Image: Se Young Au

“These last two years of the pandemic have felt like we have been slowly plowing through darkness; political shifts, racial violence, & daily turmoil saturating our environment. The breaking dawn represents a tonality of light, an opening for rebirth/s of a new era, of new rituals, surroundings, moods. ‘Radical Dawn’ celebrates the work of 10 mixed media artists: Anais Franco, Ginger Q, Jaklin Romine, Jessica Taylor Bellamy, Kayla Tange, Linnea Spransy, Molly Shea, Sarah Stefana Smith, Se Young Au, & Silvi Naci. Each taking us on a journey, uniquely navigating the temporal energy of now, attempting to find the light, if any, within this ever-shifting time.”

–Alicia Piller, Curator of RADICAL DAWN

Radical Dawn: Up with the Sun |Companion Essay by Shana Nys Dambrot

I’ll tell you this, no eternal reward will forgive us now for wasting the dawn.

—The Doors

We deserve a new beginning, after what we’ve all been through.

Alone, together, in shared solitude and outpourings into the streets; in our deep dives into the shadow self and the true history of society, naming the obstacles to justice for both each other and the planet; our allies and our enemies sometimes seeming to switch places, and our renewed calling to cultivate authentic community and mutual care — all we’ve survived has landed us at a crossroads, a threshold, an inflection point. It’s up to us to make something new from the wreckage of the volatile recent past and escape the legacy of unjust centuries. This is available to us now, if we want it. It’s a radical dawn. Here comes the sun.

Each of the ten artists assembled by Alicia Piller for this alchemical, somatic exhibition demonstrate an acute awareness of the problematics and potentials of this moment. In a range of mixed media practices engaging painting, sculpture, and installation, they give diverse, post-organic form to this energetic threshold. From repurposed, rescued, unconventional materials replete with meaning in their very presence in a fine art context, to a soulful feminist engagement with (and subversion of) the Euro-patriarchal art canon, the artists deconstruct and reassemble the castoffs of ideas and objects that have outlived their use, and reimagine it all as something new. This is actually what has happened in the art, but it also supposes an eccentric blueprint for a transformative way forward for humanity.”

–Shana Nys Dambrot, Los Angeles 2022