Solo Exhibitions
Lead With a Laugh
Sarasota Art Museum
Sarasota, Florida 2022-2023
Curated by Emory Conetta
Installation images courtesy of Ryan Gamma for the Sarasota Art Museum
One day Emory said, “You two lead with a laugh. Even when the topics are heavy, there’s joy and humor in everything you do.”
One day, we got an email from Virginia Shearer, a colleague we deeply admire. Virginia was the former head of education and engagement at the High Museum of Art in Atlanta, where we’d worked together on our Scrollathon exhibition, Speechless. Now, in 2021, she was reaching out as the Executive Director of the Sarasota Art Museum, writing, “We’re a new museum housed in a renovated high school. The community here is thriving, but the museum is still finding its place. I can’t think of better artists to help us do that than you.”
She envisioned her event as the launch for our National Scrollathon initiative, an idea we whole-heartedly embraced.. At first, we were offered one gallery, the Suhler Gallery (named after a family who later became significant collectors of our work). A few months later, Virginia proposed something bigger: “How about the entire floor?” Then it expanded again: “Take the lobby, too.” And finally: “What about the windows?” Before long, we were designing for the entire museum.
Top: The Hill Side, 2022
Center; Faith, 2014
Bottom: Dad ‘N Lad, 2015
“Family Tree” 2021. Over more than a decade we’ve photographed thousands of people participating in Scrollathon. In our more personal artistic practice, we’ve found ways to incorporate the portrait as well as the figure into our practice. Early on, William always traveled with a small beading kit and made miniature beaded trees with tiny seed beads. The small creations were then clustered together into large floor landscapes, creating forests of trees that evoke memories of cherished places.
William’s “bead kit” has transformed dramatically in the past two years; he now travels with a photographic portrait of a family member, and in his “off” time, he methodically beads their portrait using thread and tiny seed beads. Pivoting from the idea of growing forests through the one-by-one beading of trees, he refocused to build a different kind of tree, our Family Tree. He uses existing portraits of family members, solicits new photos from the younger generation, and taps into the family archive for photos of grandparents who are no longer with us.
Bead Curtain, 1996