Sears-Peyton Gallery is pleased to announce a solo-exhibition of Chicago-based artist James Kao. The eight oil paintings on view all reference moments in time. There are moments between dusk and dawn, and there are lengths before and after; but it is the liminal fields between day and night where these paintings are situated-when domestic lights are flipped off and on, when animals stir and prowl, when a wildfire's glow is obscured by provisional light. In Cotton whispers, 2025 the light from a distant cabin glows, emerging in a forest deconstructing before the viewer through geometric gestures.

Kao is also referencing the precarious and changing environment. Western Mountains lay bare the effects of geologic erosion's slow and persistent pace just as much as they reveal the velocity of environmental degradation. A blackbird soaring high sees all this in one fell swoop. The paintings capture our eyes with formal sweeps, but found shapes and considered compositions give way to a kind of intuition. Thunder breaks, and heads turn. These paintings don't ask why, they show us where to look.

James Kao is a Chicago-based artist who makes paintings and drawings. Selected one-person exhibitions include Do it cuz you love it, China Projects, San Francisco, CA; Possible Worlds, Toomey Tourell Fine Art, San Francisco, CA; Domestics, Adds Donna, Chicago, IL; Ways of Worldmaking, Lloyd Dobler Gallery, Chicago, IL, and Starlight, boundary, Chicago, IL. He has attended various artist residencies including: Marina Abramovic Institute-West, San Francisco, CA; White Mountain National Forest Artist in Residence, Center Sandwich, NH; Catwalk Institute, Catwalk, NY; The Alfred and Trafford Klots International Program for Artists, Lehon, France; Trélex Residency, Trélex, Switzerland; and Montello Foundation, Montello, NV. Kao is co-founder and co-director of 4th Ward Project Space in Chicago, IL. Kao holds M.F.A. and B.F.A. degrees from the School of the Art Institute of Chicago and a B.A. in Philosophy from the University of Chicago. He is Associate Professor of Art at Aurora University in Aurora, IL.