Corinna Button: Interfaces

Part of Super Spring Sunday Exhibition Receptions

Artist Talk on May 21 from 2-1 pm

Hyde Park Art Center presents Corinna Button’s new solo exhibition Interfaces in the Cleve Carney Gallery and Gallery 2. Highlighting the relationship between printmaking and ceramic processes, this exhibition will showcase new work in both clay and print that combine the techniques of each medium to represent the multifaceted condition being a woman. 

Button creates work that addresses the disjunction of real time and memory that happens through image-making by layering materials, embedding textures and scratching away surfaces. Her complex process involves layering fabrics, paints and other materials and then scraping them away, imbuing the works with a rich texture. Utilizing this approach in all of the media that she works with, Button observes that, “it’s the overlap of accident and intention that I like so much, because it impregnates the surface, giving it a sense of history and mystery.”

Primarily focused on female portraiture, Button’s treatment of the subject often incorporates multiple angles at once, suggesting an uncanny paradox of femininity. Her work portrays women not as exact likenesses but rather as archetypal figures whose personality is only partially exposed to the surface. “Over the past four years, Corinna has built an impressive menagerie of iconic sphinxlike women in the studios of the Art Center,” stated Allison Peters Quinn, Director of Exhibition & Residency Programs.”We’re excited to share what happens behind the studio doors with the public and expand the discussion of Button’s work to a larger public.”

Interfaces marks Corinna Button’s return to the Hyde Park Art Center following her completion of the Center Program in 2013. This program challenges working artists’ to develop new work through critical dialogue and guidance from professionals in the field. During the 6-month course, artists also having free access to the Art Center’s school studios to develop their practice and experiment with other media.

To see a time-lapse video of the artist creating Caprice, a collograph made in 2012, visit vimeo.com/38551423.

About the Artist

Influenced by German Expressionism, interdisciplinary artist Corinna Button seamlessly incorporates printmaking techniques into her paintings and ceramic sculptures. She has had over twenty solo exhibitions and has been featured in numerous group shows and fairs across the world, including Artists Interpret Shakespeare at Elmhurst Art Museum (Elmhurst), and Chicago Invasion at Blue Rider Gallery (Taipei, Tiawan). Her artwork can be found in the public collections of BBC, The University of Aberystwyth, and the Ashmolean Museum in Oxford.  Button's work will also be part of permanent collection at The Victoria and Albert Museum, London.  She completed the Center Program at Hyde Park Art Center in 2013, where she reignited her interest in new techniques and forms in clay. She holds a BA (honors) in painting from Leeds Polytechnic School of Art and a postgraduate degree in printmaking from Croydon School of Art and currently lives and works in London, UK.

Button completed the Center Program at Hyde Park Art Center in 2013, where she reignited her interest in new techniques and forms in clay. While in Chicago (2010-2016), her practice was rooted in a studio at Zhou B Art Center. She holds a BA (honors) in painting from Leeds Metropolitan University School of Art and a postgraduate degree in printmaking from Croydon School of Art. She is an elected member of The Royal Society of Painters and Printmakers, London and currently lives and works in London, UK.