Craig Krull Gallery

Taylor Kibby: With as much sweetness as I can decently manage

December 16 - February 3, 2024

Reception: December 16, 4 - 6pm

Artist Talk: January 20, 11am

Taylor Kibby was also featured in our exhibition, “of rope and chain her bones are made.” Her new exhibition, With As Much Sweetness As I Can Decently Manage, is her first solo show with the gallery. Over the past few years, Kibby has been recognized for her finely crafted, signature ceramic chain sculptures that either drape in sweeping arrangements on the wall or mound themselves in piles on the floor. She reminds us that “no energy is ever created or destroyed, it simply shifts from one form to another.” Kibby allows her clusters of ceramic chains to find their own angle of repose as they snuggle into unique shapes each time they meet they floor, thus promising an entirely new sculpture with each placement. They are meditations on memory, identity and change, the works being both hard and soft, open and closed, known and unknown. In her recent work, she uses traditional western symbols of girlhood such as bows, ribbons and braids that are strung with brilliant blue beads. She states that this work is a navigation of the body and “the expectations and perceived roles that femmes take on in the world.” Her work always highlights labor, process and repetitive acts, often leaving irregularities which, as Kibby concludes, allow her to revel in the beauty of a vision not wholly her own.