EXPO Chicago 2025

The Contemporary Art Modern Project is pleased to announce their attendance to EXPO Chicago 2025, with a showcase of solo artist Milton Bowens at Booth 222. The fair opens April 24 - 27, with the VIP viewing day on April 24th. You can purchase tickets by clicking the link below. CLICK HERE TO BUY TICKETS  The scholar Henry Louis Gates Jr, for years has been exploring and researching the ‘roots’ of people in the United States through his series “Finding Your Roots.” One thing the viewer repeatedly witnesses is the inability of a selection of guests to find connections before 1865. Records have been found showing possible ancestors among asset listings, censuses and wills. Links have been found in last names of property holders to family names, forging associations solely on assumption, or best guesses. By the end of each episode we can see how this looks, on paper, as some guests are given their family tree, with named relatives going back centuries, to other guests effectively being short changed simply because history has forgotten their ancestors, or never even named them. The goal of this series is to explore the complexities of one’s current identity and how history (or the lack of) mold the individual.  Dealing in layers, Milton Bowens aims to balance documentation with storytelling. Building his mixed media compositions drives him to not only seek answers to questions but also to record and remove filters embedded in the writings and accounting of those who write and control history. Considering the dehumanizing effect of record keeping in archives,  the reduction of person ship by the select and filtered records, Bowens juxtaposes these documents with the hidden history, the not so apparent effects of generations caught in a scenario of invisibleness. Bowen’s focus then is to expose for some, educate for others on what historical records do show. Yes, documents of the selling and bondage of humans do exist, but what is not crystal clear is how that history, coupled with the loss of ancestral names and lives continues to seep into this present.  Bowens also plays with ideas of pop culture and consumption by superficially, it initially seems, to polarize contemporary icons against backdrops of greatness, efficiency and trauma. Considering They Not Like Us (2024) we find Kendrick Lamar standing alongside Mt. Rushmore, looking off into the distance contemplating just how unlike these founders and American greats are to him, one assumes.  The work, like Lamar’s Super Bowl performance is laden with symbolism becoming almost as code for those who can read it, just as the rights that symbolically stand at Rushmore are not necessarily decipherable for all.  Added to the above, Bowens by using images of his heroes, sometimes mass produced (suggesting consumption, which in and of itself is symbolic), placing them on canvas or paper, scarring that medium with text that, on occasion, assaults the viewer - is in effect elevating the station of those realities into what we call - Art. That art then is collected, placed on walls serving not just as the record, but also becoming an object of pride.   The artist as the witness of the failings of society is not a new phenomenon, but it is a focus of a select few - beginning with Realism in the 19th century, found on occasion in Pop Art, but is firmly ensconced in the contemporary. Milton Bowens does draw from the ideology of these movements but uses a language that is seeped in moments of contradictions. He feeds a hunger found in not being able to find oneself in a society where the historical reality does not afford universal associations. His action is to claim, create and curate an experience with his work where a contrasting reality is reality.