an uncommon alliance. Figures painted from newspaper clippings, historical photographs, textile, ropes and single-use camera are assembled together to articulate the themes of identity, communication, intimacy and isolation. These props function as visual punctuation marks that question our focus and provide a trail of narrative clues. From Kelty’s process of tearing, scraping and sewing on the canvas, her work imbues a palimpsest-like effect. The rawness of her mark gives the painting a visceral quality and textural depth that addresses urban environment and primitive art.

Kelty was born in Kansas. She holds a BFA in Painting from Fort Hays State University, KS. Her work had been exhibited at Robert Miller Gallery, NY; Brent Sikkema Gallery, NY; Viridian Artists, NY; The Children’s Museum of the Arts, NY; Fusion Arts Gallery, NY and Art : Raw Gallery, NY. Her work is included in the collections of Museo de Collage in Mexico and Art of Emprise in Wichita, Kansas.

Benkin was born in the Midwest. She has received educations from College of Visual Art and Minneapolis College of Art and Design. Her work has been shown at APW Gallery, NY; Projekt30 Gallery, NY; Junto Gallery, NY and Artujillo Gallery, MN

Both Al Benkin and Jamie Kelty currently live and work in New York.
For more information please contact Art : Raw Gallery, or visit www.artrawgallery.com