OS Projects presents Seams Apparent: Maureen Fritchen & Gina Lee Robbins

Opening Reception Friday, May 3rd from 6 – 9 pm

OS Projects is pleased to present Seams Apparent, featuring paintings by Maureen Fritchen and sculptural objects by Gina Lee Robbins, for its inaugural exhibition. The show opens Friday, May 3 and continues through Saturday, July 13.

In Seams Apparent, Fritchen and Robbins reinvent the byproducts of contemporary, urban life into a new kind of natural reflection. Both artists work intuitively with discarded industrial materials, using unusual techniques to produce startling results.

Fritchen’s abstract landscapes and Robbins’ organic sculptures breathe life into manufacturing waste like rubber, corrugated cardboard, and magazines. Accumulated into a harmonious tension of angles and curves, the narratives of these materials are not entirely hidden, resting just below their irregular surfaces.

Fritchen allows the discarded material to dictate stratum-like forms, building layers that represent a moment in time like geological deposits. For her, waste tells the story of place and the people who live there. As it becomes increasingly minimal and repetitive, Fritchen’s work creates stillness that is elusive in the urban world.

Robbins combines textures to explore the balance between oppositional forces and incongruous ideas. She employs a traditionally feminine set of craft skills on industrial and other found objects, binding, stitching, weaving and assembling, until the original functions of the materials are obscured, and a new form emerges from her hands.

About the Artists

Maureen Fritchen (Racine, WI) produces paintings that investigate the formal aspects of industrial waste and the manner in which these materials create connections to place and people. She has been exhibiting her work in museums, galleries and art centers throughout the Midwest and has had her work featured in several surveys of regional art.

Gina Lee Robbins (Oak Park, IL) is a visual and teaching artist who creates sculptural objects in clay and found materials. Her work has been exhibited in solo, invitational and group exhibitions throughout the United States, including, most recently, a solo exhibit at Northern Illinois University’s Jack Olson Gallery. Robbins’ works are included in private and corporate collections worldwide.

About OS Projects

OS Projects is a contemporary art gallery in downtown Racine featuring visual artists in solo and small group exhibits. The gallery's primary focus is on artists living and working in the Chicago-Kenosha-Racine-Milwaukee urban corridor. While the range of media the gallery presents is broad—encompassing painting, drawing, printmaking, sculpture, photography, video/film and installation—the exhibited artists are unified in their engagement with topical issues, experimentation with materials and processes, and adherence to craft.

The building that houses OS Projects was designed by the award-winning Milwaukee firm, Johnsen Schmaling Architects.

General Information

OS Projects is located at 601 Sixth Street, Racine, Wisconsin. Gallery hours are Thursday - Saturday, 12 - 5 pm, and by appointment. The gallery is also open during downtown Racine First Fridays and other special events. For more information, please visit the gallery website: osprojects.art.