SISSI
CURATED BY JARED PACKARD
MARCH 13TH - APRIL 17TH, 2020
SISSI reclaims an insult hurled across schoolyards and streets to shame and dehumanize by redefining the term as an epithet of pride and empowerment. Curated by Jared Packard, this exhibition features six artists--Jared Brown, Jared Buckheister, J. Michael Ford, Walker Green, Dawuane Lamont Hayes, Matt Morris--hailing from Omaha, New York City, and Chicago. SISSI celebrates the feminine, while pointing to the social and cultural forces that regulate and oppress gender expression.
A guiding objective of this exhibition is to memorialize the ongoing and historic erasure of gender non conforming individuals through artistic gestures that privilege quietness, risk being overlooked, and sometimes eliminate objecthood all together. The rigid enforcement of gender expression requires that those operating outside its framework use subversive strategies and coded content to infect and infiltrate--stealthily opening discourse that challenges the status quo. Although voices from the margins may be dismissed by those in power, they hold culture-shifting potential.
This exhibition was presented with the support of the Nebraska Arts Council and the Nebraska Cultural Endowment.
Installation Images
SISSI Exhibition Poster
Artwork by Walker Greene and interview by Jared Ledesma with Matt Morris. Designed by Dawaune Lamont Hayes. Click to download.
SISSI Virtual Exhibition Walkthrough
About the Artists
Jared Packard is an artist and curator based in Omaha, NE where he is the Exhibitions Manager at The Bemis Center for Contemporary Art. Packard completed his BA at Clark University and his MFA at School of the Art Institute of Chicago. He has curated the NEA-funded unLOCK: Merging Art and Industry, Lockport, IL; an urban curatorial experiment, Stumble Chicago; the nationally traveling exhibition, ReTooled: Highlights from the Hechinger Collection; and (Re)Flex Space, Sullivan Galleries, Chicago, IL. He has shown his work at ADDS DONNA, Chicago, IL; Baltimore Gallery, Detroit, MI; Sullivan Galleries, Chicago, IL; Centre International d’Art Contemporain, Pont-Aven, France; Hillyer Art Space, Washington, D.C.; Shiltkamp Gallery, Worcester, MA.
Jared Brown is an interdisciplinary artist born in Chicago. In recent work, Jared has been broadcasting audio and text based work through the radio (CENTRAL AIR RADIO, 88.5 FM), in live DJ sets, and on social media. They consider themselves a data thief, understanding this role from John Akomfrah’s description of the data thief as a figure that does not belong to the past or present. As a data thief, Jared Brown makes archeological digs for fragments of black American subculture, history and technology. Jared repurposes these fragments in audio, text, and video to investigate the relationship between history and digital, immaterial space. Jared Brown holds a BFA in video from the Maryland Institute College of Art and moved back to Chicago in 2016 in order to make and share work that directly relates to their personal history.
Jared Buckhiester is an artist living and working in New York City. He has a BFA in photo from Pratt and an MFA in Sculpture from Bard College. His work combines autobiographical material with larger social and political narratives that often point toward a culminating violence. His work highlights Americana in the symbolism and archetypal tropes it employs. Buckhiester has had exhibitions at Envoy Enterprises; Feature Inc.; Gallerie Du Jour, Paris; Thomas Rehbein, Cologne; and at the Metropolitan Museum of Modern Art in Lille France. Buckhiester has been the recipient of awards from the Louis Comfort Tiffany Foundation, the Albert K Murray Foundation, and the Dedalus Foundation for the Arts. http://www.jaredbuckhiester.com/
J. Michael Ford directs psychological space through bodily engagement; creating expressive linear forms that mobilize concepts of seduction and desire as a means of examining the self. He received an MFA from the School of the Art Institute of Chicago and a BFA from Pratt Institute. Recent solo exhibitions include “Light Hand, Running” at Andrew Rafacz, as well as two-person exhibitions at Adler & Floyd (Chicago, IL) and Camayuhs (Atlanta, GA). His work has been included in group exhibitions at Carrie Secrist Gallery, the Terrain Biannual and Hume (Chicago, IL) among others.
Walker Greene is a non-binary artist from Omaha, Nebraska. They graduated with a BFA in Fine Arts from Paris College of Art, including a year of studying Printmaking at the Royal Melbourne Institute of Technology. Their work revolves around their own identity and experiences, focusing on gender and sexuality. They have co-curated and exhibited in They/Them at Neo Gallery (Omaha, NE), as well as shown works in Sothebys Institute of Art (New York City, New York), Circle1 Gallery (Berlin, Germany), and Mi Gallerie (Paris, France).
Dawaune Lamont Hayes is a multidisciplinary artist working at the intersections of movement, mass media, and social justice. As a Black Queer artist from Omaha, Nebraska, Hayes recognizes their identities are inherently political and utilizes their artistic expression as a means of historical reconciliation and radical liberatory futurism. Society is most connected when we’re dancing, Democracy is most effective when we’re creating, and Ecology is most balanced when we are living truthfully.
Matt Morris is an artist, writer, educator, and curator based in Chicago. He analyzes forms of attachment and intimacy through painting, perfume, and textile based installations. He has presented artwork nationally and internationally including Tiger Strikes Asteroid, New York; RUSCHMAN, Berlin, Germany; Krabbesholm Højskole,Skive, Denmark; The Suburban, Milwaukee, WI; DePaul Art Museum, Shane Campbell Gallery, Queer Thoughts, and Gallery 400, Chicago, IL; The Mary + Leigh Block Museum of Art, Evanston, IL; The Elmhurst Art Museum, Elmhurst, IL; The Poor Farm, Manawa, WI; and The Contemporary Arts Center, Cincinnati, OH. He is a contributor to Artforum.com, Art Papers, ARTnews, Flash Art, Fragrantica, Newcity, Sculpture, The Seen and X-TRA Contemporary Art Quarterly; and his writing appears in numerous exhibition catalogues and artist monographs. He is a transplant from southern Louisiana who holds a BFA from the Art Academy of Cincinnati, and earned an MFA in Art Theory + Practice from Northwestern University, as well as a Certificate in Gender + Sexuality Studies. In 2017 he earned a Certification in Fairyology from Doreen Virtue, PhD. In 2019, he designed the perfume for FERULA, a scented candle released by Field & Florist, Chicago, IL. Morris is an Adjunct Assistant Professor at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago. More information at www.mattmorrisworks.com.