About the Artist

Jacqueline Surdell was born in Chicago, IL. Growing up in a family of athletes and artists, Surdell spent her early life between the court and studio. Surdell played ten years of competitive volleyball and was recruited to play at Occidental College in Los Angeles, CA where she earned her BFA with cum laude honors. Since then, she has created work fusing sculptural installations with performance, painting, and video. Surdell is interested in states of duality, hybridity, and in-betweenness, attempting to both fulfill and disrupt expectations. In this way, her work embraces diverse forms of expression and connections throughout varied works. Surdell earned her MFA from the School of the Art Institute of Chicago (2017). Surdell lives and works in Chicago, IL.

Surdell’s work has been shown at South Bend Museum of Art, Chicago Artist Coalition, Western Exhibitions, Chicago; Union League Club, Chicago; Lithium Gallery, Chicago; Sullivan Galleries, Chicago; Cleve Carney Art Gallery, Glen Ellyn; Boardwalk Gallery, Los Angeles; Weingart Gallery, Los Angeles; and Galerie LeRoyer, Montreal. Surdell was awarded residencies at Ragdale, Lake Forest, IL, Acre Projects, Steuben, Wisconsin, and is currently a Hatch Projects Artist in Residence at Chicago Artists Coalition. 

 

Artist's Statement

I am an interdisciplinary artist and former collegiate athlete. My practice draws from an ideology of rigorous discipline and directed stamina defining my athletic career as a lens for translation, interpretation, and abstraction of the contemporary body. Through sculpture, performance, video, photography, and installation, my work examines the friction between wide-reaching cultural and socio-political narratives defined and complicated by intimate personal histories or encounters.