Level Up: A Juried Exhibition for Graduate Artists In the Main Gallery at Brentwood Arts Exchange
On view May 8 - June 17, 2023
Opening Reception Saturday, May 13 from 5 - 8 pm
Artist & Curator Talk Saturday, June 3, 2023 from 2 - 4 pm

Marie Gauthiez
Every Today at Sundown
Oil on unstretched canvas
72 x 56 inches
2022

Brentwood Arts Exchange is proud to announce Level- Up: A Juried Exhibition for Graduate Artists, curated by Mary Early and featuring the visually captivating work of eleven artists: Kelsey Bogdan, Claudia Cappelle, Marie Gauthiez, Boram Kim, Lindsay Mueller, Sookkyung Park, Elaine Qiu, Jill McCarthy Stauffer, Amelie Wang, Jiazi Yin, Tara Youngborg.

Level Up spotlights the work of early-career visual artists from across the Mid-Atlantic region by presenting the work of current and recent students. Eleven artists were selected through a competitive jurying process from four area institutions: American University (Marie Gauthiez, Lindsay Mueller, Jiazi Yin), Maryland Institute College of Art (Amelie Wang), Towson University (Claudia Cappelle, Sookkyoung Park, Tara Youngborg), and the University of Maryland, College Park (Jill McCarthy Stauffer, Elaine Qiu), along with the School of the Art Institute of Chicago (Bo Kim) and Columbia College Chicago (Kelsey Bogdan).

When viewing a collection of work, we search for common threads among the artists as part of the human instinct for categorization. The artists represented here are learning and creating in a specific time and place, which can incubate certain styles or ideas. Still, they come from different backgrounds and generations, and that common thread can prove elusive. At a glance, the quality overwhelmingly present among the painters in the exhibition is a sense of abstract architectural space, as exemplified by Every Today at Sundown, 2022, by Marie Gauthiez. Amelie Wang’s interior scenes suggest a conflict between external and internal stimuli. In Untitled, 2022, a pair of figures sit together while the room around them simultaneously overlaps and evaporates.

Some artists are responding to the unique societal crises of this era. Boram Kim’s drawings of ornithological specimens in ink on paper reflect the discipline of a scientist and observer, a reminder of the artist’s role in society as a skilled visual observer ready to review visual evidence and present a case for social change or environmental concern. Kelsey Bogdan, Jill McCarthy Stauffer, and Tara Youngborg have been invited to create site-specific installations in the gallery space based on and in response to their previous works. Kelsey Bogdan’s multimedia work is informed by her background in neuroscience and gender studies and explores the role of radical joy in healing from trauma.

The path to a fine arts education at the college level or graduate level is not static. Many of the artists in the exhibition began their education in fields of study beyond the visual arts, with influences from other disciplines such as cognitive neuroscience, art history, fashion, gender studies, and psychology. When looking at these assembled works as a whole, I observe a cohort of artists who have come to this moment through one of the most challenging events of recent history and are processing it through many lenses. The true common thread is the compassion and empathy shown in these works and the invitation to the audience to navigate developing history using their many tools.

- Mary Early, April 2023

Level Up: A Juried Exhibition for Graduate Artists runs from May 8, 2023 through June 17, 2023 with an Opening Reception on Saturday, May 13, from 5 - 8 pm and an Artist and Curator Talk on Saturday, June 3, 2023 from 2-4 pm.

About Mary Early
Mary Early is an artist based in Washington D.C. and the Director of Hemphill Artworks. She has a particular interest in public art and community engagement, as well as the materials and processes of contemporary sculpture.

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Additional images available upon request.