Without Loneliness

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Kirsten Stoltmann and Jennifer Sullivan @ Julius Caesar

 

Kirsten Stoltmann and Jennifer Sullivan had been scheduled for a March exhibition inside Julius Caesar. In light of public gathering restrictions over the Covid-19 outbreak, we have postponed the physical show to a later date. In the meantime, we are pleased to present video works by Stoltmann and Sullivan.

 

Stoltmann’s “True Confessions of an Artist,” “Wind,” and “Post -nothing” wander between music video and diaristic confessional, where reason becomes passenger to imagination. Sullivan’s One-Week Walden, Adult Movie, and Window Kitty share themes of isolation and alienation, but they vacillate between seeking attention in an oblivious world to fleeing from it. Stoltmann’s work collapses pretense with the declarations of being made-by-an-artist, while Sullivan mulls the very notion of pretense when questioning the alienation of devotion.

 

Journeys taken alone in the wake of dreams deferred, Stoltmann and Sullivan's wayward wandering resonates with life inside a quarantine’s suspended state of irony. While we wait to return, to arrive, and to share our work with the communities we live within, let this tide us over.

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It might be lonelier
Without the Loneliness —
I'm so accustomed to my Fate —
Perhaps the Other — Peace —

Would interrupt the Dark —
And crowd the little Room —
Too scant — by Cubits — to contain
The Sacrament — of Him —

I am not used to Hope —
It might intrude upon —
Its sweet parade — blaspheme the place —
Ordained to Suffering —

It might be easier
To fail — with Land in Sight —
Than gain — My Blue Peninsula —
To perish — of Delight —
 

-Emily Dickinson

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Kirsten Stoltmann was born and raised in Milwaukee Wisconsin. She received her M.F.A. from the University of Illinois at Chicago in 2000. Solo exhibitions include Basic Premise, Ojai, CA., Lump Gallery, Raleigh, Brennan & Griffin Gallery, New York, Suburban Gallery, Oak Park, Sister Gallery and Cottage Home, Los Angeles, Wallspace Gallery, New York, Institute of Visual Arts, Milwaukee and Donald Young Gallery, Chicago. Other group exhibitions include a two-person collaboration with Jennifer Sullivan at Five Car Garage in Santa Monica, Abstract America, New Painting & Sculpture, Saatchi Gallery, London, Guild and Greyshkul Gallery, New York, Christian Nagel Gallery, Berlin, Overduin and Kite, Los Angeles, New York Underground Film Festival, New York, Honor Fraser, Los Angeles. Stoltmann lives and works in Ojai, California.

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Jennifer Sullivan is a New York-based artist whose painting practice evolved out of roots in performance and video. She received her BFA from Pratt Institute and her MFA from Parsons. Recent solo and Two Person exhibitions include Female Sensibility (with Kirstin Stoltmann) at Five Car Garage, Los Angeles (2020), Exiled Parts at No Place Gallery, Columbus, OH (2019), Stretch Marks at Real Estate Fine Art, Brooklyn, NY (2018) and the soft animal of your body at Five Car Garage, Los Angeles, CA (2018). Sullivan has exhibited widely including group exhibitions at Marinaro, Brennan and Griffin, Rod Barton, Marvin Gardens, Safe Gallery, and Klaus Von Nichtsaggend. Awards include a fellowship at the Fine Arts Work Center, and residencies at the Lighthouse Works, Skowhegan, Ox-Bow, and Yaddo. Her work has been reviewed in the NY Times, Artforum, Art News, The Brooklyn Rail, and Art Papers. She is represented by Five Car Garage in Los Angeles, CA.