Run Amok
Jennifer McCandless

GALLERY II

October 14 – November 12, 2023

Opening reception: Saturday, October 14 from 6–8pm

A.I.R. Gallery is pleased to announce Run Amok, an exhibition of new sculptural works by National Member Jennifer McCandless, in her first solo exhibition at A.I.R. The exhibition centers on mixed-media ceramic sculpture that seeks to poke fun at our dark realities, acknowledging painful truths in the hope of approaching those truths with fresh eyes.

Employing a sort of Magical Realism, McCandless’s ceramic sculptures use humor and satirical narratives to challenge viewers to examine their perspectives on constructions of identity and societal norms. The pieces offer a social critique of how we see ourselves, interact with one another, and interpret the ills of the world.

McCandless’s fascination with human behavior is cultivated in the study of the figure. The expressive quality of clay is used to take on dark personal and social realities and offer playful, ironic, or damning commentaries. Through her sculptures, McCandless aims to slow down the daily media barrage of superficial ideas in order to contemplate everyday topics that we often find unpalatable to talk about: our relationships to ourselves and each other, death, religion, and nature. In doing so, she also communicates her own thoughts and frustrations.

This exhibition is supported in part by the Vermont Council for the Arts, the National Endowment for the Arts, and the New England Foundation for the Arts.

Jennifer McCandless received her BFA in Sculpture from Otis/Parsons School of Art and Design and her MFA in Sculpture from the School of the Art Institute of Chicago. She has taught Ceramics and Sculpture at Wayne State University and The Loomis Chaffee School. She recently segued into full-time sculpting after serving as Art Department Chair, Curator, and Director of the Mercy Gallery and a Nichols Fellow in Art at Loomis Chaffee. McCandless has been the recipient of numerous awards, including the Michigan Council for the Arts Individual Artist Grant, The Palmer Fellowship 2011–2015, and the Skowhegan full fellowship. The work created for Run Amok at A.I.R. was supported by both Creation and Development grants from the Vermont Council for the Arts and the National Endowment for the Arts. Her extensive exhibition history includes shows at the National Sculpture Society, the Contemporary Art Institute of Detroit, The Lemberg Gallery, the Housatonic Museum, the John Sly Ely Museum, the Elmhurst Art Museum, Hyde Park Art Center, The Frederick Meijer Museum of Sculpture, A.P.E. Gallery, and Soapbox Art and X Contemporary in Miami. McCandless’s satirical work was featured in Fahrenheit 2018 at the American Museum of Ceramic Art. She was recently an artist in residence at Abba House (Ghana), MassMoCA, The Millay Colony, and ChaShaMa North. Her work will be featured in the exhibition Strange States (representing Vermont) at the Shelburne Museum in 2024. McCandless is also an Eco Artist, creating outdoor sculptural works that double as pollinator habitats in consultation, with scientists and students at both the University of Vermont and Middlebury College as well as the Xerces Society in designing for specific species. She is represented by A.I.R. Gallery in Brooklyn, NY and Soapbox Arts in Burlington, VT.

View the Press Release here.

View Jennifer McCandless’s page.

Recent Press: Doug Navarra, “Navigating Persona: Jennifer McCandless’s exploration of identity and society”, Ceramics Now, November 6, 2023, https://www.ceramicsnow.org/articles/navigating-persona-jennifer-mccandlesss-exploration-of-identity-and-society/.

Photography: Matthew Sherman