Artist – Lauren Kelley
Big Gurl, 2006
Schroeder Romero
214 Weirfield St.
Brooklyn, NY 11221
USA
T: (1) 212.630.0722
E: sarajo@schroederromero.com
W: www.schroederromero.com
In “Big Gurl”, various shades of Barbie like dolls are brought to life with clay to form malleable characters that navigate viewers through mundane situations that occur in public restroom stalls and behind fast food kitchen counters. An earthy narrator is employed to lead a cast of inert beings through various vignette about the durable nature and limits of human strength.
Lauren Kelley was awarded a Louis Comfort Tiffany Award in 2011 and in 2007 she received the New Museum’s Altoids Award. She has been awarded residencies at the Skowhegan School in Maine; the Museum of Fine Arts, Houston; and Glassell School’s Core Program as well as the Studio Museum in Harlem, New York. She received her MFA in 1999 from The School of the Art Institute of Chicago. Her work has been exhibited at the New Museum, New York, NY; Spellman College Museum of Fine Arts, Atlanta, GA; Sikkema Jenkins & Co. New York, NY, Los Angeles Contemporary Exhibitions (LACE), CA; and Project Row Houses, Houston, TX. Reviews on her work have appeared in The New Yorker, Art:21 Blog, Art in America, ArtLies, Houston Chronicle, and Houston Press. Currently, Kelley is on staff overseeing the Prairie View A&M University Art Gallery. She lives and works in Houston, Texas.