SAINTS AND SINNERS
Chase Gallery
January 26, 2024 to March 23, 2024
What makes a saint today? Whether we possess a soul or are just an unruly bundle of synapses, how do we measure virtue and corruption? In a pluralistic society, clear-cut moral and spiritual signposts can get lost in the thickets. Do we look for guidance in age-old traditions? In contemporary culture? In our own imaginations?
In Saints & Sinners, the artists of Project Onward, a Chicago studio for artists with disabilities and mental illnesses, offer their own thoughts. Many of the works pull deep from the well of Christian iconography, though the interpretations are highly personal. Catherine Butterfly (b. 1952) makes rough, strikingly visionary marker drawings; serpents, crucifixes, and disembodied organs flow together in a phantasmagoric haze. For Butterfly, the biblical currents of a 1950s southern childhood meld with people she knows, images remembered from TV, and her own dreams. The drawings of Tony Davis (b. 1960) are practically encyclopedias of sin: brawls, orgies, and shady transactions galore. The scenes hearken back to an intense phase of the artist’s life as a pimp and hustler, though the source material is bent into extravagant comic-book dramas. Look closely and you’ll find touches of Renaissance altarpieces in dense tableaus. Painter Luke Shemroske (b. 1991) makes frequent use of charged religious symbols. Angels, demons, and sacred hearts appear, but they’re flooded in a torrent of automatic text and an internal monologue that is at once passionate, pained, and self-contradictory.
For these artists, and other spiritual explorers from the Project Onward studio, the visions are often more slippery than a clear dichotomy of good and evil might allow. Zen philosopher Alan Watts said “saints need sinners,” suggesting that the monstrous and the angelic are inextricably bound together, both in the world and within ourselves.
Photo Credit: Project Onward; artwork by Charles Buchanan
Participating Artists: John Behnke, Matthew Bianchi, Cherylle Booker, Ruby Bradford, Sammi Bregman, Charles Buchanan, Catherine Butterfly, Jacqueline Cousins, Tony Davis, William Douglas, David Holt, Blake Lenoir, Coral Kappel, Shandrewick Key, Paul Kowalewski, Molly McGrath, Allen McNair, Jack Moore, Fernando Ramirez, Luke Shemroske, Alita Van Hee, Sereno Wilson, George Zuniga
Click HERE for more information on gallery hours and private appointments.
SAINTS AND SINNERS
Chase Gallery
January 26, 2024 to March 23, 2024
What makes a saint today? Whether we possess a soul or are just an unruly bundle of synapses, how do we measure virtue and corruption? In a pluralistic society, clear-cut moral and spiritual signposts can get lost in the thickets. Do we look for guidance in age-old traditions? In contemporary culture? In our own imaginations?
In Saints & Sinners, the artists of Project Onward, a Chicago studio for artists with disabilities and mental illnesses, offer their own thoughts. Many of the works pull deep from the well of Christian iconography, though the interpretations are highly personal. Catherine Butterfly (b. 1952) makes rough, strikingly visionary marker drawings; serpents, crucifixes, and disembodied organs flow together in a phantasmagoric haze. For Butterfly, the biblical currents of a 1950s southern childhood meld with people she knows, images remembered from TV, and her own dreams. The drawings of Tony Davis (b. 1960) are practically encyclopedias of sin: brawls, orgies, and shady transactions galore. The scenes hearken back to an intense phase of the artist’s life as a pimp and hustler, though the source material is bent into extravagant comic-book dramas. Look closely and you’ll find touches of Renaissance altarpieces in dense tableaus. Painter Luke Shemroske (b. 1991) makes frequent use of charged religious symbols. Angels, demons, and sacred hearts appear, but they’re flooded in a torrent of automatic text and an internal monologue that is at once passionate, pained, and self-contradictory.
For these artists, and other spiritual explorers from the Project Onward studio, the visions are often more slippery than a clear dichotomy of good and evil might allow. Zen philosopher Alan Watts said “saints need sinners,” suggesting that the monstrous and the angelic are inextricably bound together, both in the world and within ourselves.
Photo Credit: Project Onward; artwork by Charles Buchanan
Participating Artists: John Behnke, Matthew Bianchi, Cherylle Booker, Ruby Bradford, Sammi Bregman, Charles Buchanan, Catherine Butterfly, Jacqueline Cousins, Tony Davis, William Douglas, David Holt, Blake Lenoir, Coral Kappel, Shandrewick Key, Paul Kowalewski, Molly McGrath, Allen McNair, Jack Moore, Fernando Ramirez, Luke Shemroske, Alita Van Hee, Sereno Wilson, George Zuniga
Click HERE for more information on gallery hours and private appointments.
Project Onward is a non-profit progressive visual arts studio located on the south side of Chicago at the Bridgeport Art Center. The mission of Project Onward is to support the creative growth of visual artists with mental illnesses and developmental disabilities. Project Onward provides more than 60 artists the opportunity to create their work in a safe, supportive studio environment with access to workspace, materials, and professional guidance without being encumbered by cost. Project Onward connects neurodiverse artists with the arts community and the general public by holding professional exhibitions and selling their work across the city of Chicago, the country, and worldwide. Fifty percent of each sale of work goes directly back to the artist, while the remaining fifty percent goes back to the program. Project Onward hopes to inspire change by using art to promote empathy and reduce the stigma of mental illness and developmental disabilities. We believe that artists who are neurodiverse deserve a voice in the world of art and ideas, and that their extraordinary work has a universal audience.
Project Onward is a non-profit progressive visual arts studio located on the south side of Chicago at the Bridgeport Art Center. The mission of Project Onward is to support the creative growth of visual artists with mental illnesses and developmental disabilities. Project Onward provides more than 60 artists the opportunity to create their work in a safe, supportive studio environment with access to workspace, materials, and professional guidance without being encumbered by cost. Project Onward connects neurodiverse artists with the arts community and the general public by holding professional exhibitions and selling their work across the city of Chicago, the country, and worldwide. Fifty percent of each sale of work goes directly back to the artist, while the remaining fifty percent goes back to the program. Project Onward hopes to inspire change by using art to promote empathy and reduce the stigma of mental illness and developmental disabilities. We believe that artists who are neurodiverse deserve a voice in the world of art and ideas, and that their extraordinary work has a universal audience.
