Ebecho Muslimova | Resistance & Reimagination | Magenta Plains

Resistance & Reimagination brings together seven exceptional painters who understand the subtle, often invisible modes of resistance that reside within the structures of visual language, challenging us to reconsider the role of image-making—not only in political discourse but in everyday acts of self- expression. Through the work of Sascha Braunig, Melissa Brown, Becky Kolsrud, Danica Lundy, Josephine Meckseper, Ebecho Muslimova, and Julia Wachtel, this exhibition explores how contemporary painting, at times infused with the playful intensity of graphic and animated forms, becomes a tool for reflection and reinvention.

Conceptually central to this exhibition and its participants is the iconography of cartooning–a form of visual expression which has become all but anodyne–and its reclamation as a tool of subversion in the visual space. The principles of cartooning such as symbolism, exaggeration, and distortion are visible in the work of Sascha Braunig, Melissa Brown, Ebecho Muslimova, and Julia Wachtel. These artists address questions of shifting identity while questioning societal norms to expand the boundaries by which painting offers an insight into our world at large. Present in the work of Julia Wachtel is the language of consumer culture and a criticality of commercial display to expose the political and aesthetic systems that shape public consciousness. In the work of Josephine Meckseper are apparent reimagined historical undercurrents. Through her use of book pages, cut-out shapes, and window frames, she both engages with and subverts the discourse of the readymade and the collage, simultaneously exposing and encasing cultural signifiers and everyday objects.

Artists: Sascha Braunig, Melissa Brown, Becky Kolsrud, Danica Lundy, Josephine Meckseper, Ebecho Muslimova, Julia Wachtel