January 3, 2018

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

San Francisco, CA–The Artist in Residence Program at Recology San Francisco will host an exhibition and reception for current artists-in-residence Rodney Ewing, Beth Krebs, and Santa Clara University student artist Ciaran Freeman on Friday, January 26, from 5-8pm and Saturday, January 27, from 1-3pm. Additional viewing hours will be held on Tuesday, January 30, from 5-7pm, with a gallery walk-through with the artists at 6pm. This exhibition will be the culmination of four months of work by the artists who have scavenged materials from the dump to make art and promote recycling and reuse. Please note that Friday receptions now end at 8pm.

Rodney Ewing
Between Walls and Ceilings
In artworks that provide space for dialogue around complex issues, Rodney Ewing questions established histories through the investigation of individual experience and memory. While at Recology, he has turned his attention to San Francisco and its history and changes, creating mixed-media works that combine text with photographic portraits from the early 20th century. Ewing uses lath, the material along with plaster that composes the walls of old San Francisco homes, as backgrounds for pieces that reference the people who once lived in the structures currently being remodeled or torn down for new construction. A series of lath cube sculptures connected by rope act as buoys, offering physical objects to grab onto to keep diverse San Francisco stories afloat. Ewing also incorporates clock parts, a weather vane, kitchen drawers, ledger paper and basketballs—materials all new to his practice. Fragments of language paired with altered photographs suggest traces of disappearing personal stories, and draw attention to a changing present by connecting it to a disappearing past.

Ewing holds an MFA from West Virginia University and a BFA from Louisiana State University, Baton Rouge. He has been an artist-in-residence at the deYoung Museum, and has had numerous solo and group exhibitions in Bay Area venues including Jack Fischer Gallery, Frey Norris Gallery, Yerba Buena Center for the Arts, San Francisco Arts Commission Gallery, Berkeley Art Center, and the San Jose Institute of Contemporary Art. He has exhibited nationally at The Drawing Center in New York, Los Angeles Contemporary Exhibition, Johnsonese Gallery in Chicago, and Greymatter Gallery in Milwaukee.

Beth Krebs
Candy Land
In a large-scale sculptural installation, Beth Krebs explores the lure of the stuff we buy—especially cheap plastic items—and its insidious impact on the environment. Krebs entices viewers with bright colors and appealing forms and textures, creating a wonderland from masses of packaging material, Styrofoam, and components from children’s toys. Abstract still lifes within the installation are suggestive of food or landscapes, but though visually alluring, feel lacking in nourishment. Though playfully absurd, Krebs’ eye candy is also a stomach ache-inducing picture of consumerism run amok.

Krebs has exhibited in the Bay Area at Minnesota Street Projects and the Peephole Cinema, and in New York at venues including Station Independent Projects, the Bronx Museum of Art, Smack Mellon, and the Brooklyn Academy of Music (BAM). She has been an artist-in-residence at the Bemis Center in Omaha, Sculpture Space in Utica, NY, and the MacDowell Colony in Peterborough, NH, and was the recipient of a Joan Mitchell Foundation MFA grant. She received an MFA from Rutgers University and a BA from the College of William and Mary.

Ciaran Freeman
Lineal
In paintings, spatial line drawings, and mixed-media works, Ciaran Freeman explores the gestures and physicality of construction labor. By incorporating blueprints, conduit, lumber, and other items discarded by contractors, Freeman creates figurative and abstract pieces that use the language of building materials to talk about physical work. His emphasis on line creates expressive works that suggest an almost dancer-like use of the body. In many cases, Freeman references photographs from his experiences working for his father’s construction company in New York City. 

Freeman will receive a BA from Santa Clara University in June. He is the founder and president of the University’s Art League and a member of the Alpha Sigma Nu Honor Society. He has been the Jean Donovan Fellow at Commonweal Magazine, where he looked at the intersection of art, faith, and social justice though writing and editorial projects, and has received a Brooks Fellowship to study at the Anderson Ranch Arts Center in Snowmass, Colorado. He has worked on projects at the Children’s Discovery Museum in San Jose and the de Saisset Museum in Santa Clara, and has exhibited at the Pacific Art League in Palo Alto.

When:
Reception-Friday, January 26, 2018, 5-8pm (Please note that Friday receptions now end at 8pm.)
Reception-Saturday, January 27, 2018, 1-3pm
Additional viewing hours-Tuesday, January 30, 2018, 5-7pm with gallery walk-through with artists at 6:00pm at 401 Tunnel Avenue

Where:
Art Studio, 503 Tunnel Avenue and
Environmental Learning Center, 401 Tunnel Avenue, San Francisco, CA

Admission is free and open to the public, all ages welcome, wheelchair accessible. 


About the Recology Artist in Residence Program
The Artist in Residence Program at Recology San Francisco was established in 1990 to encourage the conservation of natural resources and instill a greater appreciation for the environment and art in children and adults. Artists work for four months in studio space on site, use materials recovered from the Public Reuse and Recycling Area, and speak to students and the general public. Over 150 Bay Area artists have completed residencies. Applications are accepted annually, June through August.