Alone Together: Columbia MFA Class of 2020

About

Steve Turner is pleased to present Alone Together, an online exhibition featuring new work by twenty-three members of the Columbia University MFA Class of 2020. On March 15th, all MFA students at Columbia were given 48 hours to vacate their studios. For the class of 2020, this was especially traumatic because it meant that each student was also losing the opportunity to have a thesis exhibition. After being displaced, the artists went their separate ways and started working from their apartments or temporary homes. Many stayed in their New York apartments, while those that could, fled the city for temporary lodging upstate or in Massachusetts, Maryland, California, New Mexico, Missouri, and British Columbia. 

Wherever they went, the artists worked in isolation while still maintaining contact with their classmates. In between zoom meetings, they made do with what they had. Some found inspiration outside their windows; others found it inside their small apartments while others mined their imagination. The works on view are ample evidence of the talent and resolve of these twenty-three artists. 

The opening will take place on Sunday, May 10 when the works will be made viewable on the gallery’s website. The gallery took on this project with the hope that it would help soften the impact each artist has faced, financially and emotionally, and that it will enable them to better transition from MFA candidates to studio artists during this unsettling time. 

The participating artists are Aika Akhmetova, Henry Gabriel Anker, Roni Aviv, Patrick Bayly, Eric Brittain, Fontaine Capel, Susan M B Chen, Joanna Cortez, Baris Gokturk, Jenn Hassin, Yifan Jiang, Clare Koury, Yushan Liu, Cara Lynch, Erica Mao, James J.A. Mercer, Kathryn Ann Miller, Bradley Pitts, Stipan Tadic, Kiyomi Quinn Taylor, Meredith Pence Wilson, Mark Yang and Yi Sa-Ra.