We are proud to announce Warm Up, a solo show by our first artist-in-residence, Madeline Donahue.

Madeline Donahue was at the final stage of her residency at Artshack when the Coronavirus pandemic hit. She was beginning a series of small scale sculptures addressing intimacy through motherhood. Her second child was three months old when she started her ceramic residency. While in residence,  she began making work in response to the moon which she saw while walking to and from Artshack at night.

When the residency period was cut short in March 2020, Madeline temporarily moved out of town to quarantine. Living outside of the city, she observed nature in a new way, during a strange time. She continued making ceramic work and this observation is reflected in the works on view in Warm Up.

Almost a year later and back in Brooklyn, the way Donahue’s sculptures occupy the space is subtle yet potent. Bats silently hang from corners. Flowers sit on window sills, as if they had been there all along and had just bloomed for the coming season. Her ceramic work, deeply tied to her drawing practice, is barely tridimensional. It has a front and a back, but no sides, reminiscent of Egyptian hieroglyphs. It captivates because it leaves you with a desire to see that missing dimension. Yet there’s a practical reason for this: Donahue sketches directly onto clay, using drawing as a template , because it allows her to be economical with time and materials while caring for two small children. Her pieces are then built by sticking front to back, which is a precarious construction for ceramics because forms tend to collapse under their own weight. This seems to reflect the fragile state of equilibrium the artist depicts in many of her images.

Reflected is a private world between a mother and her children together in a present moment in nature. The work is an attempt to create something beautiful and humorous during an incredibly chaotic time.

We will be hosting a socially-distant reception on Thursday, March 11th, 5:30-7:30pm.

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