EXPO CHICAGO ONLINE
8 - 12 April 2021
Anthony Meier Fine Arts is pleased to present a selection of Protest Posters by New York-based artist, Kate Shepherd.
Kate Shepherd explores formal relationships in her paintings, prints, and screenprints, combining a pared-down minimalist style with humanism, via the artist’s hand. Her imagery derives from computer-manipulated patterns and architectural prototypes, however, she renders the lines by hand, bringing a human element to otherwise pristine forms and colors.
Shepherd’s Protest Poster series began in 2007. Seeking a way to work as efficiently as possible while on press, the artist only shot one screen. To create myriad permutations of shape and color, Shepherd flipped the page and shifted the paper up and down between runs.
"I wanted to make light. With a stark value shift, a final color makes a "window" to all the under misregistered layers."
- Kate Shepherd
“I often picked from a wall of inks left at the print shop from other artists and re-tinted them to my needs. Colors were extended with base medium to add transparency so that secondary and tertiary hues could emerge. The self-imposed rules of the project changed with each 'edition' of the print; however, the one constant was that no two prints would ever be the same,” Shepherd states.
The artist titled the works Protest Posters for their vertical proportions but also with the idea that these color studies carry an emotional impact. Shepherd's recent series, Nina Simone Sings Pirate Jenny, is made to illustrate stark shifts—both with the strong contrasts of layers and the title that harkens to a powerful song performed from two points of view.
"The Bolivian architect Freddy Mamani lifts monochromatic geometry from his country's culture. But his buildings explode with greens and pinks -the prints remind me of him, a high frequency of clashing energy."
- Kate Shepherd
ABOUT THE ARTIST
Kate Shepherd (b. 1961) lives and works in New York City. Shepherd received her B.A. from Oberlin College, and her M.F.A. from the School of Visual Arts and attended Skowhegan School of Painting and Sculpture.
Her work has been the subject of solo presentations both stateside and abroad, including exhibitions at Anthony Meier Fine Arts, San Francisco; Galerie Lelong, New York and Paris; The Phillips Collection, Washington, D.C.; Chinati Foundation, Marfa; Lannan Foundation, Santa Fe; Hanes Art Gallery, Wake Forest University, Winston-Salem; Otis College of Art & Design, Los Angeles; PACE Prints, New York; Hiram Butler Gallery, Houston; and Krakow Witkin Gallery, Boston. Her work frequently features in prominent group exhibitions, including presentations at The Phillips Collection, Washington, D.C.; de Young Museum, San Francisco; Lannan Foundation Gallery, New York; Tang Teaching Museum and Gallery, Skidmore College, Saratoga Springs; and Milwaukee Art Museum, Milwaukee.
Kate Shepherd’s work is held in the permanent collection of numerous public institutions, including the Albright-Knox Gallery, Buffalo; Allen Memorial Art Museum, Oberlin College, Oberlin; the Baltimore Museum of Art, Baltimore; the Bibliothèque National de France, Paris; Des Moines Art Center, Des Moines; Detroit Institute of the Arts, Detroit; the List Visual Arts Center, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Cambridge; the Los Angeles County Museum of Arts, Boston; the Menil Collection, Houston; the Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York; Museum of Fine Arts, Boston; Norton Museum of Art, West Palm Beach; the Phillips Collection, Washington, D.C.; and the Seattle Art Museum, Seattle. Shepherd is the recipient of residences at the MacDowell Colony, Peterborough; the Chinati Foundation, Marfa; the Lannan Foundation, Santa Fe; and Dieu Donné Paper Mill, New York.
