Artist Conversation: Jill Mulleady
Join artist Jill Mulleady for a conversation marking the opening of Jill Mulleady: The Passenger —the artist's first solo show at a major museum.
Mulleady’s paintings often depict scenes that are enigmatic and dangerous, showing figures at risk or under threat—from appetite, predation, or compulsion. Her imagery draws actively on painting lineages—allegory and the Baroque, Symbolist unease, the grotesque—recasting genres and canonical images for the present. In contrast to the purity and rationality of 20th-century Modernism, Mulleady prioritizes a tradition in which chaos, instinct, and history drive art making.
The artist will be joined in conversation by David Joselit, Arthur Kingsley Porter Professor in the Department of Art, Film, and Visual Studies at Harvard University; and Giampaolo Bianconi, Dittmer Associate Curator of Modern and Contemporary Art at the Art Institute of Chicago. Together, they will reflect on the works in the exhibition and the ideas animating Mulleady's practice. The conversation will take up questions of painting's role in an era of remediated artistic practices, considering how images travel, transform, and accumulate meaning across contexts.
This program is made possible by the Carol Given Winston Fund for Docent and Patron Education.
About the Speakers If you have any questions about programming, please reach out to museum-programs@artic.edu .
Closed captioning will be available for this program. For questions related to accessibility accommodations, please email access@artic.edu .
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Mulleady’s paintings often depict scenes that are enigmatic and dangerous, showing figures at risk or under threat—from appetite, predation, or compulsion. Her imagery draws actively on painting lineages—allegory and the Baroque, Symbolist unease, the grotesque—recasting genres and canonical images for the present. In contrast to the purity and rationality of 20th-century Modernism, Mulleady prioritizes a tradition in which chaos, instinct, and history drive art making.
The artist will be joined in conversation by David Joselit, Arthur Kingsley Porter Professor in the Department of Art, Film, and Visual Studies at Harvard University; and Giampaolo Bianconi, Dittmer Associate Curator of Modern and Contemporary Art at the Art Institute of Chicago. Together, they will reflect on the works in the exhibition and the ideas animating Mulleady's practice. The conversation will take up questions of painting's role in an era of remediated artistic practices, considering how images travel, transform, and accumulate meaning across contexts.
This program is made possible by the Carol Given Winston Fund for Docent and Patron Education.
About the Speakers If you have any questions about programming, please reach out to museum-programs@artic.edu .
Closed captioning will be available for this program. For questions related to accessibility accommodations, please email access@artic.edu .
Listed by Art Institute of Chicago · last updated today