2013 FOCAFellowships

Fellows of Contemporary Art is pleased to announce the 2013 FOCAFellowships. This year artists Hilja Keading, T. Kelly Mason and Kori Newkirk were selected to receive an unrestricted grant of $10,000 each.

A biennial artist grant program begun in 2006, the FOCAFellowships have already supported eight mid-career artists holding an important place in the California community. For this round, a pool of 28 artists were nominated by three California Curators.

Fellows of Contemporary Art will host an exhibition celebrating Hilja Keading, T. Kelly Mason and Kori Newkirk at the FOCA Exhibition Space located at 970 N. Broadway in Mandarin Plaza in Los Angeles’ historic Chinatown from July 27 to August 30.

Artists

Hilja Keading		Hilja Keading received her BFA and MFA from UCLA. Her work investigates connections between literal, symbolic, and mythical realities, while considering parallels between comedy and tragedy. Her videos and video installations have been exhibited in definitive exhibitions including the Getty Museum’s California Video and the Museum of Modern Art’s Avant Guard Video, The First 25 Years. She has shown work at MOCA, the Hammer Museum, LACMA and the Japanese American National Museum in Los Angeles; the Henry Museum in Seattle; the Bass Museum in Florida; The Biennale of Art in Lyon, the Pomona College Museum of Art, the Long Beach Museum of Art, and multiple national/international galleries.
T. Kelly Mason		T. Kelly Mason is a sculptor, sound artist and image maker from Los Angeles, California. His work examines the representational and constructed aspects of social space. Mr. Mason’s work is included in several collections including MOCA and the Hammer Museum in Los Angeles, the New York Public Library and the Whitney Museum of American Art in New York, Sammlung Schurmann in Berlin and the Centre Georges Pompidou in Paris. He is currently an adjunct assistant professor at the Art Center College of Design in Pasadena and is represented by Cherry and Martin in Los Angeles and Galerie Catherine Bastide in Brussels.
Kori Newkirk		Kori Newkirk lives and works in Los Angeles. His works explores culture as an alchemist might, using culture as a raw material to manipulate and shape, forging something new; he transforms everyday materials into loaded signifiers. He received his BFA from the School of the Art Institute of Chicago in 1993 and his MFA from the University of California, Irvine in 1997. Recent group shows include Blues for Smoke at MOCA, Skyscraper: Art and Architecture Against Gravity at the MCA in Chicago, Uncertain States of America at the Astrup-Fearnley Museum of Modern art in Oslo, and the Whitney Biennial 2006 Day For Night. His work was the subject of a ten-year survey at the Studio Museum in Harlem and the Pasadena Museum of California Art. He has had solo shows at the MCA, San Diego, and the MCA, Cleveland, as well as The Project NY and the Jessica Silverman Gallery in San Francisco.
Leah Ollman	Art Writer, Los Angeles Times and Art in America.