Closer Quarters at Marisa Newman Projects

Closer Quarters at Marisa Newman Projects

38 WEST 32ND STREET, SUITE 1602 NEW YORK, NY 10001

February 10 - March 23, 2022

Marisa Newman Projects is pleased to present “Close Quarters” an exhibition of woodblocks by New York based artist Kevin Frances. The opening reception will be held Thursday, February 10, 4-8. Masks are mandatory for all guests.

This ongoing series is set in a home of a fictional couple – the creation of Frances himself. The husband and wife are both artists – writer and sculptor respectively. The woodblocks are of different rooms in the house during different hours of the day. The human presence is evident by post-it notes on the wall, printer paper scattered upon the floor, a glow of the computer screen or the iconic George Nelson lamp still alit. Yet, people are absent from these tableaus, creating an eerie and mysterious feeling about each scene.

The title “Close Quarters” conjures up our recent reality of living and working in our homes/apartments with little opportunity for escape and thus, making these spaces into rooms that are small and cramp.

Frances creates his woodblock prints by first creating detailed miniature models of the couple’s one bedroom split level home. Many of the intricate elements “work” as the lights illuminate the heater goes on the iMac powers up. Then different moments are photographed and those images become the source material for final multi layered carved out woodblocks.

Kevin Frances is an artist who lives and works in New York City. He received his MFA from the Rhode Island School of Design in 2013, and his BA from the University of California, Davis in 2010. In 2012 he was a participant at the Skowhegan School of Painting and Sculpture. His work has been shown at the International Print Center New York, the Knockdown Center in New York, Vox Populi in Philadelphia, the Kala Gallery in Berkeley, How’s Howard in Boston, and Galleri CC in Malmö, Sweden. He received a Massachusetts Cultural Council grant in 2016, the St. Botolph Club Emerging Artist Award in 2017 and was a 2020 NYFA Fellow.

Exhibition Catalog

Interior Egos (catalog essay) by Jennie Hirsh (PDF)

NYFA Fellowship

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Dear friends,

I’m super proud to let you know that I’m a 2020 NYSCA/NYFA Fellow!

The NYSCA/NYFA Fellowship is a direct grant from the City and State. New York is basically full to capacity with amazingly talented artists, so I really am honored to be given this recognition. You can read more about it here.

Interview with George Adams Gallery

I recently did an interview with George Adams Gallery about my project Superposition. It was very helpful to me to clarify my thoughts, and hopefully it is interesting to other people. Enjoy!

https://www.georgeadamsgallery.com/news-and-press/kevin-frances-on-superpositions

Documents at George Adams Gallery

Documents at George Adams Gallery

Jack Beal, Manny Farber, Kevin Frances, Kija Lucas and Tony May

July 16 – September 26, 2020

I’m extremely pleased to be in this group show at George Adams Gallery in New York with some really amazing artists. Manny Farber in particular has been an inspiration for me, so I’m tickled to be included in a show with his work. The gallery is open by appointment, so here’s a few pictures. I’ll be posting more on my instagram.

Included in the show is a new woodcut I’ve been working on during quarantine. It’s a continuation of my project Superposition, about two creative people who work from home, and the push and pull of negotiating egos in a relationship and in physical space. In this piece a disruptive outside force has entered the picture and interrupted the status quo. Ha.

You can read more about the show here: https://www.georgeadamsgallery.com/exhibitions/documents

Man in the Moon at Leon

Back in March I had an exhibition at Leon in Denver called Man in the Moon. Unfortunately it was cut short by Covid-19, but some people got to see it and it got some nice write ups, and I was very happy with how it looked. Here are some pictures, and links to some of the articles about it.


Symbiogenesis at Flyweight Projects

Back in October I collaborated with Clare Torina and Jesse Cesario of Flyweight Projects on an exhibition in their miniature gallery. Here’s some writing and pictures:

Symbiogenesis is an offshoot of a larger body of work in which I created the living and working spaces of a husband and wife. The wife is a sculptor, a ceramicist. She works in a basement studio in a small, one bedroom duplex. Directly above the studio, in a living room turned home office, the husband works. He is a writer. Their work spaces are distinct, but there is a push pull, a bleed over. This is a story about collaboration, living with art, living with an artist, craft, and egos.

In Symbiogenesis, the objects in the gallery represent in a sense an exhibition of the wife’s work, but time and space are collapsed; the home has invaded the white cube. Piles of clothes wait to be folded, recycling asks to be taken out, a window appears in a smooth white wall opening onto a balcony garden. Saturating the gallery in blue light is a projection of an ethereal seascape, upon which float banal folder icons: “taxes” and “to do.” It is the husband’s computer desktop, swallowing the world.

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Who swallows who?

In evolutionary theory, symbiogenesis is the theory that complex single cell organisms evolved, in part, by absorbing other single cell organisms and continued to live in a symbiotic relationship. The classic example is that the mitochondria in all of our cells, which play such an essential role in cells’ functioning, used to be distinct, independent entities. All of what we are is built upon this initial partnership.

An Unexpected Houseguest at Cheymore Gallery

My exhibition at Cheymore Gallery, An Unexpected Houseguest, recently closed, but here’s some pictures of the installation. Shore publishing will be showing a print of mine this weekend (October 24-27) at the Editions/Artists’ Book Fair, so check that out!

Superposition at Wellesley College

My show Superposition is now open at the Jewett Art Gallery at Wellesley College. It’s a bit of an open studio, throughout the run of the show I’ll be photographing the sculptures in the gallery and hanging the prints, culminating with the closing reception on Friday, March 1, 4 - 7pm.

Here’s the exhibition as it stands now, and I hope you’ll join me at the reception to see how the project evolves!

And here’s some thoughts:

Superposition is a first and foremost about a relationship. The wife is a sculptor, a ceramicist. She works in a basement studio in a small, one bedroom duplex. Directly above the studio, in a living room turned home office, the husband works, he is a writer. Their work spaces are distinct, but there is a push pull, a bleed over. This is a story about collaboration, living with art, living with an artist, craft, and egos.

In quantum physics, a particle in superposition occupies multiple states simultaneously. The act of observation snaps it into one state, one possibility within many, ending the superposition. Observation is inherently reductive, you can never know someone else’s marriage, but it’s all we’ve got.



Magpie opens at Galleri CC

I've recently spent some time in Malmö, Sweden installing my show Magpie at Galleri CC. The show is the cumulation of two years of work, and includes new woodblock prints, photos, and stereoscopic photographs in the black box gallery.

The show is open through April 22, but if you can't make the trip, here's some pictures.

The magpie has a reputation as the smartest of the birds, but with a bad habit. They steal especially shiny things, with which to build their nests. Jewellery, bits of string and aluminium foil, whatever catches their eye. I find myself following a similar tact; the work evolving through a process of following my impulses, letting that lead me to something unexpected. Hopefully walking backwards into something meaningful. I’m building these nests out of bits of my past, a corner that I ate breakfast in every day, shadows cast by blinds that glided around the room, combined haphazardly with detritus, studio experiments, parts of past projects, photos borrowed and stolen.

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Winter 2018 shows, and photos from EGO

Hello everyone! This month I have work in two group shows in New York, Mokuhanga: Impressions Past and Present at Union College, and Edging Forward: New Prints 2018/Winter at the International Print Center New York. I'll be at the opening for the IPCNY show, hope to see you there.

Details:

Mokuhanga: Impressions Past and Present
January 3 – March 9
Crowell and West Galleries, Union College, Schenectady, NY
Opening Reception: Thursday, February 1, 4:00-6:00 p.m.

Edging Forward: New Prints 2018/Winter
Selected by Miguel A. Aragón, Natasha Becker, Pepe Coronado, Bernard Lumpkin, Jennifer Melby, and Mark Waskow
January 11 – March 28, 2017
Opening reception and artist talks: Thursday, January 11 from 6–8PM

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Ego at Schnormeier Gallery, Mount Vernon Nazarene University, Mt Vernon, Ohio

This Fall I had a show at Mount Vernon Nazarene University. I was excited about the opportunity to show two bodies of work, New Apartment and Lucas, in their entirety for the first time, and I think the show came together really nicely. Peter Michael Stevens did a great job on all parts of getting the show together, thanks Peter!

Here's some pics:

St. Botolph Club Foundation Award

I'm very pleased to announce that I've been awarded the 2017 Emerging Artist Award from the St. Botolph Club Foundation! I'm very honored and flattered. When good fortune comes my way, I try to remind myself to repay the faith others have put in me by doubling down and making the best work I can. Thank you.

Monolith at How's Howard?

This Friday I'll be opening my solo show Monolith at How's Howard? in Boston. I'll be showing a new series of four woodcut prints, as well as sculpture. I hope you can make it!

Monolith
June 2 - July 16, Reception: Friday, June 2,  5 - 9pm

How's Howard?
450 Harrison Avenue, Suite 309c
Boston, MA 02118

How's Howard? is open Saturday and Sunday 12-5pm, and by appointment Tuesday through Friday.

Print week 2016

Pretty cool that BLOUIN ARTINFO included Cade Tompkin's Art in an Airstream in their roundup of what to see at this year's IFPDA Print Fair, and mentioned my work. 

Just outside of Park Avenue Armory, Cade Tompkins Projects, based out of Rhode Island, is staging a satellite presentation to the IFPDA Print Fair, entitled “Art in an Airstream.” Featuring the whimsical screen prints of Allison Bianco and Kevin Frances’s woodcut quotidian interior scenes, among many others, the exhibition is hosted in a retro-chic Airstream International 28 RV.

Group shows opening this week

I have work in two group shows opening this week. The first is an exhibition of the 2016 Massachusetts Cultural Council Fellows at the New Art Center. The opening is this Friday, September 16, from 6 to 8pm. More information here.

Also opening this Friday is the International Print Biennale, taking place at several venues across the North East of England. I'll be showing several prints at Vane. 

Massachusetts Cultural Council grant and Boston Globe Review

I'm incredibly honored to have been chosen as a 2016 Massachusetts Cultural Council fellow in Drawing and Printmaking. This is a really amazing and generous organization, and makes me proud to live in Massachusetts!

In other news, You Are Here at the New Art Center was reviewed in the Boston Globe, thanks Cate McQuaid!

There will be a panel discussion about the show tomorrow night, February 4th at 7pm, and all the artists and curator Pam Campanaro will be there, good time to visit if you missed the opening!

Boston Globe Magazine and Upcoming Shows

I'm pleased to share this interview that was published in the Boston Globe Magazine, you can read it online here.

I've been working really hard to finish new work for these upcoming shows, come celebrate with me!

 

You Are Here at the New Art Center, Newton MA

January 15-March 26 2016, Opening January 15, 6PM

 

Boston Does Boston 9 at Proof Gallery, Boston MA

January 23-February 26 2016, Opening January 23, 6-8PM

 

Contemporary Moku Hanga at Cade Tompkins Projects, Providence, RI

February 13 - April 16, 2016, Opening February 13

 

 

A bit about process

Under the bed, 2015, 7.5" x 15"

Earlier this year the Print Club of Rochester asked me to make a print for their members. The result, above, is a woodcut printed in the Japanese technique, comprised of five blocks that together form the final image. 

The Japanese technique is distinct in that the blocks are printed with waterbased inks using soft brushes instead of brayers, allowing subtle gradation of color. Below is an excellent video of a master printer printing a reproduction of Hokusai's The Great Wave Off Kanagawa:

Below are the blocks that make up Under the bed. Printed in sequence on top of each other, they make up the final print (click through to look closer). 

Upcoming shows, Fall and Winter 2015

Hello everyone, I've got several upcoming group exhibitions in the Boston area, I hope to see you there!
 

A page from Six Moments, a book showing at changes // △ // metamorphosis 

A page from Six Moments, a book showing at changes // △ // metamorphosis 

changes // △ // metamorphosis

Industry Lab, 288 Norfolk St, Cambridge MA
Opening: Saturday November 7, 8-12 AM
Show Dates: November 6-November 22

A sprawling exhibition on the theme of change and the I Ching, curated by the mysterious Gregor Spamsa.

Bedroom Wall, showing in Mimic

Bedroom Wall, showing in Mimic


Mimic

Dorchester Art Project, 1486 Dorchester Ave #2, Boston MA
Closing Reception: December 11, 6-9pm
Show Dates: November 13-December 11

Really excited to be taking part in a group show at this cool artist run space. Will be showing a bunch of new work, don't miss this one! Curated by Sarah Pollman.

 

Our Bedroom, in You Are Here

Our Bedroom, in You Are Here

You Are Here 

New Art Center, 61 Washington Park, Newtonville, MA
Opening: January 15, 6-9pm
Show Dates: January 15-February 20

You Are Here presents place as both physical and conceptual geographies. Curated by Pam Campanaro.

Please Elaborate

I always like to have a few side projects running in the background, and my latest is called Please Elaborate. It's pretty simple, just a running list of all the artist talks in Boston and the surrounding areas, but I think it's a pretty useful thing; some of the local institutions are so coy about their talks! It can be hard to even find out when or where a talk is happening. Some schools only announce their talks by taped up flyer, or email newsletter, or facebook event. So I gather them all in one place, and there's even links to pull up a map, or automatically add the event to your calendar!

Check it out!     www.pleaseelaborate.com