valery@valeryestabrook.com
insta: @valeryestabrook
twitter: @KoreanFanDeath

NEWS

JULY 2023

ChaShaMa North (ChaNorth) Residency and Upstate Art Weekend

I'm very excited to announce that I’ll be joining the ChaNorth Residency for their July 2023 session. I’m looking forward to a month of connection, reflection, and exploration. ChaNorth is located in Pine Plains, New York, about 90 miles north of New York City along the Hudson. We will be opening our studios as part of Upstate Art Weekend, July 21-24. If you are in the New York area, please come by and say hello!

JUNE 2023

Currents New Media Festival 2023
Santa Fe, NM

I’ll be showing the latest iteration of my ongoing long term video installation project, (This is/Is This?) How To Do It?, that examines grief and its relationship with memory, our perception of time and space. The installation will be up from June 16-25. On display will also be the original “Datura Dress” that is worn in part of the video performance.

MAY 2023

SPRING/BREAK Art Show (Secret Show!) in NYC!

I’ve got five new concept glasses in SPRING/BREAK’s secret pop up show. If you follow me on Instagram, you might have seen that I’ve been playing around with making multi-paned, multi-lens concept glasses and other wearable objects with rigid materials. They will be up May 10-20 in the Old School location, Go check them out if you’re in the city!

FALL 2022

Temple Contemporary Presents: "With or Without You: America"

Temple Contemporary proudly presents With or Without You: America, a timely exhibition of works by 11 first-generation American artists that encourages viewers to contemplate personhood in America and reflect on the liminal space between personal and political. Temple Contemporary is a visionary center for exhibitions and public programs at the Tyler School of Art and Architecture. 

A visual allegory inspired by James Baldwin’s 1955 iconic collection of essays Notes of a Native Son, the works represent various perspectives of the U.S. experience and illustrate moments of impact that have shaped each artist's identity as they traverse being first-generation Americans. Pioneers in their familial landscapes, these artists are challenging the paradigms of scholarship, wealth, gender, sexuality, citizenship, land, and stature in their communities. 

“The exhibition invites viewers to consider America as a verb, an action word that calls on us to complicate our understanding of humanity within and without borders,” says Jova Lynne, Tyler’s newly appointed Director of Exhibitions and Public Programs. 

An opening reception will take place on Friday August 26, 2022, from 6-8 pm. During the reception, multidisciplinary artist Valery Jung Estabrook will present Garden, a performance work inspired by equal parts Korean shamanism, her family’s private mourning practices, and her own personal exploration of deeper consciousness. The performance illustrates the journey of grief, acceptance, and remembrance, and reclaims an emotional space in which joy can be experienced once again. 

With or Without You: America is curated by Lynne, who joined Tyler in 2021 from the Museum of Contemporary Art Detroit, with curatorial assistance from Adam Blumberg, Exhibitions Manager, and Amy Shindo, Graduate Assistant. 

Artist List: Caff Adeus | Brock Oakley Ailes  | Valery Jung Estabrook | Jezabeth Roca González | Tommy Kha | Antonia B. Larkin | Grace Rosario Perkins | Stephanie Concepción Ramirez | Adee Roberson | Raúl Romero | Zeinab Saab 

Gallery Hours
Wednesday-Thursday, 12-8 pm 
Friday-Saturday 11am-6 pm

SUMMER 2022

Hi Everyone! I’m currently working on a new video performance and sculptural installation project, tentatively titled “Garden.” The work is born from the past two years’ exploration ways to grieve through acts of movement: ritually with others, privately in the home, as well as mentally within our own subconscious space.

The first 2 parts of this project will be shown at the end of this summer at Temple University in Philadelphia as part of a group show entitled “With or Without You: America.”

SPRING 2022

I’m at SPRING BREAK ART SHOW LA! Come say to me in booth 35!

I’m showing all new ceramic sculptures with paintings by Corey Escoto in our two person project, “Pump ‘N Dump: a handjob in low earth orbit and the American Dream”

We were featured in Artnet this morning! Check it out:

Below is the first of my Mars Jars “piggy banks” public riddles. See if you can crack the code :)

Good, Another Zealot

Good, another zealot. Educated

Eons ago. Right now,

We rarely ever stay true, loyal, etc.

Gosh, let’s ask Deity,

Just until it cedes everything.

Or may I try

Another natural, concurrent, heartfelt, obvious road?

Dry every tear. Agony, injury: lost.

May every tattered tree enter rebirth.

Calling Any Body in near

Space. Hey! Oh! Cry! Kick!

Something cracks. A tenderhearted theologian exists reluctantly.

WINTER 2020

The Kickstarter campaign for the final leg of the Impeach Mint Project was a funded, with our stretch goal met. Thank you to everyone who supported the project.

You can still purchase coins directly from the Impeach Mint Shop. From now until January 5, 15% of all sales will be donated to Fair Fight, to help combat voter suppression in Georgia and aid in fair senate runoffs.

OCTOBER 2020

Betsy DeVos has long worked against the interest of public education and students in need, resulting in multiple lawsuits during her time serving in Trump’s cabinet. Most recently she tried to redirect funds from the CARES act to private and religious schools. Her coin commemorates the day she was held in contempt of court for continuing to collect loans from defrauded victims of defunct for-profit colleges. A portion of the sales of her coin will be donated to Alice’s Kids, a great organization helping students in need.

This weekend I watched the live debate between Lindsey Graham and Jaime Harrison, and what can I say, it inspired me. I’ve just added LINDSEY GRAHAM’s coin and am donating a portion of the purchase price of this coin to Jaime Harrison’s campaign.

SEPTEMBER 2020

The 2020 election is rapidly approaching, and I’m busy making new coins. Just released are designs for Ivanka Trump and Steve Bannon. They will ship later this fall, expected November 2020.

You can preorder them now from my Impeach Mint shop.

I will be donating a portion of all Impeach Mint coin sales and presales to progressive organizations and Democratic races in swing states. Specific organizations are listed each coin’s description.

June 2020

NO JUSTICE NO PEACE

On May 25th, police brutally and publicly murdered George Floyd. Protests around the country continue to demand justice for him and for the countless other black lives killed by police. Thousands of peaceful demonstrators have been arrested. In support of the Black Lives Matter movement and protests, I am raising money for various organizations that battle systemic racism and/or benefit black communities.

100% of the proceeds from the sales of pewter coins are donated

Pewter Coin mini set includes:
“Impeached” ;
“A Perfect Phone Call”;
and Roger Stone, “Guilty On All Charges”

Each is solid pewter, created in an edition of 100, and come with a signed and numbered certificate of authenticity.

MAY 2020

PRE-ORDER is now open for the newest coin in the Impeach Mint Series: “Coronavirus Task Force”.

Right now I’m offering $25 off the regular price and 50% of net proceeds from pre-orders will be split evenly and donated to Seeding Sovereignty (offers financial resources to Pueblo nations), New Mexico Asian Pacific Islander Supplemental Aid Project (offering grocery assistance to Asian American families in need), and Movimiento Cosecha's Undocumented Worker Fund (direct financial assistance to undocumented residents).

I’m making masks for those who need them! To date, I’ve made over 300 fabric masks and face shields. If you’d like a mask, you can get one here.

If you are not able to donate you can still request a free mask using this form here. Over 20% of the masks I’ve created are donated. Organizations I’ve donated to include my local USPS and Navajo Nation.

March 2020

I just arrived back from SPRING/BREAK Art Show in New York. This year I curated a solo project by artist and Paradice Palase co-founder Kat Ryals, and also presented the Impeach Mint Project as an immersive performance installation, curated by SPRING/BREAK directors Ambre Kelly and Andrew Gori. With all that’s going on with the ongoing pandemic, I’ve had little chance to fully process this year’s experience, but I still wanted to share a few images from this very exciting week. I hope you are all staying safe (and at home!).

Kat’s booth featured her recent sculptural and photo lenticular works in a setting that conjured feelings transcendence. A few of her works are still available to collect.

View Kat’s collection and purchase direct from the SPRING/BREAK Art Show website.

I’m also so excited to share that my solo booth for the Impeach Mint Project was featured in a couple articles, in Artnet and in ARTnews.

Artnet: Here Are 9 of the Most Wildly Creative Ways That Artists Transformed an Office Building Into an Art Wonderland for SPRING/BREAK 2020

ARTnews: Take a Tour of the 2020 Spring/Break Art Show in New York

Artnet: Armory Week Round-Up: Here’s Everything We Published on the 2020 New York Fairs, All in One Place

January - February 2020

A SERIES OF RICOCHETS
JANUARY 3 - FEBRUARY 15 2020
Garage Door Gallery, Holman Arts & Media Center
Incline Village, Nevada
Reception Thursday, February 6, 5 – 7 pm

Right now you can find my work in “A SERIES OF RICOCHETS,” a three person show curated by Kara Q. Smith at Sierra Nevada University. My video works My Hands are Medicine, Five Twenty Two, and interactive pieces Hand Held Prototypes will be exhibited alongside works by nicholas b. jacobsen, Eric-Paul Riege. The show will be up Jan 3- Feb 15, so be sure to go check it out if you are in the area!

HOMETOWN HERO (CHINK): AN AMERICAN INTERIOR

In February I’ll be spending some time as an artist in residence at the University of Michigan’s Institute for the Humanities. While I’m there I’ll be showing my installation Hometown Hero (Chink) and working with students in discussions about race, culture, and American identity.

For this iteration of the installation there will be a reading/writing area where visitors are invited to share their own thoughts and experiences. The work will be on view February 12th through mid March.

Hometown Hero (Chink): An American Interior
UM Institute for the Humanities Gallery
202 South Thayer St, Ann Arbor, Michigan
Opening Reception Wednesday February 12, 5:30-7pm

Happy Holidays!

2019 is almost over and I am prepping for some shows in January and February 2020. Plus packing for my month away at Vermont Studio Center!

I hope wherever you are you are safe, warm, and surrounded by loved ones. Let’s make 2020 a great year.

- Valery

FALL 2019

Successful Second Kickstarter

As many of you know, I've been working on The ImpeachMint Project as ongoing political protest. The project was born in 2017 with a goal to highlight corruption and criminality within the Trump administration, while also asserting a record of factual events. With the White house having already released many of its own challenge coins (one of which even supposedly "symbolizes the genius level thinking & proven successes of President Donald J. Trump") I found it only appropriate that they should also be the medium for my work.  The ImpeachMint Project's coins have been featured in The Guardian, Vice's Garage, and BoingBoing.

The new Kickstarter campaign was kicked off in October and the new designs are currently being finalized with the foundry. Pre-orders will be available soon, with shipping set for February 2020.

Interviews and Features
I'm excited to share that my work has been recently featured in a few places. Over the summer my work with the ImpeachMint Project was featured in Vice's Garage (These 7 Artists are Redefining Patriotism). Thank you to writer Nadja Sayej for researching my work and reaching out to me for the article!

In July Musée Magazine, made me their first featured video artist for my Thinly Worn video and mask series.

University of New Mexico
I ecstatic to share that I started teaching Experimental Art and Technology at the University of New Mexico in August! My class gives an overview of the same processes I use in my studio practice: integrating media elements into sculpture and installation. My students are a motivated and incredibly hard working mix of undergrads and MFA candidates. Lately we've been looking at micro controllers and conductivity in textiles (very fun stuff!). Huge thank you to Lee Montgomery and Dean Mary Tsiongas for giving me this opportunity and for being so warm and welcoming to me as I find my way around the university!

Spring 2019

In March I'll be returning to SPRING/BREAK Art Show in New York to curate GREY MATTER, opening on March 5th; On March 8th Beautiful Face will be included in an online auction benefiting the AHL Foundation through Paddle 8; Five Twenty Two will be included in In the Presence of Absence at EFA Projects, opening March 27th; and my catalogues for my solo show Three American Bodies is finally out and available to order online. With so much going on, I hope to see you sometime soon! Details for all events below:

GREY MATTER
SPRING/BREAK Art Show
866 UN Plaza 
March 5th - 11th, 2019

In GREY MATTER curator Valery Jung Estabrook presents recent sculptural works by Rose Nestler and Corey Escoto; Nestler’s reinterpretative series of sewn power suits and Escoto’s politically minded resin tissue-box covers. Rooted in disguise with the purpose of revealing the truth — a power held within vulnerability — their works occupy the “grey” area that connects FACT and FICTION.

The “power suit” refers to the style of business suits typically worn by women in the 1980’s: wide-shouldered, angularly cut, rigid garments that reinvented the female form in business culture.  These suits provided women’s bodies a masculine shield and a facade of dominance at a time that wasn’t welcoming to women working in the corporate sector.  It was their armor.  By interpreting these iconic items of clothing into soft sculptures and wall hangings, Nestler reinstates feminine power. Often constructed with hands sewn into the garment, these suits offer a comically menacing potential to “grab back.”

The Kleenex box — an instantly recognizable commercial product both tenderly evocative and simultaneously pathetic — used to be deemed unsuitable for home display.  Before these boxes were factory printed with graphic patterns, one might dress them up in a tissue box cover to make them less conspicuous.  Escoto’s sculptures take the box covers’ function of disguise as their central purpose, but diverge from their innocuous predecessors in forms that blur design and sculpture.  With politically directed texts such as “THIS PAIN DOES NOT SEEM TO GO AWAY,” and “THE NEW NORMAL,” the tissue box cover is no longer a passive object of domestic camouflage, but an active teller of truth — however painful that truth may be. 

(images: Good Man, 2018, by Corey Escoto; and Hung Out to Dry, 2019, by Rose Nestler)

Get SPRING/BREAK Art Show Tickets

AHL Online Auction Benefit
Paddle 8
Auction preview: February 28 - March 7 
Bidding Period: March 8 - March 21 
Post Auction Sale Period: March 22 - April 4

A signed and numbered edition of my video Beautiful Face will be up for auction on Paddle 8 to help raise funds for the AHL Foundation. Bidding starts March 8th, but you can head over the the site now and take a look to see what's available! If you see something you like, please consider making a bid - every sale helps the artists and the foundation. You can go to the auction here.

The AHL Foundation is a non-profit organization formed in 2003 to support talented artists of Korean heritage working in the United States with their ongoing exhibitions, grants, educational programs, and an archival platform. AHL's annual online benefit auction works to broaden the scope of diversity in today's contemporary art world by providing artists with more opportunities to expand their audience to a global setting.

In The Presence of Absence
March 27 – May 11, 2019
EFA Project Space
323 W. 39 St., 2nd Floor, NYC, between 8th and 9th Avenues, Hours: Wed - Sat, 12 – 6 PM

Inbal Abergil, Emily Carris, Leigh Davis, Valery Jung Estabrook, Hock E Aye Vi Edgar Heap of Birds, Nene Humphrey, Melinda Hunt, Jaamil Olawale Kosoko, M. Carmen Lane, Todd Shalom

Curated by: Jillian Steinhauer
Curatorial Fellow: Nick Witchey
Curatorial Advisor: Meghana Karnik

EFA Project Space is pleased to present In the Presence of Absence, an exhibition about the nature of grief. The show explores the creative possibilities of mourning, looking at how people transmute suffering over the loss of loved ones into ways to live.

American culture is grounded in the denial of grief. The United States was founded on the slaughter of Native Americans and the enslavement of Africans, yet there are no official, national monuments to attest to these horrific crimes or honor their victims. Meanwhile, statues venerating those who perpetrated them—colonizers and missionaries, slaveholders and Confederate soldiers—abound, creating a sanitized and glorified narrative about the roots of this country. Who gets to be memorialized, and whose perspectives are privileged in that process? As many people grapple with the present political reality, we would do well to remember its underpinnings in unresolved historical traumas and the erasure of violence. Some are mourning a version of the United States they thought they knew, but others have been unable to escape the consequences of its myths for centuries.

For Americans, death is either a day-to-day spectacle or a highly private matter.  But the attendant sorrow and pain don’t disappear, and time doesn’t heal all wounds; it just changes them. In the Presence of Absence posits that one way to move forward is to deal with our grief—to admit its existence, to sit with it, make space for it, and work through it. To hold it in its constancy and discover what it can engender. The artists in this exhibition offer a place to start.

Finally, the catalogues for my solo show Three American Bodies at Austin Peay State University finally arrived! If you wanted to come out but couldn't make the trek to Tennessee, this is the next best thing. Beautiful photos by New Gallery Director Michael Dickins and essay by Laura Hutson Hunter. They are available in both softcover and hardcover and can be ordered through these links: Hardcover Softcover

January 2019

For the next month, my single channel video work, My Hands Are Medicine, will be included in group exhibitions at Aggregate Space Gallery in Oakland, CA and Field Projects in Chelsea, NYC. The piece is part of an ongoing personal exploration into the topics of grief and healing. On January 16th my solo show for Hometown Hero (Chink) officially opens at James Madison University’s New Image Gallery in Harrisonburg, VA. And for those of you in the southwest, my multi-tablet work Five Twenty Two will be on view at Currents 826 gallery in Santa Fe, NM.

I will also be participating in the artist talk at Aggregate Space Gallery in Oakland on Saturday January 19th, so please come out and say hi if you're in the Bay area! 

Details for each of the respective shows are below:

Field Projects
No Place Like
Curated by AN/OTHER NY
Opening Reception: January 10, 6-8pm
Dates: Jan. 10 – Feb. 9, 2019
Hours: Thur-Sat, 12-6

Field Projects and AN/OTHER NY are pleased to present No Place Like, featuring the works of Mitsuko Brooks, Naomi Cohn, Yewen Dong, Valery Jung Estabrook, Mariano Del Rosario, Maria Fragoso, Emily Kettner, Amanda Konishi, John Lee, Padma Rajendran, Dana Robinson, Jia Sung, Taro Takizawa, and Connie Zheng.

The nature of home can be complicated and fluid, fluctuating between internal feelings of belonging and one’s placement in the external world. The works included in No Place Like build a complex understanding around this familiar word through the process of making. A home can be physical, located in a specific time or place, pointed to on a map, a structure where material objects rooted in the domestic proliferate and become the backdrop to one’s life. It can be an emotional space, familiar, or of collective memory, where the trace of one’s community and family remains, accessed through the recollection of a gesture, a habit, or everyday routines. Or home can simply be where one exists, changing moment to moment as time moves forward.

Cohn and Kettner conjure domestic talismanic objects through the form of the vessel and the discipline of craft, while Fragoso and Rajendran point to the spaces that house them and their owners. Through repetition of movement, Estabrook and Lee linger on a private moment in time. Robinson and Sung explore cultural stories shared by many, referencing popular media from the past and present. Dong focuses on the memory of material that bears witness to traces of the hand, while Konishi’s abstractions use the repetition of shapes and mark-making to suggest landscape. Brooks and Zheng mine items consumed in our daily lives to glean meaning from the detritus of the banal, while Del Rosario and Takizawa pare down complex objects and information in search of a kind of universality.

AN/OTHER NY is a group of artists, writers, and curators advocating for Asians and Asian- Americans in the arts. Founded in 2015, they are an evolving community for workshopping artistic practices, and a safe space for collective thinking and action around issues of race and representation, transnational identities, and political engagement in the arts.

Aggregate Space Gallery
Holding Breath | 6th Annual Open Call for Works in Video
Opening Reception: January 4th, 2019, 6-10pm
Artist Talk: January 19th, 11am
Dates: Jan 4 - Feb 2 2019
Hours: Thursdays, Fridays, and Saturdays 1-5pm
and by appointment

Oakland, CA. Aggregate Space Gallery is pleased to present this selection of video works from our annual open call for time-based media. For the 6th time, we intentionally chose to forgo a themed call so that a cohesive show may be discovered in the relationships between some of the 200+ submissions. This year, the works that stood out were all surreal depictions of personal struggle with outside forces, some via artist confessionals, and some presented more cryptically. The video pieces that will be playing concurrently within Holding Breath each contain one-sided conversations either with an implied partner or no-one at all, often relying on humor as a weapon to disarm the viewer from the frustrations, anxiety, and loneliness under the surface of each piece.

Featuring works by Abe Abraham, Maryamsadat Amirvaghefi, Selvaggio Dordetti, Emma Penaz Eisner, Valery Jung Estabrook, Rachel Garber Cole, Matthew Gottschalk, Beata Rasitsan, Britt Thomas, and Siru Wen.

Aggregate Space Gallery programs are generously supported by Andy Warhol Foundation for the Visual Arts, Creative Work Fund (Walter & Elise Haas Fund and William and Flora Hewlett Foundation), Neda Nobari Foundation, Creative Work Fund, Kenneth Rainin Foundation, Zellerbach Family Foundation, East Bay Community Fund, Clorox Foundation, Awesome Foundation, and ArtNow International.

Hometown Hero (Chink)
New Image Gallery
James Madison University
Harrisonburg, VA
Opening reception & Gallery talk Jan 16th 5 - 8pm

My solo show and immersive installation Hometown Hero (Chink) will be opening at New Image Gallery in Harrisonburg, Virginia at James Madison University (just one hour from my actual hometown!). Reception and public gallery talk is January 16th, 5-8pm. I'm looking forward to spending a few days on campus - in particular leading a video workshop for the MFA candidates and a panel discussion with faculty regarding protest and art. Thank you to Professor Corinne Diop who, after hearing about how important it was for me to show the work in Virginia, worked hard to make this happen!!

Five Twenty Two
Currents 826
Santa Fe, NM
on view now - end of February

My multi-tablet installation Five Twenty Two is currently on view at Currents 826, the new permanent gallery space for Currents New Media in Santa Fe, NM. The space features a gallery space with both large and small-scale new media art, a shop with digitally created artworks, and a back room dedicated to VR. Frank Ragano, Mariannah Amster, and the entire Currents family has done a stellar job of creating an amazing space where everyone's work truly shines!

Before I close out this New Year update, I wanted to quickly say thank you to everyone who gave me opportunities this past year. I believe that none of us get where we are without the help of someone else, and I've been incredibly lucky to have met many generous people in my life. Huge thanks to AHL Foundation & President Sook Nyu Lee Kim, Keith Schweitzer, Michelle Yun and Midori Yoshimoto; Jennifer McCoy and Jen Dalton of Auxiliary Projects; Michael Dickins at Austin Peay State University; Corinne Diop of James Madison University; Gallery Korea; Amber Kelly and Andrew Gori of SPRING/BREAK Art Show; Justin Baker of Collar Works Gallery; Vanessa Albury, Ivan Gilbert, and William Penrose of NURTUREart; Alexis Wilkinson, the Knockdown Center and BOMB Magazine; Kat Ryals and Lauren Hirshfield of Paradice Palase; Indira Cesarine of Untitled Space, Mariannah Amster and Frank Ragano of Currents New Media Festival; Cory Doctorow at Boing Boing, independent curator Alex Santana; Tiffany Shin and Danielle Wu; and the EST Collective who is Diane Zhou, Son Kit, and Celine Wong Katzman. Finally, thank you to my partner John Driscoll who has steadfastly supported me and my art through the most challenging past couple years of my life. Also thank you for writing music for my videos whenever I need it (I know sometimes I don't give much notice) <3

November 2018

My solo show Three American Bodies at Austin Peay State University will be up through the beginning of December.
Check out additional info and details here.

For the month of November my work will also be on view as part of a group group exhibition at SFA Projects in New York, NY.

I WILL BE YOUR MIRROR
SFA Projects
131 Chrystie St.
New York, NY

THE AHL FOUNDATION 2018 CONTEMPORARY VISUAL ART AWARDS WINNERS EXHIBITION
Artists: Valery Jung Estabrook, Hyunjung Rhee, Myung Gyun You
Curated by Michelle Yun

November 2nd, 2018 — November 25th, 2018
Opening Reception: Friday, November 2nd, 6pm-8pm
more information here

Mid June 2018

I'm very happy to share that I've been selected as the winner of the Gold Award for AHL-T&W Foundation Contemporary Visual Art Awards. The jurors for this year's prizes were Keith Schweitzer, Michelle Yun, and Midori Yoshimoto.

I am deeply grateful for this award and humbled to be recognized alongside the other award recipients, Hyunjung Rhee and You Myung Gyun. 

Thank you to the jurors and AHL Foundation! 

At the start of this week, my Kickstarter campaign for my new series, the ImpeachMint Project, was featured on Boing Boing by Cory Doctorow!

And to make things even better, we're only halfway through our funding period but have already reached our funding goal. Thank you to everyone who pledged and helped spread the word!

If you would like to get your own "Collusion Coin" there's still plenty of time. Just head on over to my Kickstarter page to pledge and claim yours. All funding that comes in above and beyond our goal will go towards costs associated with creating the next coin in the series. 

Summer 2018 Shows

Hand Held
Auxiliary Projects
212 Norman Ave, Brooklyn
May 11 - June 17
Sat & Sundays 1-6pm

Auxiliary Projects is pleased to present Hand Held, a solo exhibition by Valery Jung Estabrook, on view from May 11 – June 17, 2018. 

Hand Held delves into the experiences of grief, loss, memory, and healing. Painted in pastel hues, the gallery echos a retail skincare boutique — in the real world, a place where immaculate professionals proffer small objects and remedies promising self-care and healing. In Estabrook’s installation, a pristine “beauty bar” counter signifies another kind of aid that aesthetics and science can offer. In works such as “Refresh and Reset” and “Night Mask”, Estabrook displays candy-colored, palm-sized sculptures in the shape of makeup compacts in department store vitrines. When held in a viewer’s bare hand, videos spontaneously play inside the silicone sculptures, each miniature screen presenting imagery mined from Estabrook’s memories following her father’s death last year. When Estabrook returned to her home in Taos afterwards, she was inspired by the natural beauty of the Southwest, its abundant life and dramatic skies, to focus her creativity on her emotional restoration. This exhibition is the result of that process.

Displaying artifacts of pain and relief in a retail setting, Estabrook’s installation also reminds us what the word ‘consume’ means outside of it: when we are consumed by grief, we soothe ourselves however we can, covering the lacerating sand grains with pearl.

Estabrook’s single-channel videos play on the surrounding gallery walls, each featuring hands continuously reaching out toward the viewer. In “My Hands are Medicine,” Estabrook’s mother’s voice repeats the title phrase in Korean, “Nae soni yakseonida,” something she would often say to comfort the artist when she was feeling unwell.

The sense of touch is a central theme in Hand Held, even when no touching occurs. The use of electronics in the gallery —  emotional connections over a distance, triggered by touch — bring this concept to full flower. This touch without contact refers to the loss of the physical body in death while also providing consolation to viewers for whatever personal pain they may be feeling. Instead of art’s general inclination to offer questions, this exhibition presents potential solutions.  Heaven knows we are all in need of a comforting gesture.

Read more about the work at Auxiliary Projects' website

Thinly Worn at CURRENTS NEW MEDIA FESTIVAL
Santa Fe, NM
Opening weekend June 8-10

El Museo Cultural de Santa Fe
555 Camino de la Familia, Santa Fe, NM
full dates June 8 - 24

This June I'll be exhibiting additional mask works from Thinly Worn for Currents New Media Festival in Santa Fe, New Mexico. Currents is a huge annual, citywide new media art event. The Festival brings together the work of established and emerging New Media artists, from New Mexico, the US and the World, for events showcasing interactive and non-interactive installations, multimedia performances, VR and AR environments, single channel video, animation, experimental documentary, web based/app art forms, robotics and 3D printing. 

There will be events throughout the entire opening weekend, plus many more performances, talks, and presentations throughout the month. So much in fact, that there's too much for me to list here - Check out the full calendar.

And if you're thinking of visiting Currents and Santa Fe give me a shout!
 

Morir Soñando at the Knockdown Center
Opening reception
Friday, June 22nd 6-9pm

52-19 Flushing Ave, Maspeth, NY
full dates June 22 – August 19

Knockdown Center is pleased to present Morir Soñando, a multimedia group exhibition on view June 22 – August 19, 2018. Artists Penn Eastburn, Valery Estabrook, Hein Koh, Kristianne Molina, Onel Naar, Esther Ruiz, Cristina Tufiño, and Woolpunk engage with softness and vulnerability in their work addressing contemporary social and political issues. Curated by Alex Santana.

The exhibition’s title, Morir Soñando, is borrowed from the popular Dominican beverage made of orange juice and milk. When combined with the acidity in the juice, and if not made at the proper temperature or mixed with a particular rhythm, the milk has the potential to curdle. A careful, soft choreography is necessary to infuse two unlikely ingredients in delicious harmony.

The delicate process of making morir soñando, and its resistance to easy preparation and consumption parallels the artists’ use of materials. Working acrosspainting, sculpture, textiles, and video, each artist approaches difficult subject matter such as racial tensions, gender-based violence, neocolonial trauma, and environmental concerns, but do so in subtle, soft ways, employing care and attention to their engagement with materials. Together, the works included articulate the potential of vulnerability as a tool for liberation.

Twinkies, Wasps, and Avatars
Single Channel: Video Art Festival
Sunday May 13th, Doors 2pm, Screening 2:30pm

At Anthology Film Archives
32 2nd Ave, New York, NY 10003
Free and open to the public

My video Twinkies, Wasps, and Avatars will be screening as part of NURTUREart's Single Channel Video Art Festival! There are two programs (May 12th and 13th, both 2pm) and my work will be included in the Sunday, May 13th program. Both are FREE to attend (yay!).

Each 60 minute screening will be followed by a conversation with participating artists.

Single Channel 2018 is a video art and short film festival that will screen the work of 19 artists. The festival, with a focus on emerging and under-represented artists, provides the context for single channel video work and short film to be screened outside of exhibition spaces in a more suitable context. NURTUREart’s Single Channel offers uninterrupted and undisturbed viewing and listening experiences to come to full fruition—acknowledging the exceptionality of video art and short film by presenting them on a large screen. Participants are selected through a free open call. 

Saturday, May 12 Program
featuring works by Rob Carter, Fiona Cashell, Michael Hanna, Franck Lesbros, Dana Levy, Cole Lu, Jeremy Olson, Mauricio Saenz, Jan Staller, Ezra Wube

Sunday, May 13 Program
featuring works by Collin Bradford, Valery Jung Estabrook, Autumn Knight and Chelsea Knight, Katy McCarthy, Mores McWreath, Joiri Minaya, Bárbara Oettinger, Rachel Rampleman, Hidemi Takagi
 
Curated by Vanessa Albury, Ivan Gilbert, and William Penrose. 

Cardinal Planes at Gallery Korea
Korean Cultural Center New York
460 Park Ave, 6th Floor, NYC
May 16 - July 7

A few of my works from Thinly Worn will be exhibited in Cardinal Planes, a group show at the Gallery Korea.  In this exhibition “cardinal planes” are used for psychological self-examination as humans living in the contemporary world. In today’s society, individuals are no longer categorized or limited to certain roles. If there were any limitations in actions that we could take in the past, no longer are we restricted today. With the infinite potential of the cardinal planes, innumerable postures, stances, and directions can be made via the coordinates. Though the chances of inner conflict or even confusion may rise, we have gained more freedom now than ever in choosing who we would like to be. 

Other exhibiting artists include Tae Eun Ahn, Alexis Avlamis, Namwon Choi, Alice Gaskon, Jisook Kim, June Kim, Christina Massey, Sidhi Rajesh Parikh, Avani Patel, Goeun Seo, Ritu Sinha, and Kazaan Viveiros.

April 2018

My immersive installation Hometown Hero (Chink) will be on view until April 28th at Collar Works Gallery in Troy, NY as part of a group show, Transactional Days curated by Justin Baker. Performing + exhibiting artists include: Ed Atkeson, Lionel Cruet, Valery Jung Estabrook, Rachel Frank, Hana van der Kolk and Jack Magai.

The 45th President of the United States, Donald Trump, has been described as a transactional president; a man who can produce results. However a transaction is more than an end result or an exchange of commerce. More generally, a transaction is a communicative action or activity involving two parties or things that reciprocally affect or influence each other.

In this hyper-political, partisan, media saturated environment we currently live in, artists are tasked ever further with the choice of looking inward or outward. While the public voice is one of dissent, the private voice may be discordant, which in some ways is more confounding. The artists in Transactional Daysnegotiate this balance of the public and private by inviting the viewer to engage with them through theatre, performance and installation.

Though navigating these two streams is the job of the artist, ultimately these works rely on the viewer to determine the net outcome. Transactional Days wishes to look at the various ways that we as a society are currently communicating and influencing one another. The artists invite the viewer to intensively engage with them and the questions they are asking. 

February - March 2018

This spring is shaping up to be very busy!

I have new work in a group show at Paradice Palase in Brooklyn, New York. It Just Sort Of Happens One Day will open on Friday February 24th. PARADICE PALASE is a curatorial project powered by crowdfunding. Please consider making a contribution - those who donate can choose a gift from a selection of artwork by the participating artists (and more). It's a great way to support this artist-centric gallery while also scoring some affordable art.You haven't yet made a donation, please consider doing so here - in return you can choose from affordable art by the participating artists (including me :) ). Whether or not you are able to donate, come out to the opening and show us some love <3

In mid March I will be showing my installation Hometown Hero (Chink) at Collar Works Gallery in Troy New York. The show is set to open the third week of March, more details to follow here soon.

And finally, plan to see SPRING/BREAK Art Show in New York! Details are above on how to get a ticket.

The summer is shaping up to be busy too, but I'll wait to announce more here in a few weeks. Thanks everyone for all the support and interest!!

January 2018

One Year of Resistance
My work Miss America will be included in One Year of Resistance at The Untitled Space in Tribeca, New York. The show includes more than 80 artists and is curated by Indira Cesarine. The show will be on view until February 4th. Thank you to Widewalls and Quiet Lunch for featuring my work!

It Just Sort of Happens One Day
Two new works of mine will be included in an upcoming show by Paradice Palase in Brooklyn, NY alongside works by Nick Alciati, David Nelson, Tiffany Smith, Estefania Velez, and Eleni Zaharopoulos. 

It Just Sort of Happens One Day expands the adage of "feeling like a stranger in your own home" - what does home mean to each of us; can we ever experience it the same as in our youth; does it ever truly exist how we believe it to be?

December 2017
Some very exciting things have happened this fall/winter that I'm happy to share. I was recently interviewed by Kevin West (author of Saving the Season) for the December "Art Issue" of Surface Magazine. Two of my paintings from my 2013 painting series "Food Porn" are featured. You can read the full article here.

My video Beautiful Face was screened at the 2017 LA Underground Film Forum in November. Thank you to everyone who came out to support this growing community of experimental film and video artists.

Right now I have a few pieces from my installation "Hometown Hero (Chink)" on view at the Shenandoah Valley Art Center for their annual juried exhibition, Subversive | Domestic. This exhibit is an exploration of modern textiles, featuring works by artists working in the medium in unexpected ways. It will be on view to the public until January 20, 2018.

September 2017
A short while ago my work was featured in two pop up shows, both in Brooklyn. The first, The Incubator at COLONY Studios curated work from my "How to" video series as part of their HYPERREALISM exhibition. The Incubator was founded last year with the purpose of creating a space where photographers can achieve projects and have a better understanding of the image in current society.

BODY FARM at Paradice Palase also became a reality, where I joined other new media and video artists Yaloo, Frank Yefeng Wang, Jonathan Sims, and James Brehm. You can still catch the online version of the exhibition which also includes Casey Kauffmann and Mark Sabb of Feltzine, and also see photos and images of the the in-person show. Right now the full length, HD version of Beautiful Face is live on their site, and will be available while the online show is up.

Just in case some of you are halfway around the world, you should know that tomorrow my video "Beautiful Face" will be screened at Channels biennial video art festival in Melbourne at the Australian Centre for the Moving Image. My work is included in Video Visions, Channels’ flagship screening program exclusive to ACMI. Presented over one night, Video Visions is curated from over 470 submissions from artists across the world. Drawing on contemporary positions in video art, the 2017 program presents 17 artists with disparate observations, critiques and reflections on cultural identity, appropriation, gender and shared experiences.

I'm also very happy to learn that my video How to Make an Eggroll was chosen to be screened at BIDEODROMO International Experimental Film and Video Festival in Bilbao, Spain from September 12-28.

You'll also find some of my images and words from Thinly Worn featured in an upcoming print edition of the Brooklyn College Review. There will be a release party and reading at Berl's Poetry shop in DUMBO on October 1st.

June 2017
I'm excited to announce that I'll be part of PARADICE PALASE's 2nd group show, Body Farm, scheduled for this August. Please click over to their Kickstarter page to learn more about their innovative gallery model.

Body Farm embraces digital mediums as the catalyst for a secondary truth. How far does decomposition go before you can no longer recognize something? How far can something be warped and still we can identify? This group show features artists using digital means to explore their practices - included in the show are Wang “Frank” Yefeng, Jonathan Sims, Yaloo, Casey Kauffmann, Mark "Digital" Sabb, James Brehm, and Valery Jung Estabrook

PARADICE PALASE is an “artist-first” model dedicated to getting artists paid for their efforts, a curated series of topics for your consideration, an experiment in the strength of community-driven arts.

March 2017
Thank you to everyone who came out to see my two most recent bodies of work - Hometown Hero (Chink) and Thinly Worn - at SPRING/BREAK Art Show in NYC, curated by the wonderful Debbi Kenote and Til Will of Open House. The reception was incredible, and I'm humbled by the positive feedback and grateful for the meaningful conversations I had with so many people during the run of the show. Open House has a 30-minute interview with me up on their site which explores the themes and background of these two installations.

ARTFCITY, State Of The Union At SPRING/BREAK, by Emily Colucci

“Hometown Hero (Chink) presents a rarely depicted view into the tensions inherent in being Asian American within the American South and I found that electrifying. Art is most compelling when it gives voice to new stories. Making this all the more special, art fairs, which tend to be more akin to a really expensive street fair than a museum experience, don’t often have room for works like Estabrook. Thus, the work’s very existence makes SPRING/BREAK a welcome outlier in the expanse of Armory week.” - Emily Colucci

VICE, Unsettling Anime Masks Exorcise This Artist's Insecurities, by Beckett Mufson

"If human personalities are a collection of characters we play in different situations, Korean-American artist Valery Jung Estabrook is done with 'acting the part.' In a video artwork called Thinly Worn, she escapes the roles institutions in her life expect from her by performing exaggerated versions of herself through therapeutic use of Korean tal masks." - Beckett Mufson  

Artspace, 8 Stand-Out Emerging Artists at SPRING/BREAK, by Will Fenstermaker

"Hometown Hero (Chink), a three-part installation by Valery Jung Estabrook, is dominated by a recliner in the center of the room, upholstered with the pattern of a Confederate flag. “I wanted to make an uncomfortable space with comfortable materials,” Jung Estabrook says, as a way of speaking to the “state of psychological exile” common to immigrants who’ve found home in the American south." - Will Fenstermaker

Artnet, Don’t Miss These Unbelievable Installations at SPRING/BREAK, by Sarah Cascone

“Southern comfort is anything but comfortable in Valery Jung Estabrook’s Hometown Hero (Chink), a full-scale living room replete with a working TV, displaying the artist’s video work. ”Valery is from the South, so there’s definitely a critique of Southern culture, but she’s also Korean-American,’ said co-curator Debbi Kenote of the piece, which attempts to reconcile this dual identity. The soft upholstered surfaces of the work belie the deep-seated, destructive force of racism associated with the Confederate flag, which boldly decorates the room’s cushy reclining chair.” - Sarah Cascone

HAHA Magazine, Our Favorite Rooms at the 2017 Spring Break Art Show, by Ginger Rudolph

ARTnews, Cabinets of Wonder: Spring/Break Offers an Art Menagerie in Former Condé Nast Offices, High Above Times Square, by Barbara A. MacAdam and Robin Scher

Hyperallergic, The Messy, DIY Aesthetic of the Spring/Break Art Show, by Hrag Vartanian

BROOKLYN magazine, Best in Show: Brooklyn at NADA & SPRING/BREAK, By Rachel Miller

VICE, Here's All the New York Art Fair Sh*t You Don't Want to Miss This Weekend, by Beckett Mufson

Bedford + Bowery, Best of Spring/Break: Trump Comics, Disco Queens, and Alcoholtopia, by Nicole Disser

Zmeetsworld, A Night in the Art World in NYC, Zainab Zaheer

ARTnews, A Tour of the 2017 Spring/Break Art Show, By Maximilíano Durón

Curva Magazine, Spring/Break Art Show ’17- New York Recap, by Katrina Rozeville