Western Exhibitions Drawing Biennial

Western Exhibitions is thrilled to present the second Western Exhibitions Drawing Biennial, a celebration of the medium of drawing in many expanded mutations. Contributions by gallery and affiliated artists confirm the gallery’s commitment to drawing and works on paper and the varied approaches on view — from schematic to free-form, in-your-face to speculative, abstract to figurative — will capture the current state of contemporary drawing practices while placing a focus on gallery artists’ core concerns of personal narratives and cosmologies, identity and gender, sexuality, pattern and exuberance, all with a keen attention to materiality.

The inaugural WXDB, in 2021, presented multiple works from each artist. This iteration is different: participating artists will present just one or two pieces – some created specifically for this show, others pulled deep from within the artist’s archive – to concentrate the viewer’s focus and reward careful looking. By continuing the idea of a Drawing Biennial, Western Exhibitions stakes a claim that drawings are to be lauded as much as painting, sculpture, and any other medium, as the gallery reveres the handmade, the tactility, the immediacy of drawing. From the essay by Shannon R. Stratton, commissioned by the gallery for the 2021 show: “Drawing is space to make visible the contents that make us, to make material, and then examine, those qualities that are much more complex than the linguistic code applied to them.”

Critic Erin Toale reviewed the inaugural Western Exhibitions Drawing Biennial in New City, expertly capturing the gallery’s devotion to the practice of drawing:

Drawing. A medium that is foundational, yet often relegated to the planning stages: just a sketch, rarely the main event or finished product, something unearthed after the death of an artist or architect to demonstrate their rendering accuracy. This biennial, however, is not drawing as a first draft, a prompt, or the beginning of something. This is the gallery declaring its commitment to drawing in a public ceremony. This is the evolving mission and history of the space as told through multiple panoramic storyboards, each artist with a vignette contributing to the overall narrative.

The 2023 Western Exhibitions Drawing Biennial will open the 2023 art season with a reception, free and open to the public, at our Chicago location on Friday, January 6, from 5 to 8 pm and will run through February 25. Gallery hours are Tuesday to Saturday, 11am-6pm and by appointment.

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For more images and information please visit the exhibition page on our website here.

Also stay tuned for a new In Depth with... page for this show, featuring insight and background information from participating artists about their work in the show.

Participating artists:

Bios and more information here

Dan Attoe

Marshall Brown

Elijah Burgher

Jessica Campbell

Lilli Carré

Ryan Travis Christian

Journie Cirdain

Courttney Cooper

Jenny Crowe

Edie Fake

Julia Schmitt Healy

Andrew Hostick

Richard Hull

Dutes Miller

Aya Nakamura

Rachel Niffenegger

Robyn O’Neil

Michael Pellew

Stan Shellabarger

Geoffrey Todd Smith

Deb Sokolow

Ruby T

Frances Waite

Erin Washington

Cathrine Whited

Lauren Wy