I was thinking a lot about longing, feeling cut off from the world, and also the way everyone was watching each other from afar with a sort of insatiable desire to report wrongdoing. …All of this started to make its way into the work and this painting in particular—the ways we were watching the outside world those first few weeks of lockdown, sometimes with longing, at other times rage and indignation, and then stretches of disorienting disbelief. – Laura Krifka   

Luis De Jesus Los Angeles is very pleased to announce Unreachable Spring, a group exhibition opening on Saturday, October 17, 2020, from 3:00 to 7:00 p.m., and on view through the end of the year. Participating artists include June Edmonds, André Hemer, Laura Krifka, Kambui Olujimi, Edra Soto, and Peter Williams. 

Unreachable Spring takes its title from the eponymous painting by Laura Krifka. The painting was slated to be featured as the sole work in her first Viewing Room on the gallery website, accompanied by an essay by the writer and art critic Andrew Berardini.  Laura began the painting in late March—within days of the start of the Covid lockdown in the U.S., and shortly after learning that she and her husband were expecting their first child.  By summer it had become clear to us that it was the lede for a deeper exploration of ideas and subject matter.  Over many months we watched as the Covid-19 pandemic transformed the world and like an earthquake of biblical proportions exposed the fragile fissures of our deteriorating human ecosystem, turning one crisis into many.  As the author Daniel Susskind writes in Life Post-COVID-19, "This crisis is focusing our collective attention on the many injustices and weaknesses that already exist in how we live together. If people were blind to these faults before, it is hard not to see them now."  These crises have also inspired artists to respond in kind, prompted by a desire to take refuge in their work and address this transformational moment in their own personal way.  By creating art that inspires contemplation and elicits discourse these paintings, sculptures and photographs bear witness and provide a record of how these artists have experienced life over these past six months.   Individual artist statements and Andrew Berardini's essay will be included in their entirety as wall text in the gallery, in the exhibition page for Unreachable Spring on our website as well as in Laura Krifka’s Viewing Room.