PLAYNTINGS: un[bound] features hybrid combinations of painting, drawing, and dimensional constructions by Lily Kuonen. She is an Arkansas native, born in the kitchen of her parent’s house, and from her experiences has learned to stretch and repurpose materials, alter forms to connect to place, and respond to surrounding visual and temporal cues through site-responsive works. She constructs layered and at times oppositional surfaces that rely on optical interplays. These visual sources are paired conceptually with forms that explore temporality, fragility, pressure, balance, comfort, interdependence, desire, and self-reliance. The work spans the space of the gallery from the ceilings, walls, and floors, at a full range of scale from both intimate to more expansive. 

Lily Kuonen received her MFA from Savannah College of Art and Design. Currently she is Associate Professor of Art and Foundations Coordinator at Jacksonville University, Florida. Her work has been included in numerous group juried and invitational exhibitions (over 50 in the last five years) both nationally and internationally including: Sarah Smith Gallery, Yale University; Phoenix Institute of Contemporary Art, AZ; Atelier Gallerie, Lacoste, France; Bargehouse, London; Bakehouse Art Center, FL; Lovey Town, WI; BOCA Museum of Art, FL; The Arlington Arts Center, VA. Kuonen has recently traveled throughout the US and abroad, completing a summer long artist residency in Lacoste, France, and thus far, in 2017 she adds four more solo shows to her roster. Kuonen regularly contributes interviews and exhibition reviews for BURNAWAY Magazine in Atlanta, GA. 

Kuonen writes, "PLAYNTING, a self-prescribed moniker and philosophy for my studio production, involves the synthesis of painting with additional forms, materials, surfaces, and actions (PLAY + PAINTING). I explore visual relationships and material interactions to construct layered and at times contradictory or oppositional surfaces. I respond to visual and structural cues around me, and layer these references with symbolic concepts related to interpersonal relationships, observed cultural paradoxes, and personal desires. These cross-categorical works explore intermediacy, the state of being in between, in order to challenge, subvert, or exploit beyond a base structure of meaning. Within a standard language of form and familiar material, I equalize the purposes of these materials, and a chance for hybridization occurs. It is no longer how one surface is on top of the other, but rather how each is related to the other. This playful integration enables interpretation and promotes interaction through optical interplays of media."