keeping the candles lit, 2021. Archival inkjet print, 24×32 inches.
Niki Grangruth
BIO
Niki Grangruth (b. St. Paul, MN) is a photo-based artist working in Chicago, IL. Her imagery explores issues of performative gender identity, beauty ideals, and the reinterpretation of art history. Her work is influenced by pervasive archetypes found in cultural texts, art history, mythologies, and folklore. Her work has been exhibited nationally at museums and galleries such as the Center for Fine Art Photography, the Indianapolis Art Center, the Kinsey Institute Gallery, and the Zhou B. Art Center. Grangruth received her B.A. in Studio Art and English from Saint Olaf College in Northfield, MN, and her M.F.A. in Photography from Columbia College Chicago.
STATEMENT
These photos are part of a series that explores the complex relationships between the female body, motherhood, and domesticity through a personal and metaphoric lens. I see the work as a kind of visual poem and use the materials to represent the juxtapositional experiences of motherhood that often occur simultaneously -- traumatic and joyful, chaos and quiet, anxiety and serenity, love and pain, sentimentality and apathy, the beautiful and grotesque just to name a few.
it's all very strange, 2019. Archival inkjet print, 16x24 inches.
sweetbittersweet, 2021. Archival inkjet prints, 32×20 inches.
gentle touch, 2021. Archival inkjet print, 16×24 inches.
the longest day, 2020. Archival inkjet print, 24×32 inches.
preserved, 2020. Archival inkjet print, 24x32 inches.