About

"Epiphany"
Featuring Michelle Marchesseault, Diana Welch, Kate Csillagi, and Mimi Bowman
Curated by Alyssa Taylor Wendt

September 14 - October 26, 2024 | Open Hours: Saturdays 12-6pm
Public Reception: Saturday, September 14th, 7-11pm (Please RSVP)
Closing Reception & Halloween Party: Saturday, October 26th, 7-11pm
Events Sponsored by Austin Beerworks

The history of humankind is riddled with points of divergence, moments in our evolution that shake the core of our comfort levels and introduce change whether we like it or not. More often, these harbingers are met with skepticism, fear, shock, and dismissal but withstand the test of time, ultimately adding to our human sophistication. When this happens, there is a moment before the outrage, a pause in our interpretation, a moment of blank rapture that defies categorization. In this blind bliss, we are free. Disruption at its finest returns us to a pure state of infantile openness, our senses in a purgatorial free fall and words fail to serve us.

Diana Welch is a multidisciplinary artist based in Austin, TX, whose body of work spans sculpture, music, and writing. A self-taught ceramicist, she has exhibited in the US and Europe as one-half of the collaborative Mother of God. Her vessels reference classical ancient clay forms imbued with unexpected flare and subversion through interaction, collaboration, and functionality. As a musician, she has released several recordings, both solo and as a member of the band Stormshelter. A reporter, editor, and author, her extensive writing has been reviewed in Vanity Fair and elsewhere.

Kate Csillagi is an interdisciplinary artist hailing from Austin, TX. She attended the School of the Art Institute of Chicago and Evergreen State College where she studied fiber art, printmaking, and bookmaking. Her work has evolved over the years to include drawing, mural work, fabric tapestry, and installation. She was also a founding member of ICOSA, an artist-run collective and gallery in East Austin. Csillagi’s work is disruptive and whimsical, constructing unexpected narratives that star her anthropomorphic characters within supernatural scenes. Her work dismantles reality through watery dreamscapes and colorful illustrations, providing refuge from the monotony of modernity.

Michelle Marchesseault splits time between Austin, TX, where she paints, and New York City, where she designs art and interiors for restaurants, television, movies, and the stage. She attended Herron School of Art in Indianapolis for painting and has been creating visuals and environments for over 20 years. The majority of Marchessault’s work fluctuates between studies of color and design that she called “twist” paintings and lush mannerist landscapes where nature is simultaneously gushing with beauty and brutality.

Mimi Bowman was born in Texas in 1989. She graduated from the University of Texas at Austin in 2022 with a degree in archaeology and Middle Eastern studies. Bowman is currently abroad pursuing an MA in archaeology at the University College of London, hoping to work in Karez rehabilitation in northern Iraq. In 2023, she curated Oshay Green and Isabel Legate’s dual exhibition Holometabolism at Martha’s Contemporary, and her collaborative video work with Jonny Negron was included in Electricity · Shadow at Château Shatto.

Alyssa Taylor Wendt is a multidisciplinary artist, filmmaker, and curator working in Detroit and Austin, Texas. Her recent projects address mysticism, the architecture of memory, and the decodified strata of history using video, ceramics, sculpture, painting, and installation. Earning her MFA from Bard, she has shown and performed internationally since 2004. She recently completed a second master’s degree in museum studies from Harvard and plans to open a small non-profit museum of cultural artifacts in 2026.