ASU School of Art Alumni Byars and Lakovich present Love and Loss in Gallery 100
ASU School of Art Alumni Byars and Lakovich present Love and Loss in Gallery 100
“Love and Loss,” a show about relationships, beginning, ending and everything in between, will be featured in ASU’s Gallery 100 from Sept. 18 - 28. The opening reception is open to all and will take place at the gallery on Tuesday, September 19 from 5-7 p.m.
Herberger Institute for Design and the Arts alumni Autumn Byars and Nadia Lakovich are the minds behind the show. The idea came from a very personal place in Byars’ heart.
“I went through a really nasty break up my sophomore year of college and I was just making so much stuff about it and I felt crazy, and fixating on it like that only added to it,” Byars said. “I started to think about why we label ex-girlfriends as crazy when these are intense emotional experiences that of course are going to have big reactions. Why do we make fun of women for that? Why isn't my heartbreak being taken as seriously, simply because I’m young? Why do I feel like the crying best friend in a rom-com instead of someone who's going through a genuine emotional experience.”
She added that this show came from a place of wanting to own these feelings to their fullest.
“I decided, if I'm going to be a crazy ex-girlfriend, I want to do it all the way, I want to fully live that and not care what anyone else thinks about it!” Bryars said. “These emotional experiences are so real and so intense, and they're allowed to be, and that's okay. I think there's way too much shame around that.”
Lakovich also has a wealth of work focused around these types of feelings.
“Whenever I do end a relationship I always make a goodbye piece and so I have a lot of those saved up and I think my last relationship was the first one that it was a happy goodbye all the other ones were like angry and collage so I'll have a few of those in there,” she said.
When this show was initially conceived, it was going to be focused on breakups alone, but they decided early in the process to open it up to all aspects of a relationship, and this allowed for an expansion of the themes of the show even if, “probably around 80 or 90% of the work is still about breakups,” according to the pair.
“It ends up giving this really nice effect about the ebbs-and-flows of relationships and the ups-and-downs and I think that's really special, especially at this age of your life when you're just starting to figure those things out for real outside of high school and as an adult,” Bryars said “These types of relationships are a big part of a lot of people's lives.”
Byars and Lakovich both have multiple works of their own in this show that they hold very near and dear to their hearts.
“My craziest piece is one where I am writing a letter to my ex-boyfriend’s mom,” Byars said. “She was a support for me as well as he was and even though that relationship ended, the relationship between her and I stood on its own. So, I’m inviting everyone who comes to the show to sign that letter, which I think will be a ton of fun. Also love this painting I did about a very pivotal moment processing that breakup, when I realized that for a while I had been living to spite this person and I realized that is still living for that person in a way you aren’t supposed to anymore and sustainably can’t do anymore,” Byars added.
“One of my favorites of mine is one I created as a vent piece in high school, and this is the first time this piece is going to be shown anywhere, it's currently just hung up in my room,” Lakovich said. “It is this three panel multi-media image. The first panel is of me throwing up the word ‘please’. The second one has me throwing up some love letters from this ex-boyfriend, and out of the letters there is also printed hateful discord messages he sent me, and word vomit of my own writing on it. The third panel is me as a happy pancake surrounded by happy memories and charms because I expelled all the hatefulness.”
“I also have a really recent piece in the show, about the end of a very long and intense relationship with someone who was my best friend all through college. The piece is these little caricatures of us with bird heads and we're tugging on a sweater that is slowly unraveling and the sweater represents the relationship and us unraveling it is meant to represent us both contributing to its demise,” Lakovich adds.
When Byars initially brought up her idea for the show, Lakovich insisted that they follow through on it and set to work on handling all of the paperwork. ASU has a standard process for the submission of shows, which doesn’t require the artists to be ASU students, but is a simple form that includes a few sample works and an explanation of the show, alongside a few other materials. Lakovich sends a very sincere thank you to ASU Professor Samuel Chung, who wrote the necessary recommendation letter on their behalf. After their show was selected, Byars and Lakovich opened up the call to other artists to submit their work to be included in the show.
“I was surprised by how many people submitted their work. We got 50 different people who each submitted multiple works, so we received at least 100 pieces. There were definitely pieces that stood out and there were some that we had to say no to, but I feel really good about the pieces we chose,” Lakovich said.
Some of their favorite pieces submitted by others included the pieces “Catch and Release” and “Home is not a place it is a feeling,” among many others.
“There are so many beautiful visual metaphors, which makes a lot of sense given the subject matter,” Byars added, “A relationship is not something you can put into words but it’s also not something you can contain in one piece, so there are a lot of people zeroing in on specific feelings. I really can’t choose a favorite because there are just so many I really love for all kinds of different reasons, we have all kinds of different paintings and prints and collages and so much different stuff, which I also think is thematically appropriate. So, people should come to the show and tell me which one should be my favorite.”
Byars and Lakovich encourage people to come to the show.
“I think it's something that a lot of people can relate to, because everyone has gone a little crazy over someone at some point or had a really intense feeling of some sort. I feel like we were taught or encouraged to feel very embarrassed or insecure about those feelings, don't want to talk too much about my ex or it'll make everyone feel weird, so this show is a celebration of all of those feelings in general, and it's something that everyone can find something in and also its something that gives us all a break from that pressure to hold it all in and handle your breakup properly,” Byars said.
The show will be up in Gallery 100, right behind the Mirabella building, from Monday, Sept. 18 through Thursday, Sept. 28. You can stop by anytime the gallery is open, which is from 12-5 p.m., Monday- Thursday and 12-3 p.m. on Fridays. The gallery is closed on the weekends. The visitor entrance is through the south doors at 65 E. University Dr., Room 111.
The opening reception is Tuesday, Sept. 19 from 5-7 p.m. in Gallery 100, and there will be food and drinks!
