LEADING A COLORFUL LIFE

With its many variances in tone and hue, color is a complex realm of expression for artists around the world. Its uniquely individual qualities enable artists to capture emotions with pinpoint precision. LEADING A COLORFUL LIFE invites viewers into the colorful lives of six artists whose work, though similar in their expansive color palettes, charts vastly different terrain. Rich in emotion and teeming with life, the works in LEADING A COLORFUL LIFE exemplify the infinite range of color’s expressive abilities.

The six artists in this show approach color from distinctly unique positions. Ziui Chen uses color to meld Euro-American and Chinese painting traditions, re-coloring her childhood with fantastical vignettes of intimacy and affection. Krista Dedrick-Lai uses vibrant and contrasting hues to paint the emotional intensities of motherhood. Sean Gerstley’s ceramic works explore the whimsy and joy of adding color in unexpected places around the home. Su Knoll Horty’s Color Pops utilize what she calls “analogous tones” to create cosmic, environmental works. Eric Uhlir’s energetic style and dense scenes rely on color’s full spectrum to deliver dynamic and immersive compositions. Maria Zamora’s textiles and painting masterfully utilize fundamental color schemes to maximum effect, relishing in the richness of colors both natural and unnatural.

LEADING A COLORFUL LIFE embraces the beauty that flows from bringing together six distinct approaches to color. The works presented in this show balance deeply personal methods with a universal appreciation for the magnitude of color, resonating on a profound level that encourages personal introspection, conversation, and imagination. With this exhibition, HOT BED hopes to inspire visitors to reflect on what color means to them and how they might lead a colorful life.

The show will be on view April 22 - May 27, 2022, with an opening reception April 22 from 6-9 PM and a closing reception May 27 from 6-9 PM. To RSVP, please visit https://www.hotbedphilly.com/appointments. To stay up-to-date on exhibition related events, please visit https://www.hotbedphilly.com/events-calendar.

ABOUT ZIUI CHEN

Ziui Chen spent her childhood amongst the hilly terrain of Sichuan Province, and in 2002 graduated with top honors from the Sichuan Fine Arts Institute with a degree in studio art. Her facilities in art and design garnered her extended studies at the famed Tsinghua University in Beijing. In 2010, Chen continued her studies by moving abroad to the United States, receiving her MFA, studying the intersection of art and design. After years of researching inclusive design, her works speak to the human body as its language, possessing infinite communications. First, in mediums more attuned to her earlier fine art training, and more recently in ways that position the body in painting as an ecosystem of changes in attitude, position, and gesture that connects us with other bodies and spaces. Each work explores her ethnicity's perception as an infinite tapestry of imagery associated with her exoneration from the polar complexities of being Chinese in the United States.

about KRISTA DEDRICK-LAI

Krista Dedrick-Lai is a multidisciplinary artist whose work confronts the everyday struggles of motherhood, domesticity, and being human. Through honest painterly application, the artist reveals, questions and normalizes the taboo brokenness of the every day. With a full range of bright neon marks to dark ominous brushstrokes, Dedrick-Lai negotiates the nonlinear space of healing and acceptance, perpetually carving out spaces of light in the dark, and methodically making a way forward. After earning her BFA from Tyler School of Art, Krista made Philadelphia her home and now lives and works just steps from the Italian Market with her husband and young son. Her work has been shown in numerous Philadelphia spaces, galleries across the country and in virtual spaces such as I Like Your Work and Dear Artists. In 2022 Krista completed residencies with Stay Home Gallery in Paris, TN and Dear Artists, virtually. I’ll Carry It for You, a solo exhibition of Krista’s interactive fiber works, was on view at Da Vinci Art Alliance in Philadelphia in March of 2023. In 2021 a poster Krista created in collaboration with Mural Arts and Streets Dept was collected by the Philadelphia Museum of Art.

about SEAN GERSTLEY

A graduate of the Rhode Island School of Design, Sean Gersley’s interest in sculpture and interior spaces is translated using clay as his primary medium. Working from his home studio, Gerstley has created a ceramic world of slab and coil built forms with pinchy surfaces and unique glazes, often bursting with color. The artist debuted his first series of tile block furniture with Superhouse (New York, NY) in 2020 and has continued to experiment with the form leading up to his first solo show with Superhouse, Sean Gerstley: Tile Block. Gerstley has shown at Emma Scully Gallery (New York, NY), Air Mattress Gallery (New York, NY) and the 99cent Plus Gallery (Brooklyn, NY). His work has been featured in numerous publications including Architectural Digest, Artforum, Dwell, Elle Decor Italia, Metropolis, Sight Unseen and Surface. He was recently named on Sight Unseen's 2021 American Design Hot List.

About Su Knoll Horty

In 2012, Su completed the CE Core Curriculum Program at the Pennsylvania Academy of Fine Arts (Pafa). Su continues to study with Abstract teachers, Kassem Amoudi at Pafa, and Peter Bonner at The Art Students League of New York. Su has been published in The Philadelphia Inquirer, Wild Roof Journal and The Woven Tale Press literary and visual arts magazines as well as interviewed on ArtWatch radio. She recently received an Honorable Mention in the Visionary Art Collective online exhibition, Finding Sanctuary, 2021, a 3rd Place award in The ArtList September Artist of the Month contest, 2019. She also received an Award of Merit from Manhattan Arts International in the online exhibition of The Healing Power of Art, 2019. Su is a member of the Philadelphia Sketch Club and received two Honorable Mention awards for her entries in the Absolutely Abstract shows, in 2012 and 2013, as well as being a juror in the 2015 Absolutely Abstract show. Su exhibits regularly and has exhibited in numerous solo and group shows, including The Biggs Museum of American Art, the Hamptons Virtual Art Show with Bluestone Fine Art Gallery, SOMA NewArt Gallery in Cape May, New Jersey, Hardcastle Gallery in Centreville, Delaware and The Delaware Contemporary. Her work is held in the Camden County Art Bank in New Jersey and in numerous private collections in the United States and Mexico. Su Knoll Horty was represented by Bluestone Fine Art Gallery in Old City Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, from 2013 until their closing in 2020 (due to Covid). From 2012 until 2019, Su displayed her paintings in Senator Chris Coons’ Washington, D.C. office.

About Eric Uhlir

Eric Uhlir (American, b. 1979) grew up in Southern California and earned his BFA from the University of Texas at Austin in 2003. His work is both figurative and abstract, examining the Anthropocene in the context of art history. He exhibited at IA&A at Hilyer in Washington, DC in 2019 and with Caitlin Berry Fine Art at Culture House in 2021. His work is held in private collections internationally. He keeps a studio in Washington, DC.

About Maria Zamora

Maria Zamora is an interdisciplinary visual artist born in Merida, Venezuela, where she began her art education in 2015. She now resides in Seattle. Maria received a BA with Honors from University of Washington in 2020. Through her work Maria attempts to portray different realities that coexist in her home country Venezuela. With a range of vibrant and contrasting colors Maria creates energetic compositions that bring to life both: nostalgic memories of the rich and diverse tropical fauna and flora, and the humanitarian crisis that has worsened in Venezuela over the recent years. Maria finds freedom experimenting with different mediums such as printmaking, painting and drawing; collaging together different subjects, elements, and textures into a single piece. Recently, Maria has begun to explore the fascinating world of textile design, by creating playful repeat patterns that encapsulate the splendor of the natural world, bringing together her art with her interest in textiles and fashion.