Waiting Room functions as
practice and platform;
we exist by virtue of presence.
ABOUT
STAFF
Kristina Johnson, Director
Jehra Patrick, Founder
LOCATION
1900 Columbus Avenue
Minneapolis, MN 55404
Follow driveway to backyard.
HOURS
Closed until
May 2023
CONTACT
gmail. waitingroomart@
instagram. /waitingroomart
Jaysen Hohlen
10.15.22 to 11.12.22
Opening reception 12-5pm on 10.15.22 as part of Twin Cities Art Week!
Drawing from histories of gay neighborhoods in Minneapolis and his father’s forty year career in framing houses in Greater Minnesota, photographer Jaysen Hohlen is developing a body of artwork spanning across multiple photographic genres in order to produce thorough investigations into class, sexual privacy and land use. His research pulls from two sites: the revitalization project of the Minneapolis Gateway District in the 1950s-60s, and current housing projects in Crow Wing County where his family resides and works.
Jaysen Hohlen (he/him) is a Minneapolis-based artist and writer whose works engage contemporary and historic gay cruising landscapes. He graduated from the University of Minnesota with a BFA in Studio Arts in 2019. Hohlen has been the recipient of numerous grants and awards, including the Minnesota State Arts Board Continuous Support for Individuals and the Metropolitan Regional Arts Council’s Next Step Fund. He has given artist talks at The University of Minnesota, Minneapolis College of Art and Design and Company Projects. Hohlen has exhibited locally and internationally at Yeah Maybe, Public Functionary and The Centre for the Periphery. He co-founded and currently runs the project space PAPA.
In your absence
Jeffrey Haddorff and Sophia Munic
10.15.22 to 11.12.22
Opening reception 12-5pm on 10.15.22 as part of Twin Cities Art Week!
In your absence brings together Jeffrey Haddorff and Sophia Munic, two Minnesotan artists in sculptural disciplines. Displaying absence is not easy. There are pitfalls along the way. And on the other hand, calling attention to absence can overwhelm what is being directly presented to you. Can we make the artifact’s presence the focus, rather than the ideas or story we want to tell with it? The melancholic potential this title seems to imply quickly gives way to the drama of Haddorff’s and Munic’s colorful objects. Frank Stella’s famous remark, “What you see is what you see,” a quip that signaled the demise of illusion and metaphor. Artwork in this show shares a bit of this intuitive drive, doesn’t deny the beauty of absence; rather, it draws on the pluralistic presence of time, taking stock of both where sculpture has been and where it is going.
Jeffrey Haddorff (he/him) is an artist, living and working in Northeast Minneapolis. He earned an MFA from the University of Minnesota, a B.A. in Psychology from Saint Olaf College, and studied the History of European Film at Kobenhavns Universitet.
Sophia Munic (they/them) recontextualizes traditional sewing and quilting techniques into sculptures that confront comfort, memory, and gender using a queer lens. They have recently completed a residency at the Kimmel Harding Nelson Center for the Arts in Nebraska; and frequently hosts workshops at the Textile Center in Minneapolis, Minnesota.
Muckout
Guest curated by Mike Curran
July 23rd, 2022 to August 21st, 2022
Water has a way of seeping in. It pools at the window wells and finds cracks in the foundation. Or it rushes in all at once, when the mechanisms we designed to contain it fail—when the channel becomes overrun or the levees break or the sewage line backs up. Once the floodwater is pumped out, the long labor begins to again make a basement inhabitable: throwing out soaked-through belongings, replacing drywall, scraping away the muck carried in with the water. This exhibition is built of that muck. It’s also built of that long labor, and the hope that this place can again be made livable. Read more here!
Featuring
Alejandra Aragón
Tom Bierlein
Jantsankhorol Erdenebayar
Carlos Macías Esparza
Rubén Macías Esparza
Sam Finegold
Maija Hecht
Ann Moody
Angus McCullough
Jonathon Rosemond
Exhibiton booklet, virtual tour and poster designed by Tom Gaasedelen
Images by Jaysen Hohlen
New work from Calvin Hafermann and Sam Dirck
June 4th-July 3rd, 2022
Opening reception June 4th, 2022
5pm-8pm
Just For Us is the first collaborative exchange between artists Calvin Hafermann and Sam Dirck. We are excited to present work from each artist after hosting our first studio residency at Waiting Room’s location on Columbus Avenue.
Engulfed between the shimmering, far-off beauty of one’s ideals and the inarticulate banality in the succession of days. The title is both deeply, viciously self-mocking and cynical, but also earnest in its intimate suggestion. The work displays a demeanor that resembles an aloof geniality, preserving aesthetic ties to Fine Art and Design as much as cosmic hyperbole. Once you delve deeper, past the aesthetics, it's hard not to wish for a few more distinguishing moments to hold onto. Maybe that’s an aspect of the artists, Sam Dirck and Calvin Hafermann’s well-developed gaze toward abstraction: one that sees the futility of overcrowding meaning, both personal and political, acknowledging that prescriptive interpretation is an unbearable alternative. Read more here.
Sam Dirck (he/him) is a visual artist living and working in Saint Paul, Minnesota. Dirck’s studio practice centers around concepts of camouflage, semiotics and simultaneity. He utilizes hard edge abstraction and expressionism to create a slurring of historically formulaic styles of painting. When situated properly, the work depicts a system of layers that oppose and reinforce eachother. Dirck’s work is owned by private collectors across the globe. His first solo show at Waiting Room in 2020, Boredom Fantasy Mimesis, was featured in Art Forum’s Critic’s Picks.
Calvin Hafermann (he/him) is an artist living and working in Minneapolis, Minnesota. Primarily working in sculpture, he is interested in surface as a polyvalent expression of synthetic design as it relates to desire, distraction, intimacy, distance and presence. He received his BFA from the Minneapolis College of Art and Design in 2020.
All images taken by Jaysen Hohlen.
Exhibition by Kristina Johnson
Located within the Otto Bremer Room at the George Latimer Central Library in downtown St. Paul, Minnesota.
January 29th to February 6th, 2022
Link to exhibition text and gallery map
Celebrated for over 135 years, the St. Paul Winter Carnival is one of our nation’s oldest and greatest seasonal traditions. Special events sponsored by major local businesses began in the late 1880s as a way to reinvigorate the spirit of the North during its most desolate months. For the artist Kristina Johnson, the Carnival is a way to connect to her family and their strongly rooted ties to Minnesota’s history. Johnson is the great, great, great granddaughter of Jacob Schmidt, founder of the Schmidt Brewery; and the great granddaughter of Edward G. Bremer, a St. Paul banker who was kidnapped by the infamous Barker-Karpis gang in 1934. This exhibition is a unique display of Johnson’s artwork interwoven with heirloom treasures from her family’s archive, highlighting the multiple generations of relatives who all grew up enjoying the Winter Carnival.
Kristina Johnson is an artist and curator currently living in Minneapolis, Minnesota. She runs Waiting Room, an arts platform that directly supports the cultivation of art and culture within the Twin Cities. Johnson has curated exhibitions exploring critical questions about the relationship of art to abstraction, the environment, social concerns, political issues and theories of identity, individuation, and subjectivation. Her curatorial work has been featured in Artforum’s “Critics’ Picks”; as well as personally featured in local Twin Cities publications such as City Pages, MNDaily, and Star Tribune.
The Saint Paul Winter Carnival is produced by the Saint Paul Festival and Heritage Foundation and is funded by private donations and corporate contributions. The Board of Directors, supported by hundreds of corporate and individual members, employs a full time staff to help plan this community celebration.