For the second edition of Frieze Los Angeles, 303 Gallery is thrilled to exhibit a focused group presentation of works in painting and sculpture by five of the gallery’s female artists: Mary Heilmann, Alicja Kwade, Tala Madani, Kim Gordon, and Sue Williams. Spanning three generations, these artists employ a broad spectrum of approaches to examine inner narratives, suggesting new possibilities for understanding the world around us.
ABOUT THE ARTISTS
Mary Heilmann’s paintings act as icons, teeming with references to personal memories, invented stories, and a wide range of cultural and aesthetic influences. Her works convey a keen sense of color, and an expert treatment of paint- alternately diaphanous and dense. She has had major exhibitions at Dan Flavin Art Institute, Bridgehampton, NY (2017); Whitney Museum of American Art, New York, NY (2015); Kunst Museum Bonn, Bonn, Germany (2013); New Museum of Contemporary Art, New York (2008) and Orange County Museum of Art, Newport Beach, California (2007), among others. Her work has appeared in three Whitney Biennial exhibitions (1972, 1989, 2008) and is in many collections, including the Museum of Modern Art, New York; Whitney Museum of American Art, New York; and Orange County Museum of Art.
Throughout her oeuvre, Alicja Kwade investigates and questions the structures of our collective human reality, reflecting on the perception of time and other systems within our everyday lives. Her sculptures and installations are based around concepts of mathematics, science and philosophy. Her work will be included in the inaugural Helsinki Biennial, opening in June 2020. Kwade presented “ParaPivot” for the 2019 Cantor Roof Garden Commission for the Metropolitan Museum of Art. Recent solo exhibitions include “In Between Glances,” MIT List Visual Arts Center, Cambridge, MA and “Moving in Glances,” Dallas Contemporary, Dallas, TX (both 2019). In 2017, she participated in the 57th Venice Biennale “Viva Arte Viva” curated by Christine Macel.
Tala Madani's paintings, deadpan and brushy scenes of fictitious rituals, typically center on groups of men or curious infants. Figures simultaneously innocent and nefarious, furtive and self-aware, or comical and violent float through a hazy pastel palette that seems to shine light through the vulgar comforts of bonding. Madani’s work is currently on view in a solo exhibition at the Mori Art Museum, Tokyo, through March 29th, 2020; and in the group exhibition “Radical Figures,” at Whitechapel Gallery, London, from February 6th through May 10th, 2020. Recent solo exhibitions include “Shit Moms,” Secession, Vienna and “Oven Light,” Portikus, Frankfurt (both 2019).
For the past thirty years, Kim Gordon has worked consistently across disciplines, and the distinct cultural fields of art, design, writing, fashion, music, and film/video. Her solo exhibition, “The Bonfire,” is currently on view through February 22nd at 303 Gallery, New York. Several works from her “Noise Name Paintings’ series will be on view at Kunsthal Rotterdam in the upcoming group exhibition, “Black Album White Cube: A Journey into Art and Music,” opening April 2020. Recent solo exhibitions include "She Bites Her Tender Mind," Irish Museum of Modern Art Dublin; and "Lo-Fi Glamour," The Andy Warhol Museum, Pittsburgh (both 2019). Her first solo album "No Home Record" was released in November 2019, on Matador Records.
Coming to prominence in the early 1980s, Sue Williams has become one of the most influential painters of her generation. In her most recent canvases, she synthesizes modes of painting from her past into gushing explosions of color, line, bits of text and cartoon flourishes. Solo shows in public museums include Secession, Vienna; IVAM Valencia, Spain; Geneva Center for Contemporary Art, and Staatliche Kunsthalle Baden-Baden, Germany. She has participated in three consecutive Whitney Biennials, and her work has been included in the museum exhibitions Everything Is Connected, The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York (2018); Painting 2.0, Museum Brandhorst, Munich (2015-16); America is Hard to See, Whitney Museum of American Art New York (2015); Take it or leave it, Hammer Museum, Los Angeles (2014); Figuring Color, The Institute of Contemporary Art, Boston (2012); Keeping it Real, Whitechapel Gallery, London (2010); and Comic Abstraction, Museum of Modern Art New York (2007).