HERE LIES SPACE April 4th-May 11th work by Robert Burnier, Aron Gent, Heather Mekkelson, Robert Chase Heishman and Jessica Taylor Caponigro An excursion longer than the journey. A mudslide over a mountain pass. A road sign blown over by the wind. Something taken, put back, and taken again. A badly worn fragment of carpet. An archipelago. Aron Gent is an artist, photography printer and art organizer residing in Chicago, IL. He received a degree in photography from Columbia College Chicago. Gent is a co-founder of MDW Fair, Director/Founder of printing/exhibition space DOCUMENT and Board member for the ACRE Residency. His photographic work is built around project-oriented investigations including images of family, familial settings, self, and intimates that are both poignantly quotidian and quietly surreal. Gent’s work is in the collection of the Milwaukee Art Museum and has been exhibited at the Hyde Park Art Center, Houston Center for Photography, Chicago Cultural Center and the Kohler Arts Center. His curatorial experience includes Transparent Reflect (2009), an exhibition of nine artists exploring portraiture and self-portraiture, and Hic et Nunc (2008), a survey of new guard photography. He currently teaches photography at the School of the Art Institute and Columbia College Chicago. Heather Mekkelson lives and works in Chicago. Solo and two-person exhibitions include Now Slices at 65GRAND, Invisible Apocalypse at Roots & Culture; Heather Mekkelson at +medicine cabinet; Limited Entry at Old Gold; Debris Field at threewalls; and Out Land at STANDARD (all Chicago, IL.) Her work has also been in group shows at The Museum of Contemporary Photography (Chicago, IL), The Figge Art Museum (Davenport, IA), The Poor Farm (Manawa, WI), Raid Projects (Los Angeles, CA), and Vox Populi (Philadelphia, PA). Mekkelson's work has been written about in Art Journal, Broadsheet, Time Out Chicago, New City, Chicago Tribune, Artforum.com and others. In 2012 she became an Artadia Award Chicago awardee. Robert Burnier is an artist and writer who lives and works in Chicago. He is an MFA candidate in Painting and Drawing at The School of the Art Institute of Chicago and holds a B.S. in Computer Science from Shippensburg University of Pennsylvania. He is currently represented by Andrew Rafacz Gallery, Chicago, and has shown his work in numerous exhibitions in Chicago, New York, Miami and Los Angeles. He writes for Bad at Sports and Chicago Artist Writers, and has lectured at several Chicago area universities. Born in 1984, Robert Chase Heishman completed his BFA from the Kansas City Art Institute in 2008 and his MFA from Northwestern University in 2012. Utilizing photography, sculpture, and video, his artwork explores self-referentiality, conditions of framing, flatness, and the peripheral. He has collaborated with the Merce Cunningham Dance Company as a Décor Artist on the work, Split-Sides, provided artwork for Icelandic band Sigur Rós’ album BA BA TI KI DI DO, in addition to exhibiting both nationally and internationally. Heishman's work is held in the collections of the Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art and the Walker Art Center. He currently lives and works in Chicago, Illinois. Before receiving her MFA from the School of the Art Institute of Chicago, Jessica Taylor Caponigro attended Bryn Mawr College where she earned her BA in the History of Art. She has taught classes at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago and Olive Harvey College and currently teaches at Harold Washington College. Caponigro is also the director of Andrew Rafacz Gallery. In addition to solo and group shows in Chicago, her work has been exhibited in Long Beach, Philadelphia, and Rome. Her work is in the permanent collections at California State Long Beach and the Joan Flasch Artists’ Books Collection. More of her work can be seen at www.jtaylorcaponigro.com.