a garden in a vase, echoes

Press Release

Nicelle Beauchene Gallery is pleased to present a garden in a vase, echoes, a project space exhibition with Leslie Baum.

“[Leslie Baum] is not wedded to a particular material or process. Her interest in remaking the same form… arises from her curiosity about the relationship between perception and apprehension–how we see what we see–while her use of different mediums expands the historical definition of painting.” John Yau, 2017

In the spring of 2020, Baum’s garden was flourishing. Hellebores, snakeshead fritillaries, black parrot tulips, bishop’s cap, bluebells, snowdrops, scented geranium, lily of the valley, violets. All seemed to bloom at once, drawing in bees, butterflies, and neighborhood passersby. Seeking an alternative to going to her studio during the pandemic lockdown, Baum took clippings from her garden to make tabletop bouquets from which she would paint daily for the next year. a garden in a vase, echoes is an exhibition of new paintings and ceramic sculptures that draw from an archive of botanical watercolor paintings started during the pandemic lockdown.

Rendered abstractly with an energetic palette, a garden in a vase, echoes, features botanically inspired paintings that reveal Baum’s interest in the potential of small gestures. Her intimate still-life paintings yield lush, sweeping landscapes that also supply the shapes and colors explored in her ceramic assemblages.

Baum works in installation, animation, ceramics, and painting. Her practice is iterative and archival, with each project flowing into the next, recalling the version that came before. Equally inspired by the giants of art history as she is by work made by non-artist friends, she frequently revisits work to gain new perspectives. Baum states, “Like a migratory bird and its nesting ground, I repeatedly return to the same paintings—my own, art historical, and now within my ongoing Plein Air Project, watercolors painted by friends, peers, and colleagues. This process pushes me to gain a deeper understanding of what might otherwise become familiar, stale, and even invisible.” a garden in a vase, echoes is the fourth exhibition exploring this body of work, and the first time it will be shown in New York.

Since 2017 Baum has maintained a practice of plein-air painting, inviting friends—artists and non-artists—to paint from nature in local parks and gardens. The painting dates are an exercise in presence, intimacy, connection, and the observation of nature’s forms and cycles—all concepts that inform Baum’s practice overall. The exhibition will be accompanied by a publication designed by HOUR with an essay by Raven Falquez Munsell.

Leslie Baum’s (b. 1971, NJ) painting practice is invitational in nature and informed by her long tenure as museum educator at the Art Institute of Chicago. Baum received her BA from the University of Vermont and studied abroad at the Glasgow School of Art. Her drawings and paintings are in permanent collections of the Art Institute of Chicago and the Elmhurst Art Museum. Baum's exhibitions have been reviewed extensively, including in Artforum, Art in America, Hyperallergic, New City, and the Chicago Tribune. She received residencies at Watershed Center for Ceramic Arts, Maine; the Nido project in Monte Castello di Vibio, Italy; Yaddo, Saratoga Springs, NY; and the Vermont Studio Center. A 2020 grant funded the creation of pleinairarchive.com, a site documenting her ongoing painting social practice.

In 2023, Baum was named one of 50 key members of Chicago’s art scene by New City Magazine. Recent solo exhibitions include ordinary awe, Goldfinch, Chicago (2024); for IRIS and Other Flowers, Compound Yellow, Chicago (2023); The Plein Air Project, Wege Center, Maharishi International University, Fairfield, IA (2022); An Instrument in the Shape of A Woman, Chicago Cultural Center, Chicago (2022); and A Garden in a Vase, the Drawing Room at The Arts Club of Chicago (2022). Participation in recent group exhibitions includes Friendship’s Death, Andrew Rafacz Gallery, Chicago (2023); Nido, organized by Michelle Grabner, Monte Castello Di Vibio, Italy (2022); Wheel of Life, organized by Scott Wolniak, Hyde Park Art Center, Chicago (2022); and Plain Air, Carrie Secrist Gallery, Chicago (2021).