OFF-SPRING: New Generations, 21c Chicago’s latest exhibition, opens to the public with a reception on Thursday, March 2, 2023 from 6:30 to 8:30pm. An introduction to the exhibition by 21c Chief Curator Alice Gray Stites will be followed by a presentation by featured artist Angela Ellsworth at 6:30 pm. The opening is free and open to the public to attend!

Rituals—religious and cultural, institutional and domestic—provide the thematic infrastructure for OFF-SPRING: New Generations. These sculptures, paintings, photographs, and videos employ iconographic imagery to explore the development of both personal and group identity, childhood, family, history, and gender politics. “At the wedding altar, in the family home, or in the classroom, within the fantasy of childhood play or the familiarity of grown-up habit, these new, old narratives generate a spectrum of meditations on the contemporary construction of self and society,” says 21c Chief Curator Alice Gray Stites, “In OFF-SPRING, transformations of iconic imagery from spheres both sacred and profane generate a new power, the power of potential and change.”

The exhibition, which remains on view through January 2024 throughout the 21c Chicago gallery spaces, presents a thematic group exhibition of 100 multi-media artworks by 60 artists from across the globe highlighting how religious, cultural, familial, and personal rituals shape who we are and how and where we live, love, and learn. OFF-SPRING features works by artists Gehard Demetz, Angela Ellsworth, Lalla Essaydi, Anthony Goicolea, Rachel Lee Hovnanian, Li Hongbo, Ragnar Kjartansson, Kelly Kristin Jones, Deana Lawson, Hans Op de Beeck, Chiaru Shiota, Vee Speers, Carrie Mae Weems, and others.

Image Credit:
Drew Tal Trust, 2017

About Angela Ellsworth
Angela Ellsworth is a multidisciplinary artist traversing disciplines of drawing, sculpture, installation, video, and performance. Her solo and collaborative work has taken in wide-ranging subjects such as illness, physical fitness, endurance, religious tradition, and social ritual. She is interested in art merging with everyday life where public and private experiences collide in unexpected spaces. Ellsworth has presented work nationally and internationally including The Getty Center (Los Angeles), Museum of Contemporary Art (Sydney, Australia), Zacheta National Gallery of Art (Warsaw, Poland), National Review of Live Art (Glasgow, Scotland), Los Angeles Contemporary Exhibitions (Los Angeles, CA), Museum of Contemporary Art (Denver, CO), Scottsdale Museum of Contemporary Art (Scottsdale, AZ), and Phoenix Art Museum (Phoenix, AZ). She holds an MFA from Rutgers University in painting and performance and a BA from Hampshire College in photography and painting. Ellsworth co-founded the Museum of Walking (MoW) in one of the least walkable cities in the US, Phoenix. With 120 square feet of physical space MoW’s reach is much wider than a room with four walls. MoW is committed to a conversation of land, action, and site within the context of art.

The Plural Wife Project, navigates issues of the body in relation to gender, sexuality, and cultural histories of the western United States. Exploring the inherent queerness embedded in early Mormon polygamy, the project engages contemporary notions of non-heteronormativity and re-imagines a community of women pioneering an alternative history.

Ellsworth was born in Palo Alto, California, grew up in Salt Lake City, Utah, and resides in Phoenix Arizona where she lives with her partner, Tania Katan, and is a Professor in the School of Art at Herberger Institute for Design and the Arts-School of Art at Arizona State University. She is represented by Lisa Sette Gallery in Phoenix, Arizona and Modern West in SLC, Utah.

About 21c Museum Hotels

21c Museum is a multi-venue museum located in nine cities. One of the largest contemporary art museums in the U.S., and North America’s only collecting museum dedicated solely to art of the 21st century, each property features exhibition space open free of charge to the public, combined with a boutique hotel and restaurant. It was founded in 2006 by Laura Lee Brown and Steve Wilson; philanthropists, preservationists, and collectors, committed to expanding access to contemporary art as a means of catalyzing revitalization and civic connection. 21c presents a range of arts programming curated by Museum Director, Chief Curator Alice Gray Stites, including both solo and group exhibitions that reflect the global nature of art today, as well as site-specific, commissioned installations, and a variety of cultural events. The organization collaborates on arts initiatives with artists and organizations worldwide, including Speed Art Museum, North Carolina Museum of Art, MASS MoCA, Contemporary Arts Center, Cincinnati, Creative Capital Foundation, Creative Time, and others.