… Your house is your larger body. It grows in the sun and sleeps in the stillness of the night; and it is not dreamless.

… And though of magnificence and splendour, your house shall not hold your secret nor shelter your longing. For that which is boundless in you abides in the mansion of the sky, whose door is the morning mist, and whose windows are the songs and the silences of night.”

-Khalil Gibran, The Prophet

Beginning June 21st, 2024, Grove Gallery will be proud to show Adam Stoner’s latest solo exhibition: “Your House is Your Larger Body.” In this collection of new and recent work, dreamlike architectures entwine with religious iconography. Pilgrimage paths meander above the town; a tangle of wooden scaffolding entraps a shadowed form; and noble saint George binds a roiling serpent. But the text of this myth — a story of cities, perspective, winding streets and grand arches — has been smoothed over and polished. The subject of the icon has been covered with a cloth.

Drawing on the forms of Romanesque cathedrals, the empty cityscapes of Giorgio De Chirico, and the cryptic scenes of early monastic painter Fra Angelico, this work gestures toward the archaic; yet the sleek, untextured surfaces call to mind computer renderings, unmoored from place and culture. In the time-based work, sand takes the shape of walls and doors, appearing to breathe and transform of its own volition.

Adam Stoner (b. 1989) received his Master of Fine Arts in Intermedia Studies from the University of Wisconsin Milwaukee in 2019, and his BA in Studio Art and Theater from Williams College in 2011. Stoner is the recipient of UWM’s Chancellor’s Graduate Student Award, Layton Fellowship, and Williams College’s Gilbert W. Gabriel Prize in Theater. Originally trained in theatrical scenic design, Adam’s research frequently explores the language of space, the latent agency of materials, and the architectures—visible or invisible— which resonate endlessly in our daydreams. Adam lives and works in Milwaukee; he teaches drawing at UWM’s Peck School of the Arts.

OPENING: Friday, June 21, 2024, 5-9 PM
Open for Gallery Night and Day:
July 19 (5-9 PM) & July 20 (12-4 PM), 2024
CLOSING: Saturday, August 3, 2024, 12-4 PM
Gallery Hours: Saturdays, 12-4 PM

For more information, visit: adamjamesstoner.com; on Instagram: @adamjamesstoner