Details:
① Artwork:
Adam’s Rib House
Described by the artist as "bare bones" in how it came together, this painting is full of visual puns. The artist identifies this as one of her more humorous paintings, thanks to its subject's messy eating and lack of pants. Yet, the sauce that doubles as blood also gives this painting a sinister feel as well as a Biblical one (Eve came from a rib, after all.)
Sarah Bastress makes compositions populated by queer people and creatures from rural America found in various states of both aggressive and tender play. Her bodies are full of possibilities, as they intentionally portray explicit imagery and signifiers that either add up to joy or menace, although without any firm conclusions.
Specs:
Thick impasto paint is built up at bottom edge of the painting and extended beyond the boundaries of the rectangular canvas approx. 1 inch. This gives physically to one of the “ribs” beyond just the idea of an “image.” A faux telegraphed “frame” is painted along the edge of the composition, referencing the oft-visible telegraphing of stretcher bars behind canvas when paintings are made too aggressively.
③ Artist:
Sarah Bastress makes compositions populated by queer people and creatures from rural America found in various states of both aggressive and tender play. Most of her paintings are self-contained narratives ruminating on her own body and how it relates to other bodies. Full of queer excitement, visual puns, and a healthy dose of self-deprecation, the scenes in her paintings are born out of the confusion and longing of the pandemic era, having become even more preposterous, surreal, and ambiguous since. Bastress’s bodies are full of possibilities, as they intentionally portray explicit imagery and signifiers that either add up to joy or menace, although without drawing any firm conclusions.
Sarah Bastress was born in 1989 in Kingwood, WV, and lives in Chicago, IL. She received her BA in Government from Smith College in Northampton, MA (2012) and her MFA in Painting and Drawing from The School of the Art Institute of Chicago in Chicago, IL (2016).
She has mounted solo exhibitions at RUSCHMAN, Chicago, IL (2022), and Boundary, Chicago, IL (2019).
Bastress has also been featured in group exhibitions, including The Long Dream at The Museum of Contemporary Art, Chicago, IL (2020); Sticky Thoughts at Julius Caesar, Chicago, IL (2018); and Animal Farm at Dalton Warehouse in Los Angeles, CA (2017).
Described by the artist as "bare bones" in how it came together, this painting is full of visual puns. The artist identifies this as one of her more humorous paintings, thanks to its subject's messy eating and lack of pants. Yet, the sauce that doubles as blood also gives this painting a sinister feel as well as a Biblical one (Eve came from a rib, after all.)More
- Unframed
- Signed
