Attractive and Popular: Christopher Michael Hefner; Rebekka Federle

ATTRACTIVE & POPULAR uses the practice of collage as a jumping-off point to address the ways in which we, both as cultural participants and as social animals, make use of the things we find around us to build our images of ourselves, our voices and our manner of interfacing with the world.  Federle and Hefner show us a world of beings, spaces and moments that weave threads from an inaccessible past into new arrangements for navigation of a fraught and uncertain present. 

FEDERLE: Using antique print material she's collected over 10 years, Federle coaxes taut narratives from the works of now-anonymous draftspeople, addressing the quiet act of being alone and the frustrations––and triumphs––of connection. By removing illustrations from their intended plots and contexts, she diverts and manipulates any original intent. Significance is thrust on the minor through extraction when a single background figure becomes the lead of a scene they weren't created to represent. Quiet and disquiet, have we arrived here by choice or force?

HEFNER: Through charcoal drawings and photo booth photos, Hefner addresses the construct of identity, the vocabulary of desire and the mystery of human limitations.  His work investigates the manner in which we concoct and inhabit complex and often contradictory systems of signifiers in the hopes of finding or creating meaning and interpersonal connection.  His drawings and photos, built upon found images he distorts by various means, draw focus toward the ways in which we interface with that which is unknowable and out of reach, even within the familiar.

Closing Reception: Friday, August 17, 7-10pm

Gallery hours hosted by one or more of the artists on Sundays from 1-4PM (additional times TBA via artists’ Instagram)

REBEKKAFEDERLE.COM
@rebekkafederle

CMHEFNER.COM
@christophermichaelhefner

Beverages at the opening are provided by Temperance Beer Co. and Red and White Wines, Chicago.  

Exhibition is open during regular gallery hours, M-Sat 10-4.