In the Open
August 21 - October 2, 2021

Chase Barney & Dylan Hurwitz

Baby Blue Gallery is excited to announce In the Open, an exhibition of work by Chase Barney and Dylan Hurwitz. Both artists craft images of queers spaces that mix fact and fantasy. The settings range from Brooklyn parks, the Wasatch Mountain range, and surreal Vegas inspired scenes. Out of these images emerge narratives that celebrate queer joy, love, and intimacy. However, the works do not ignore the risks of vulnerability and the threats to these places; a rapid test or a strange pickup truck on the horizon. Through ceramic and painting, Barney and Hurwitz encapsulate a longing for the ideal, queer community, and connection.  

Barney is interested in how craft translates and immortalizes both collective and personal experiences. Through ceramics, images can become tangible, and consequently a vehicle for stories. Barney's own practice takes imagery from his youth outside of Salt Lake City Utah, and resurrects it in the forms and surfaces of his ceramics. These images that stir in his mind come from the rugged landscape and the varied fantasies that surrounded him; including bible stories, angels gifting seeing stones, and a copy of The Wizard of Oz on VHS. They embody a queer youth's yearning for different worlds, for the potential of a timeless, universal space free from prejudice and social stress. Or at least something more tolerable.

After months of lockdown in his Brooklyn apartment, Hurwitz has followed his impulse to be outside as much as possible, and around people, trees, and water. This has led to a renewed focus on the depiction of public parks and queer outdoor gathering spaces in his recent work. Hurwitz employs a range of materials, utilizing primarily oil paint, as well as chalk pastel, graphite, and acrylic. While some works are painted en plein air, he also works from imagination and memory. These works are as much about documenting fleeting experiences of queer community and the potential of public space, as it is about imagining how the world might be. 

Chase Barney is currently an MFA candidate at School of the Art Institute of Chicago. Barney graduated with a BFA from the University of Minnesota in 2019. He has exhibited throughout the United States, and has received numerous grants and scholarships in support of his work including a 2020 Minnesota State Arts Board Artist Initiative Grant, and is the recipient of the New Artist Society Full Merit Scholarship awarded from the School of the Art Institute of Chicago.

Dylan Hurwitz is based out of Brooklyn, NY. Hurwitz has exhibited at Monya Rowe Gallery, Zurcher Gallery, Freight+Volume, Danese Corey, Steven Harvey Fine Art Projects, Samson Projects (Boston), Flatland Gallery (Houston), Massachusetts College of Art and Design, and Tapir Gallery (Berlin). Residencies include Takt Residency (Berlin) and DNA Residency (Provincetown, MA). He was Director of the Boston LGBTQIA Artist Alliance from 2015-2017, an arts organization dedicated to elevating the visibility of and providing resources to Boston-area LGBTQIA artists. Hurwitz received his MFA in Painting from the Rhode Island School of Design, and a BFA from the School of the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston/Tufts University.