A group show curated by Cody Tumblin
Omar Abulsheikh – Chris Austin – Guy Connors – Stefan Harhaj – James Kao – Lawrence M – Jane McKenzie – Jack O’Sullivan – Susan Pasowicz – Kate Sable – Jennifer Sullivan – Peter Shear – Matt Smoak – Cody Tumblin – Chris Viau
Arts of Life is a Chicago non-profit space that advances the creative arts community by providing artists with intellectual and developmental disabilities a collective space to expand their practice and strengthen their leadership. In 2023, I curated a group show titled If a Mountain Could Love that included Arts of Life resident artists, thematically centered around landscape painting (landscapes of the natural world and of the heart).
How would you describe a landscape? Would you use a brush? Would you use your heart? Would you sing a song? If a bird can sing a song to describe the shape of the day, surely we can whistle a tune that paints a stage for the sun. And if the sun can shine, we may be able to find our way in the darkness. When the sun presses against the darkness, early in the morning, its love bends and breaks the horizon into a thousand colors. If the warmth of the day comforts and guides, then it is the stars that ask us to look up and dream. If only we could dream more like the trees do, drinking in the heavens with each passing storm. Each drop of rain could be a message, a hymn, a secret from the sky above.
