LENORE TAWNEY
INCLUDED IN ‘GREATER THAN THE SUM: PRACTICES OF GATHERING, REUSE, AND ASSEMBLAGE’, JOHN MICHAEL KOHLER ARTS CENTER, SHEBOYGAN, US: OPENING 24 OCTOBER
24 October 2026 – 7 February 2027
The artists included in the group exhibition Greater Than the Sum: Practices of Gathering, Reuse, and Assemblage each utilise practices of gathering, reuse, and assemblage. Through sculpture, fibre, found objects, and collected materials, they demonstrate how a component’s value is not found solely in its advertised or initial use, but in its ability to connect in countless ways with other beings, ideas, and objects to create complex, stronger, and richer collectives and meanings.
Working with materials carrying rich and often unknowable histories, the artists create physical manifestations of the relationships between material, cultural, and environmental experiences and histories. Their works reveal practices rooted in observation, collection, collaboration, and transformation.
The exhibition includes Lenore Tawney’s gathered materials, collaged boxes, and assemblages drawn from her studio practice; environmentally focused assemblages by Carolina Caycedo; spiritually charged sculptures by Arthur Simms; wrapped fiber works by Judith Scott; and Kea Tawana’s custom-built trunks and systems of organisation. Together, the artists offer a range of models for connection, steeped in community and environmental contexts.
Through their artworks and artistic practices, the artists demonstrate the transformative and empowering nature of coming together, of beings and things, with our various stories, experiences, skills, and strengths. In this vein, artistic practices of gathering and reuse demonstrate that an interconnected assemblage, community, or ecosystem embodies a vaster potential value—that is, Greater Than the Sum of its parts.