Melina Ausikaitis at Devening Projects

Artist: Melina Ausikaitis

Exhibition title: Everyday Everyday

Venue: Devening Projects, Chicago, US

Date: September 8 – October 12, 2019

Photography: all images copyright and courtesy of the artist and Devening Projects, Chicago

Describing the full dimension of the work of Chicago artist, musician and performer Melina Ausikaitis is both a delight and challenge. This is an artist who incorporates so many interchanging and overlapping di-mensions that it’s as if she’s created her very own genre. Object making derived from found and self-pro-duced material, diaristic installations, and performances that fall comfortably within and often fully outside of what we consider familiar musical classifications. Melina is an artist, a dedicated musician and lyricist, a skilled seamstress, a spoken word performer, curator and playful image- and object-maker. It’s exactly the depth and richness of her practice that makes the work of this mercurial artist so compelling and has us very excited to open our fall season with her event.

For EVERYDAY EVERYDAY, Ausikaitis will bring her studio to the gallery to create a working environment and showcase that celebrates her process and most recent obsessions. We’ll see a series of wearable sculptures made from found materials and textiles that have been collected, hand-dyed — or otherwise altered — assem-bled and then displayed on custom manikin stands. During the show, she will be in the gallery periodically to finish new works while transforming others. The pieces for the installation take on the same character-istics found in all of her work. Talismanic and inhabiting the full history and personality of previously owned, closely held and lovingly used items, this is the apparel we need for the current state of our soci-ety and culture. At times roughly assembled and discomfiting, they still reflect the deep care and sensitiv-ity of their imaginative maker. These are works whose stories are told through style — fancy shirts, chore jackets, lab coats, long winter parkas — and through the improvisational imagery and text applied to the material. Assembly and disassembly also factor into the deeply resonant way we understand and desire these objects. Ultimately, the final form of any one piece may belie expected or intended use; embellishments work counter to any notion of adornment. Wearing any of Melina Ausikaitis’ pieces will change you, and make you the most interesting person in the room. This is attire that declares, disguises and enchants all at once.

Melina Ausikaitis is a multidisciplinary artist and musician in Chicago. She has exhibited and performed all over the country and traveled the world playing in her band Joan of Arc. She is as much an inventor as an artist, and as much a librarian as a songwriter.

This exhibition is produced in cooperation with Regards, Chicago

melinaausikaitis.com

Melina Ausikaitis, Everyday Everyday, 2019, exhibition view, Devening Projects, Chicago

Melina Ausikaitis, Deep Space Jacket, 2019, men’s shirt collars interfaced with pages of Revelation Space by Alastair Reynolds, sheep skin, cotton, woodburn drawings, 32 x 24 inches

Melina Ausikaitis, Make My Day Jacket, 2017, window screen, thread, Pergola wood, canvas bank bag, cement, 60 x 32 inches

Melina Ausikaitis, Out of Step Turtleneck, 2017, wall paper, wool, grease pencil, 24 x 17 inches

Melina Ausikaitis, Pony Visualizer Shirt, 2017, silk, drawing, wire hanger, Narnia box, 22 x 20 inches

Melina Ausikaitis, You are Not in Your Own Way Jacket, 2019, digital fabric print, hand-dyed cotton, denim, satin, canvas money bag, Pergola wood, cement, canvas bank bag, 60 x 24 inches