Opening Reception: Thursday, November 17th | 5pm - 7:30pm

Anglim Gilbert Gallery is pleased to announce a solo exhibition of sculptures and works on paper by Anne Chu (1959 - 2016). The presentation will be both a tribute to the life of the artist and the unveiling of recent artworks.

Anne Chu created her work with a view to history and the lasting contributions of distinct cultures and times. Borrowing from and paying homage to Eastern and Western cultures, her works celebrate resonant archetypes and the spirit of legend: guardian figures, children, animals, warriors and angels. Building upon tradition, she looked to the future with invention and experimentation, using unexpected materials and formats that challenged the tenets of weight and volume, of space and gravity. She also played with the interpretation of her work, using figuration and abstraction simultaneously.

“More artificial than natural, Chu’s work represents representation over time, time contained and objectified on every level of her art’s imagery, making and reception.” - Ingrid Schaffner from her essay in Anne Chu: Animula Vagula Blandula, catalog for the exhibition, Kunstmuseum Krefeld, Sept 2012 - April 2013. 

New works in the exhibition speak to the underwater world. An experienced diver, Chu references the sensations of transparency through glass, of floating by means of suspended shapes, of living surfaces through sewn cloth, leather and laminated fabric. A series of works on paper, Burial of the Sardine, celebrates Goya’s 1810 painting of pre-Lenten revelers.

Anne Chu’s studio practice was based in New York, the city of her birth and upbringing. After graduating from the Philadelphia College of Art, she returned to NY and Columbia University where she received her MFA. With artist and friend Paul Bloodgood she co-directed AC Project Room. She had over thirty solo exhibitions at galleries and museums internationally, including the Dallas Museum of Art, the Weatherspoon Art Museum and the Donald Young Gallery. Her works were featured in 54th Carnegie International in 2004, in a two-person show with Mathew Monahan at the ICA Philadelphia and the the Basel Parcours program.

Anne Chu has also been the recipient of many prestigious grants and awards from: the John Simon Guggenheim Memorial Foundation, the Joan Mitchell Foundation, NEA/ Arts International, Art Matters, and her works are in major museum coectios. Her work, a special commission, Mountain Views, is on permanent view at the US Embassy in Beijing.

The gallery thanks Anne Chu’s family for their assistance and encouragement in organizing this exhibition.