This exhibition will feature new unique works on paper that the artist has created at the Pace Paper Workshop. Most known for his kinetic sculptures, this is Kessler’s third exhibition of works on paper.
In his new body of work, Jon Kessler continues to investigate the materiality of papermaking in innovative ways. Thinking of the process of papermaking as a performative act, Kessler sets up situations where the ingredients for picture making are placed into a “primordial soup” of raw material (water, paper pulp and images). When the plastic liner is pulled from the deckle box and the levees are broken, so to speak, the water drains through the papermaking mould, leaving behind pulp, images, pigment and tubes of paint, feathers, and string. Kessler has only a short time to interact with the materials as they drain and the dried, finished works retain the memory and trauma of their creation. The Predator series uses images of eagles, owls and falcons as patriotic symbols and characters in a narrative, creating protected spaces in which they reside. Referencing wombs, nests and vessels, the more sculptural works from this series become reliquaries, invoking longing and loss.
Jon Kessler was born in Yonkers, NY in 1957. He received a BFA from SUNY Purchase and attended the Whitney Independent Study Program. Since 1983, Kessler’s work has been widely exhibited throughout the United States, Europe and Japan. His recent solo exhibitions include Deitch Projects, Dieu Donné, P.S. 1 and The Drawing Center in New York; The Louisiana Museum, Copenhagen; and Arndt & Partner, Berlin.
Kessler’s work is in the collections of The Museum of Modern Art, New York; The Whitney Museum of American Art, New York; The Brooklyn Museum, New York; The Walker Art Center, Minneapolis; The Israel Museum, Jerusalem; The Saatchi Collection, London; The Museum of Contemporary Art, Chicago; The Museum of Contemporary Art, Los Angeles; The Neuberger Museum of Art, New York; and The Aldrich Museum, Connecticut, among others.