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Emerge Selections 2013

Images

Roe Ethridge, Beach Scene (Louis Fèraud), 2008. Chromogenic development print; 40 3/4 x 31 3/4 in. (103.5 x 80.7 cm)

Courtesy of the artist and Andrew Kreps Gallery, New York

Kon Trubkovich, Go back a million days, 2013. Oil on canvas; 72 x 60 in. (182.9 x 152.4 cm). Courtesy of Marianne Boesky Gallery, New York

Michael Wilkinson, Never Work 6 (triptych), 2012. Left: acrylic, cutting, cellophane, card, audio-tape, oil; center: blackboard paint, beeswax, string, verdigris; right: etched mirror, oak shelf, cuttings, card, cellophane, dowel, blackboard paint, chalk with verdigris, painted badge, oak shelf; three parts, each: 26 1/8 x 23 3/8 in. (66.5 x 59.5 cm). Courtesy of the artist and Blum & Poe, Los Angeles

About

This exhibition brings together work by three artists who are finalists in MCA Chicago’s annual Emerge Acquisition for 2013.

Emerge is an MCA donor group that supports the museum's education, exhibition, and acquisition programs. Comprising art enthusiasts, collectors, and art patrons, Emerge sponsors events with artists and curators that reflect the dynamic issues of contemporary art today. Every year, the group selects and collectively funds the purchase of a work by an artist not currently represented in the MCA Collection.

In collaboration with the MCA curatorial team, Emerge members have selected works by Roe Ethridge, Kon Trubkovich, and Michael Wilkinson for consideration. Although these works were chosen individually, when viewed together they suggest how today’s artists are responding to an ever-expanding ecosystem of visual imagery and to the history of photographic form.

Ethridge cannily blurs distinctions between different modes of photography, including art, advertising, and fashion. Trubkovich’s painting is based on a single frame from a 1980s videotape of his mother and muses on the distance between memory and recorded image. Wilkinson’s mostly abstract paintings incorporate image clippings that relate to punk rock and moments of political unrest.

On April 29, Emerge members cast their final vote to determine which of the artworks on view is the next addition to the MCA Collection.