Sherry Leedy Contemporary Art
KATHY LIAO
Gallery Director: Sherry Leedy Catalog Design: Elise Gagliardi Find us at: SherryLeedy.com IG: @sherryleedycontemporaryart FB: @sherryleedycontemporaryart 2004 Baltimore Ave. Kansas City, MO 64108 Cover Image: Oil on Canvas
Presenting artworks by: Kathy Liao
Kathy Liao in her Studio’s Inc Studio
Biography
Drawing inspirations from her diverse cultural background and personal history, Kathy Liao mixed media work is about the intimate yet universal concept of relationships.
Liao received her MFA in Painting from Boston University and BFA in Painting and Drawing from University of Washington, Seattle. Liao is a recipient of various awards including the 2020 Charlotte Street Foundation Visual Artist Award, Elizabeth Greenshield Foundation Grant, and artist grants and fellowships from Anderson Ranch Arts Center, Vermont Studio Center, and Jentel Artist Residency. Her work was shown in Boston, New York, Los Angeles, Seattle, Kansas City, and many other cities nationally and internationally. In the past, Liao was the Director of the Painting and Printmaking Studio Art Program at Missouri Western State University, and taught at Boston University, University of Washington, Seattle University, and Gage Academy of Art. She is currently part of the Artist Services team at Mid-America Arts Alliance in Kansas City.
Collect Calls (from “Conversations” series)
2011 Woodcut mono-type, chine colle on paper
6.
56” x 30” each
7.
Saving Face/ Self Portraits
8.
Self Portrait in Studio
2015
Mixed Media on canvas
30” x 36”
9.
Self Portrait with Purple Hearts
2017 Oil on Canvas
48” x 48”
10.
Breath Out
2014
Mixed Media on canvas 66 x 58 inches
11.
Breath In 2014
Mixed Media on canvas
68 x 58 inches
I’m Home
“I’m Home / 我回來了 / ただいま”: an announcement of one’s return, a declaration of one’s presence in the house. In Japanese culture, ただいま/tadaima “I’ve returned” is often met with the phrase おかえりなさい/okairinasai, “welcome back”. A home is not complete without that exchange - the acknowledgment that my presence is welcomed and embraced by others who share my home.
Coming home, I enjoy the sense of familiarity to everything around me - all the little things that remind me I belong here. This include the presence of family I’ve grown accustomed to around the house - family members going about their daily routine, watching TV, on the computer, doing laundry, cooking... Even when they are no longer there, their presence lingers and I know I’m home. Compiled from photographs and recent memories, the paintings and drawings were an attempt to record and preserve those presences in those familiar spaces. -Liao
13.
Red Hat
2014
Mixed Media on fabric on panel
46 x 36 inches
Oil on two canvases
60 x 140 inches
14.
Family Pool
2014
15.
Lingering Presence
In the last few years, my grandmother’s memories have been slipping away from her. I held her close to my heart, but I could feel the distance between me and her widening. I am at the periphery of her foggy world. Despite losing her memory, she is always so happy and surprised when I came into focus. I often wonder how she experiences her world. Does she live in a colorless blurry haze to have it punctuated by bursts of kaleidoscopic remembrance?
The absence and presence of “Memory” is something I think a lot about in my recent work. I think a lot about how memories fade with time, and how memories get altered and distilled through iterative attempts to record it. My work has really slowed down, now that I paint less from life and more from memory. In the last few years, my grandmother’s memories have been fading away. I call her waipuo (which means grandma in Chinese). The absence and loss of her memory only prompted me to hold on to it more, wanting to preserve it somehow. -Liao
17.
Fortune Telling
2019 Oil
on canvas
46
x 36 inches
Proximity (multiple color variations) #1
4 Plate Aluminum Lithography
16 x 13.5 inches
18.
2016
Proximity (multiple color variations) #2
4 Plate Aluminum Lithography
16 x 13.5 inches
19.
2016
Presence
20.
Absent
2017 Oil on linen
24 x 24 inches
21.
2017
Memory of Watermelons
Oil
and fabric on canvas
54
x 53
19 x 20.5 inches
22.
Polka Dot Couch 2017
Gouache, collage, and color pencil on paper
Of Bugs and Strangers
2016
3 plate Aluminum lithography
12 x 9 inches
23.
Losing Touch 2019 Oil on paper
20 x 34 inches (framed)
24.
48 x 38 inches
25.
Balcony 2022
Oil on printed linen
26.
Underlying
Hum 2021 Oil on canvas 40x 40 inches
Collage, marker, color pencil and gouache on paper
30 x 34 inches framed
27.
Korean Drama Lullaby 2020
Distance Between Here and There
In this body of work I considered the physical distance, psychological distance, and this new cyber distance we experience around us.
During my travels, I see everyone glued to the phone, they all feel closely connected to something in cyberspace, but a million miles away from the person next to them. This compression and expansion of distance is most apparent to me when my grandmother’s faced popped up on Facetime. It is always a mixed bag of emotions for me. She recognizes me sometime, and other times, she’s confused with the technology and who I am. She is so far and so close at the same time (sometimes a little too close to the screen). -Liao
28.
Ink and collage on paper
24 x 20 inches
29.
Flight 2016
Your Space/ MySpace
30.
2018
Oil on canvas
62
x 50 inches
In Between the Lines 2019
Charcoal, marker, ink, silkscreen, oil on paper and canvas
252 x 132 inches approx
Site Specific Installation at H&R Block art space.
31.
In Between the Lines
Phone calls at the same time every day, packing and unpacking luggages, eagerly waiting at Arrival and saying good-byes at Departure, getting into another long winding customs and border security line… These rituals are performed by many American Dream hopefuls, despite not knowing when or where the line ends. In my work, I look for patterns and repetitions in behaviors of the immigrant family. I want to understand the driving force behind making choices to uproot a family. As families separate and migrate, I recognize the invariable loss and the struggle to justify and reconcile the distance in between. -Liao
Layered Memories and Lullaby
My recent paintings and wall drawing installations document the fluid state between experience, memory, and place.
My family is very much part of me, and I find comfort in patterns and rituals that weaved through the way my family interacts, from a long distance. I think about the layers of memories pass down through generation.
My grandmother’s memories, overlapped through my mother’s retelling of her stories, layered with my very own lived experience. We can’t separate our perception of the RIGHT NOW from our past generational history to our envisioning of the future.
-Liao
Returning and Thread 2023
Mixed media installation
Wall installation: 88 x 132 inches
Sculpture: 41x 24 x 40 inches
34.
36.
Liu Nian 2021
Oil and acrylic on panels
120 x 180 inches
Nerman Museum of Contemporary Art Installation
Photography by E.G. Schempf
37.
Mixed media on paper
115 x 168 inches
38.
Without 2018
39.
Neon Lights Lullaby 2019
Collage, woodcut prints, litho touche, and oil on paper
72 x 75 inches
30th and Market 2012
40.
Mixed media on canvas
48 x 60 inches
41.
Tero in Green Shirt 2013
Oil and collage on canvas
40 x 30 inches
Mother Tongue Series 2024
Acrylic on masa paper
26 works on paper
22 x 30 inches each (unframed)
44.
Curriculum Vitae
EDUCATION________________________________________________________________________
2016 Lithography Summer Workshop, Tamarind Institute, Albuquerque, NM
2011 Master of Fine Arts in Painting, Boston University, Boston, MA
2008
2006
Bachelor of Fine Arts in Painting and Drawing, University of Washington, Seattle, WA
Bachelor of Arts in Psychology, Interdisciplinary Arts, University of Washington, Seattle, WA
SOLO & TWO-PERSON EXHIBITIONS__________________________________________________
2023 [upcoming] solo exhibition Title TBD, Studios INC, Kansas City, MO
2022 Returning/Belonging, Benjamin Park and Kathy Liao, Albrecht-Kemper Museum of Art, St
Joseph, MO
Kathy Liao, Johnson County Library System, Cedar Roe Branch, Overland Park, KS
2021 Charlotte Street Foundation Visual Artist Award Exhibition, Nerman Museum of Contemporary Art, Overland Park, KS
2018 Autonomous Bodies, StudiosINC Exhibition Space, Kansas City, MO
Immigrant Stories, Monmouth College, Monmouth, IL
2017 Lingering Presence, Prographica/KDR Gallery, Seattle, WA
Floating World, Kiosk Gallery, Kansas City, MO
So Close and So Far, University of Central Missouri Art Gallery, Warrensberg, MO
2016 New Works on Paper, Art Source & Design Gallery, Overland Park, KS
Distance between Here and There, P.O.E. Foundation Gallery, Cottey College, Nevada, MO
2013 I’m Home, CORE Gallery, Seattle, WA
We Are Close, Blindfold Gallery, Seattle, WA
2012 Duality beyond Borders, Ethnic Heritage Gallery, Seattle, WA
2011 New Works on Paper, Burk Gallery, Seattle, WA
Reaching: MFA Candidate Show, Commonwealth Gallery, Boston, MA
2009 Reflection, Boston University Women’s Resource Center, Boston, MA Behind the Façade, La Familia Gallery, Seattle, WA
GROUP EXHIBITIONS________________________________________________________________
2022 Found in Translation, Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art, Kansas City, MO
CSF 25th Anniversary Site Installation, Charlotte Street Foundation, Kansas City, MO
Lamplighters, Vulpes Bastille, Kansas City, MO
2021 Site One, Beco Gallery, Kansas City, MO
Stretch Marks, Project + Gallery, St Louis, MO, Juror: Jennifer Sees
The Space Between, Marks Art, Wichita, KS, Juror: Armando Minjarez
Materialist II, Leedy Voulkos Gallery, Kansas City, MO
Disrupted Realism, Buckham Gallery, Flint, MI
2020 Collective Disquiet, an online exhibition, Musa Collective, Boston, MA
September Exhibition, Sager Braudis Gallery, Columbia, MO
REBIRTH, Heidmann Art Salon, Kansas City, MO
2019 Look me in the Eye, Epsten Gallery, Overland Park, KS, Juror: Mike Lyon
45. K A T H Y L I A O w w w . k a t h y l i a o . c o m 4304 Campbell St, Kansas City, MO 64110 | 206.719.8966 | kathyliao.art@gmail.com | 1
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