Join *** (Asterisks) artists Jami Porter Lara, Erin Mickelson and Kate Ruck on the closing day of their group exhibition for an intimate talk and walkthrough the show and their respective practices.
Jami Porter Lara is a conceptual artist interested in the ways humans use ideas about what is natural to naturalize human political constructs. Through a broad range of formal approaches such as sculpture, printmaking and drawing as well as sewing and embroidery, Porter Lara explores how fictions of identity create lived reality. Her work is in public and private collections across the US and Mexico, and has been featured in Art 21 Magazine, American Craft, Hyperallergic, and on PBS. In 2017, Artsy named her one of the artists shaping the future of ceramics. Exhibitions include the National Museum of Women in the Arts in Washington, DC, the New Mexico Museum of Art in Santa Fe, NM; and Craft Contemporary in Los Angeles, CA. Fellowships include MacDowell, Yaddo and the Tamarind Institute. She is represented by Gerald Peters in Santa Fe and Simon Breitbard in San Francisco.
Erin Mickelson’s work includes printmaking, bookbinding, new and mixed media, artist books, and micro-press publishing. Mickelson’s imprint is Broken Cloud Press. She earned her BFA with a concentration in book arts at Oregon College of Art & Craft, and holds a degree in graphic design as well. Erin includes both traditional techniques as well as digital and experimental processes in her work, which is held in various private and public collections including the libraries of Seattle Art Museum, Yale University, Reed College, Baylor University, and Minneapolis College of Art & Design. Mickelson’s premiere solo show at form & concept, titled PAST PERFECT FUTURE, opened in the fall of 2021.
Kate Ruck, born 1982 in Detroit, draws from mass culture and collective object memory to render virtual avatars and their tools with materials from the natural world. She has exhibited works at The Bruce High Quality Foundation and Amy Li Projects, and is a former artist-in-residence at Rule Gallery. Ruck received her BFA in Video Game Design from The Illinois Institute of Art, and has since managed the studios of Charles Ross and Camille Henrot. Ruck currently lives and works between New York, NY and Las Vegas, NM.
