Artist Deb Sokolow’s exhibition, Schematics, Surveillance, Murder, is on display at the University Galleries, located in Uptown Normal. Sokolow will deliver a talk about her work and its reference to the art world cast in a strange or outright criminal context at noon on Thursday, March 2, in the University Galleries.
Sokolow’s text-based drawings and collages are based on purposeful research and humorous conjecture about cultural icons and everyday people, mysterious moments and alternate histories, distant places, and nearby spaces. Her drawings typically consist of multiple sheets of paper filled with blocky graphite lettering, Xeroxed photographic images, sketchy architectural renderings, and painted geometric shapes reminiscent of Minimalism.
Rather than supplying linear narratives, Sokolow writes inventive storylines that incorporate the voice of a suspicious narrator who interjects with questions, suggestions, and opinions. The four multipanel drawings included in this exhibition, ranging from 6- to 27-feet wide, were made between 2012 and 2016.
Sokolow’s work has been included in the 4th Athens Biennial, as well as exhibitions at the Drawing Center, New York; Van Abbemuseum, Netherlands; Institute of Contemporary Art, Philadelphia; Museum of Contemporary Art, Chicago; and the Kemper Museum of Art, Kansas City. Her work is in the collections of Los Angeles County Museum of Art; Wadsworth Atheneum Museum of Art, Hartford, Connecticut; Museum of Contemporary Art, Chicago; Kinsey Institute for Research in Sex, Gender, and Reproduction, Bloomington, Indiana; and the Joan Flasch Artists’ Book Collection at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago.
This exhibition is organized by Senior Curator Kendra Paitz. Programs at University Galleries are funded in part by a grant from the Illinois Arts Council Agency. For more information, contact University Galleries at (309) 438-5487 or gallery@ilstu.edu.
