press releases for
All of the press releases on this page were authored by Gray for CIRCA Gallery in Minneapolis, Minnesota. With the exception of the first, they were each released in conjunction with an art exhibition.
Press rlease
CIRCA Gallery’s Commitment to Inclusive and Equitable Practices
Our Commitment
We are living through a time when many creative energies are facing outwards: towards protest, towards offering solidarity to front line workers and organizers, towards public mourning of communal loss. This reality continues to be true even as a verdict has been reached in the trial of Derek Chauvin and COVID-19 vaccines become more widely accessible. There has been significant movement towards the pursuit of justice, and yet there is still significant change that needs to happen.
Amidst all of this, we will continue to evaluate our policies and replace them with sustainable, equitable, and anti-racist practices where there is discrepancy. We continue to prioritize the careers of BIPOC, LGBTQIA+, and other historically underrepresented artists. We stand in solidarity with those in our community who have invested significant time, resources, and energy into the movement for justice and abolition. We stand in protest of the ongoing, racist violence targeted at Black people and other POC in our not-so-nice state of Minnesota.
CIRCA Gallery will invest its time and energies into the following actions.
Expanding and diversifying our roster of artists. CIRCA Gallery commits
to representing more artists who are a part of historically marginalized and
underrepresented communities. We take responsibility for our lack of doing so thus far.
We commit to diversifying our roster of artists to include more Black, Indigenous, and
other artists of color, striving for equity of opportunity as our goal.
Broadening our understanding of contemporary imagery. The nature of contemporary
art is its constant state of flux, reflecting the nature of the contemporary itself. Each artist
shown at CIRCA is considered in light of how they will contribute to the expansion of the
range of work that we show. When our visual world is bigger, we are all better for it.
We believe that art can significantly impact a person’s or community’s wellbeing. CIRCA Gallery continues to connect our community and supporters with abstract contemporary artwork whilst actively striving towards equitable and anti-racist practices. These priorities will strengthen and expand the range of stories we tell, making our roster more reflective of the community in which we reside.
Thank you for joining us in this process.
- Gray Arel, director, they/them
CIRCA Gallery
Minneapolis, MN
Originally published on July 30, 2020 at www.circagallery.org/our-commitment
Press release
Kathleen Waterloo Road Games
CIRCA Gallery is excited to present Road Games, Kathleen Waterloo’s first solo show with the gallery. Road Games can be viewed on CIRCA’s website and Artsy.net/circa from January 14 - March 18, 2022. Select works are available for in-person viewing, by appointment only. Contact the gallery to set an appointment.
Kathleen Waterloo (Chicago, IL) offers a series of encaustic paintings composed of layered energetic line and vivid color. Her inspiration flows from elemental forms, hues, and irregular patterns in human-made structures. Combining bits and pieces of observations from her road trip along Route 66 from Seattle, WA to Chicago, IL, Waterloo’s shifting, loosely gridded paintings have wide-ranging appeal due to the artist’s expert use of color.
CIRCA Gallery celebrates 31 years of offering artwork from emerging and established contemporary artists to its collectors and community. CIRCA maintains an online-only presence, using digital exhibitions and online events to bring abstract artwork to an ever-expanding audience.
Press release
REAL GOOD ART a digital juried show
real good art showcases a wide variety of local, national, and international artwork. The exhibition can be viewed on the gallery’s website from November 2-December 27, 2021. Select works are for sale and available for in-person viewing, by appointment only. Contact the gallery to set an appointment.
The exhibition features selections in painting, photography, drawing, sculpture, and installations from 28 artists at various stages in their careers. Highlights include a series of four black and white multi-media sculptural prints from Jessica Henderson (St. Paul, MN), meditative collage compositions from Heather Polk (Chicago, IL), and vibrant geometric abstractions on unstretched linen from Ellen Weider (New York City, NY).
Local artists include Laurie Borggreve, Kendall Dickinson, Helen Dolan, Mad S. Golitz, Lindsy Halleckson, Cynthia Holien, constance klippen, Petra Lee, Joanna Manning, Ky McDonald, Lynda Mullan, Lalita Prachanty, Merick Reed, Andy Richter, Sarah Sampedro, and Brian Wagner. The exhibition also features work from Oryiman Agbaka (Nigeria), Emeli Höcks (Sweden), Farida Hughes (Owings Mills, MD), Izosceles (Dallas, TX), Marietta Leis (Albuquerque, NM), Qian Liu (Chicago, IL), Jessica Matier (Belford, NJ), Lilach Moreno (Israel), and Meredith Morrison (Hamtramck, MI).
Press release
Karian Amaya light under the stones
CIRCA Gallery is excited to present light under the stones, Karian Amaya’s first solo show with the gallery. View the online-exclusive exhibition August 26-November 1, 2021 on the gallery’s website and Artsy. Select works are available for in-person viewing, by appointment only. Contact the gallery to set an appointment.
Karian Amaya (Guadalajara, Mexico) explores the delicate condition of matter through an eco-sculptural lens. Using primarily copper and found marble fragments, Amaya reflects on the ecological changes that occur after minerals are extracted from their natural environment. Sculptural forms evoke the setting sun and rising moon; sparsely worded copper engravings emulate pastoral poetic structures.
For Amaya, the visual changes that result from copper’s natural aging process are essential to the experience of her work. Gradual oxidation offers “the opportunity to establish a sustained relationship between collector and artwork, as both grow and change during the aging process.”
CIRCA Gallery celebrates 31 years of offering artwork from emerging and established contemporary artists to its collectors and community. CIRCA maintains an online-only presence, using digital exhibitions and online events to bring abstract artwork to an ever-expanding audience.
Press release
Nina Ghanbarzadeh Drawing Words
Minneapolis, MN – CIRCA Gallery is excited to present Drawing Words, Nina Ghanbarzadeh’s first solo show with the gallery. Drawing Words can be viewed online May 13-July 7, 2021. In lieu of an artist talk, Drawing Words will be featured in CIRCA Gallery’s first Viewing Room in partnership with Artsy.net.
Nina Ghanbarzadeh (Milwaukee, WI) uses a range of media to deconstruct cultural and language-specific symbols and letterforms. Delicate line and dot drawings, sizeable sculpture, and acrylic paintings on frosted mylar are composed of forms derived from the Farsi language and Persian culture. A distinct and gentle sense of movement is palpable across mediums and pattern established through dense repetition.
“We might not be able to read a language different from our own, but we understand line, dots, shapes, and colors,” says Ghanbarzadeh. “I use [these basic forms] in repetition to create dual meaning: first, a literal translation of the text, and second, artistic and symbolic.”
For over 30 years, CIRCA has provided the Twin Cities community with art from local, national, and international contemporary artists, seeking to bring awareness, inspiration, and appreciation for contemporary art.
Press releasE
Evan Blackwell Cadence
Minneapolis, MN – CIRCA Gallery is excited to announce the addition of Evan Blackwell to its roster of artists. cadence, her debut solo exhibition, can be viewed online March 15-May 2, 2021. A virtual artist talk will be held on April 19, 2021 at 7pm on Instagram; further details can be found on CIRCA’s website.
Evan Blackwell (Atlanta, GA) creates bright mixed-media paintings on paper and canvas. Using acrylic, graphite, pastel, and pen, the artist layers semi-transparent forms and vibrant pigmentation to create a sense of rhythm with intuitive gestures. Embodied with contradictions, shapes range from diaphanous to formidable; line quality varies between smooth and erratic; colors hover side by side in contrast yet not discordance.
Abstraction is “as vast as culture itself and as intimate as an individual’s own memory,” in Blackwell’s words. Although akin to that of abstract expressionism in form and concept, her work strives for a connection with abstraction beyond a single movement.
Press release
Barbara Kreft Enfolded Space
Minneapolis, MN – Barbara Kreft debuts a series of paintings in her online solo exhibition Enfolded Space featured on CIRCA Gallery’s website January 25 - March 15, 2021. A virtual artist talk will be held on February 18th at 7pm, during which Barbara Kreft and CIRCA’s director Grace Arel will discuss her work. The talk will be hosted via Instagram Live; further details are on CIRCA’s website.
In Enfolded Space, Barbara Kreft (Minneapolis, MN) debuts a series of oil paintings that offer balance and order in a mimesis of the natural world. Kreft creates a unique visual language by observing and visually organizing forms and patterns in rocks, tree bark, light and shadows, swarms of tiny insects, and other organic materials. The artist elaborates: “In response to a world in distress, I am driven by an urgency to map, systemize, and ornament the shapes and patterns I encounter. I work with found forms in an attempt to leave my own gesture behind.” Through experimentation and repetition, Kreft’s work establishes relational opposition with itself: some works boldly claim space, suspended, quivering– while others delicately hover, quietly altering their environment.
Press release
AHAVANI MULLEN from sky to sky
Minneapolis, MN – Ahavani Mullen debuts a series of mixed-media painting and sculpture in her solo exhibition from sky to sky, featured on CIRCA’s website November 6-December 19, 2020. All are welcome to join a virtual artist talk on Instagram Live Tuesday, November 17th at 7pm CST/8pm EST; further details can be found on CIRCA’s website.
In from sky to sky, Mullen (Chicago, IL) reflects on the common breath present in the ether, understanding the vast sky as a universal home connecting individuals across time and place. Using lyrical lines that dance within a framework of refracted light and shadow, Mullen’s work echoes the multiplicity of the atmosphere.
Layered transparency, color gradation, and repeated forms create a sense of motion in the Root and Boughs of a Teeming Vast series, while other works seemingly alternate between weightlessness and impossible density. Silver leaf and acrylic on aluminum contrast with the grounding qualities of charcoal, talc, and limestone– muddling the viewer’s sense of material composition throughout the exhibition. Mullen’s work offers vast and boundless ether and connection, even in times of extended physical isolation.
Press release
JOSH MEILLIER indistinct relations
Minneapolis, MN – Josh Meillier debuts a series of multi-media painting and sculpture in his solo exhibition indistinct relations at CIRCA Gallery, featured on CIRCA Gallery’s website September 14-November 5, 2020. A publication by Joe Fyfe will be published in conjunction with the opening, excerpts of which are included below.
In indistinct relations, Meillier (New York City, NY) uses a wide range of materials to emulate the contemporary ephemera found in a painter’s studio and a construction site. Fyfe observes that, “Blue masking tape and duct tape are repeatedly juxtaposed to form x‘s and delineate interior boundaries; grainy, rough textures resembling that of wood and cinder blocks, delicate lines, and warped geometric forms are layered and stacked using transfer, collage, and paint in a mimesis of the process of fabrication. In Untitled (pictured below), Meillier creates a subdued color field demarcated by a fragmented yellow and blue oil-based ‘x’ and framed by his ubiquitous faux blue tape.”
Meillier attributes his experiences as a young person assisting his father with homebuilding in Northfield, Minnesota as foundational to his artistic practice. “Throughout my childhood, my family would build a house, living in it for a few years, sell it, then build another. This instilled a respect for processes and materials from a young age because I was expected to help with the construction.” Utilizing a compendium of materials as a structural model in these nuanced works, Meillier offers uniquely tactile painting and sculpture in the digital age we now occupy.