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LAURA CRAIG MCNELLIS: INSIDE OUT 1970-2003
March 12- June 4, 2004

press release

Untitled (Boat), c. 1982
Paint on newsprint
20” x 28”

Press release:

Intuit: The Center for Intuitive and Outsider Art will present the exhibition, Laura Craig McNellis: Inside Out 1970-2003 from March 12 through June 4, 2004 at Intuit, 756 N. Milwaukee Avenue.The exhibition is curated by Roger Ricco and Frank Maresca of Ricco/Maresca Gallery, NYC.

Laura Craig McNellis was born in Nashville, Tennessee as the youngest of four girls. Laura lived with her family for 41 years. Her developmental disability prevented her from going to school with her sisters, and instead she watched her mother refurbish a neglected boarding house into a single-family home. Her mother refinished and upholstered furniture, plastered, painted, and decorated much to the amusement of her observant daughter.

Laura began creatively expressing herself with paint and paper by recording objects, peoples, and events in her life. By the time she entered school and workshop employment, her imagery depicted her expanded environment and included subjects such as buildings, cars, and planes. Unbelievably, by the time she was an adolescent, McNellis was a relentless painter and often worked throughout the night. This immense oeuvre was later stored in numerous boxes around the family’s house.

Laura’s work records objects, people and events that surround her. Buildings, cars and airplanes became subjects in her work. In her later work, cutouts and collages show her fascination with structure and function: hangers appear in the collars of buttoned shirts, clothes are painted on both sides. In 1985, Laura’s work stopped. For fifteen years, she didn’t paint, and no one knew if she would ever start again. The artist continues to be represented in museums, galleries, publications, and private collections around the world. She currently works at Studio XI/ Signature Home in Morgantown, North Carolina.

Running concurrently in Intuit’s back gallery through the end of June is Sistuhs: Four African-American Self-Taught Artists. For more information, please contact Intuit at 312.243.9088 or intuit@art.org.