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Polk County Heritage Gallery: AUGURAL | Future’s History

1/31/2025

AUGURAL | Future’s History

An exhibit of artworks that tell stories of self and others, in varied styles and media. The exploration of  and making of timely and timeless work is something to be celebrated, but also carefully read, and thought through, into and across. These paintings, collages, drawings, sculptures, photographic, and textile works have this in common: They address the combinatory nature of the world, and ultimately, the inherent and mysterious inextricability of what we don’t know, what we know, and what we hope.

Artists: Izabella Balcer, Rachel Buse, Toni Corbett, Shushanik Droshokiryan, EJ Frye, Inga Frye, Sarah Grant, Kathranne Knight, Madeline Maser, Rachel Merrill, and Olivia Valentine

Curated by Michaela Mullin, PhD

Featured artists’ bios:

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• Sarah Grant grew up in Ames, Iowa, with thoughts of being an actress, architect or engineer, and flourished amidst the best combination of cultures: arts, academics, science and agriculture. Steeped in a traditional undergraduate art education, she admired and devoured works by artists such as Robert Henri. She studied at Colorado State, and earned her BFA, MA and MFA at the University of Iowa, where she studied under Mauricio Lasansky, among others. During her academic years, she focused on drawing, intaglio printmaking, art history, and painting. This liberal arts foundation led her to connect with Abstract Expressionism, and to recognize and appreciate it for its two schools within the movement: narrative and non-narrative. Recently, she’s been focusing on making large-scale paintings, in an effort to push and expand her understanding of abstraction as it relates to storytelling. In 1986, Grant founded Sticks, which has received national acclaim for a distinctive line of furniture, accessories and object art.

• Kathranne Knight’s drawings speak in the packed way of a symbol, often stripped down and elemental, but ricocheting with associations and metaphoric possibilities. Impermanence, multiplication, and issues of representation are plumbed through materials as various as fly paper, silver, tears, and graphite; while the action and materiality of drawing are stretched, performed, and reconfigured. Knight holds an MFA from The Yale University School of Art and has been artist-in-residence at Donald Judd’s Chinati Foundation, Marfa, Texas; and the Connemara Conservancy Foundation, Dallas, Texas. Her work has been shown in The Danforth Museum of Art, Mass MoCA, The Des Moines Art Center, Carroll and Sons Gallery (Boston, MA), Geoffrey Young Gallery (Gt. Barrington, MA), Muriel Guepin Gallery (New York, NY), September Gallery (Hudson, NY), and many others. Knight was an Iowa Artist Fellow in 2014, awarded an Iowa Artist Grant in 2015 and 2021, and is co-publisher of the art+poetry press, Correspondence Publishing. She is represented in Iowa by Moberg Gallery.

• Olivia Valentine is a visual artist working in textile construction, drawing, photography, and installation, as well as collaborative projects that span a variety of media and disciplines. Through her work she examines the edges and boundaries of spaces, beginning with the close examination of the edges of fabrics and textiles.  Her work has been exhibited and performed across the US and internationally at museums and galleries including a recent solo exhibition at the Des Moines Art Center (Iowa) and other venues such as The Round Tower (Copenhagen), Museum of Arts and Design (New York), The Kohler Art Center (Wisconsin), The Hyde Park Art Center (Chicago), The American Academy in Rome (Italy), and The Powerhouse Museum (Australia). Awards include a Fulbright Fellowship, A 2020 Iowa Artist Fellowship, the Brandford/Elliott Award, and grants from the Iowa Arts Council.  Olivia is currently an Associate Professor of Art and Visual Culture at Iowa State University. Valentine is represented by Olson Larsen Galleries in West Des Moines, Iowa.

• Rachel Merrill was an athlete once. Her Toe-touch-reach won her an achievement award and a certified document from the President’s Council on Physical Fitness in 1992. After winning this high achievement, she’s continued with a competitive edge. Exploring themes of spectacle, American sport, and competition, Rachel Merrill’s interdisciplinary approach integrates textiles, sculpture, and performance into HIIT-like video projections and installations. 

Merrill received her BA from Northwestern University in St. Paul, Minnesota, and earned her MFA from Cranbrook Academy of Art, Michigan. She serves as an Associate Professor of Art at Grand View University in Des Moines, where she received the Excellence in Teaching Award in 2018. She is the recipient of the prestigious Iowa Fellowship Grant (2019) made possible by the Iowa Arts Council and the National Endowment of the Arts. Her It’s Always A Competition series won several awards in selected group exhibitions, continuing her reach.  

• Izabella Balcer, aka Izzy, is a multimedia artist focused on temporal design and creative writing. Their practice utilizes newspaper and natural materials, creating works that reflect a lifelong love for nature, science, and subsequent grief caused by inevitable loss. Izzy’s work encourages us to be compassionately present with one another, knowing someday we will transform into something unknown-something new. 

• EJ (Erin Jay) Frye moved to Iowa from North Carolina to marry her (now) ex-husband from Illinois. She previously taught elementary school art for Des Moines Public Schools and Sayre Montessori School, but now works at Sticks. She enjoys food, books, road trips and her three daughters — most of the time. She used to travel a lot but now she has a mortgage, so she hangs out with her super cool neighbors in Beaverdale.

• Inga Frye is currently a student in the College of Design, studying architecture at Iowa State University, where she also plays double bass in the symphony.

• Rachel Buse is inspired by playgrounds, fantasies of grandeur and real estate listings. She wrestles with her materials to make large, site-specific installations. Many of her works are sewn by hand. This process allows her to work intuitively as if she were drawing in space. The softness of fabric begs to be touched. It’s skin-like quality evokes our familiarity with living inside the embrace of clothing. 

Currently living and working in Des Moines, Iowa, Buse is the co-owner of Portrait Studio, an interactive drawing exchange between artist and sitter. She also is the Creative Director at Raygun Shirts and a Creative Strategist for Group Creatives.

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