Group Art Exhibition: Alex and Jeremy Ackerman “Just Duet”

Just Duet
Group Exhibition by Alex Ackerman and Jeremy Ackerman

Exhibition Dates:
August 18th, 2025 – Exhibition Opening Day
September 6th, 2025 – Exhibition Closes

Artists’ Statements:

Alex Ackerman:
For as long as I can remember I have found comfort and joy in making things with my hands. Art has helped me process and respond to the beauty and complexity of the world through every phase of life. Now, as an adult, I can see that all my work is in honor of childhood and in dedication to my childhood self, the girl who found pure freedom in creating her own worlds. My paintings are “internal landscapes”, unique environments that reflect a deep love of color, pattern, nature, and play. My visual language draws from my years of experience farming and gardening across the country. I have found infinite pleasure in the simple act of watching plants grow; my hands in the soil, bearing witness to the life cycle from seed to fruit, contemplating the mysteries of clouds, bugs, and steaming piles of compost. The transformative experience of pregnancy and motherhood have also shaped me as an artist, giving new meaning to the concept of “creation”.
For the past twenty years I have constantly sought to balance my roles of mother and artist, finding joy and tears in the process. During the pandemic I shifted my focus from watercolor to acrylic and mixed media. I began gluing fabric scraps onto wood panels, and painting around and over them. Cutting and gluing was grounding and healing in a time of extreme uncertainty. My current work – a series of acrylic and fabric paintings on wood – explores a combination of contrasting themes: wild vs. cultivated landscape, domestic vs. natural environment, order vs. chaos. Each painting seeks harmony and balance in color and composition, texture and pattern. I am especially inspired by folk art, botanical art, aboriginal art, and patchwork quilts. I hope my paintings will stimulate curiosity and encourage the viewer to look at the world with fresh eyes.

Jeremy Ackerman:
The irreverent artist Ray Johnson produced a series of seemingly improvised performances during his career that he referred to as “Throw Away Gestures.” Usually consisting of a few unremarkable objects, Johnson would break down social norms by interacting with these objects in playful yet unsettling ways. These performances were not slick but rather a series of untethered gestures that were meant to surprise those
bearing witness. Simple, uncomplicated, yet full of possibilities. In my most recent series of mixed media cut paper collages, I’ve adapted Johnson’s concept of the “Throw Away Gesture” for two dimensional work. Scribbles became loose forms that were drawn up very quickly; sometimes without even looking at the paper. As the number of my throw away gestures accumulated I would look for interesting relationships between them. The drawn gestures then went through a comically tedious process of being cut out with an x-acto blade. Ultimately, I was left with a collection of forms that were chopped up, reduced, expanded, connected, colored, layered and sometimes actually thrown away.
My lifelong fascination with music played a major role in the aesthetic of these works. Rhythm and color push against each other as the cut out gestures dive, slam, twerk, bounce and pogo; avatars for all the things floating around in my head. In these artworks the viewer might see glimmers of my lived experience of punk rock, doo-wop, death obsession, new age philosophy, hamburgers, boom boxes, spirits in the material world, guilt, divine comedies, garbage collection, aboriginal dreamtime conduits, cosmic jazz and other such additions to a life time laundry list. In the end, these sets of throw away gestures and random rules ushered in a new era of psychedelic storytelling that was in hot pursuit of self actualization.

Artists’ Biographies:

Alex Ackerman:
Alex Ackerman is a mixed media artist who uses color, pattern, and form (both organic and geometric) to create playful and dynamic abstract landscapes. Her artwork has been influenced by her years of experience working on farms and in gardens across the U.S. She is also inspired by folk art, patchwork quilts, abstract expressionism, and the Midwest landscape. Originally from Ann Arbor, Michigan, Ackerman grew up a keen observer of the natural world, knowing from a young age that she would be an artist. She earned her BFA at Massachusetts College of Art, where she explored a variety of media, often incorporating fabric, collage, and found objects into her work. Ackerman has continued her exploration for three decades, maintaining a childlike freedom in her painting while balancing her roles as artist and mother. She has participated in numerous solo and group exhibitions nationally and her work has found a home in many public and private collections. Recent exhibitions include the Iowa State Capitol, Memorial Union Gallery at ISU, and the Dubuque Museum of Art biennial. Her work can be found at Liz Lidgett Gallery and Prairie Lights Bookstore. Alex shares a studio with her husband, Jeremy, in downtown Iowa City.

Jeremy Ackerman:
In the 1990’s, visual artist Jeremy Ackerman attended Massachusetts College of Art in Boston. There he studied unconventional painting and installation with Afro Cuban artist Magadlena Compos-Pons. Heavily influenced by Compos-Pons’ polymathic approach to art making, Jeremy began to explore a multitude of media including drawing, sculpture, film and performance. After moving back to his hometown of Minneapolis at the end of the century, Jeremy continued to create art work while also founding the critically acclaimed eclectic pop group, Walker Kong. During this creative era of music making, Jeremy also began to experiment with cut paper collage. As his cut paper practice developed, so did his vision for what could be expressed with the medium. Jeremy has spent the last two decades creating a body of cut paper work that distills hyperactive movement into eye popping psychedelic dreamscapes.
During the pandemic Jeremy created his most ambitious work to date “Run Run Run (We Could Have Died)!” The first public viewing will be at Octagon Center for the Arts. In addition to growing his visual art, Jeremy recently started a recording studio/ DIY music label, Mouse Traxx Sounds. He is a current member of the music group, Oranj Ruffs, whose debut album was released in June 2024. He lives in Iowa City with his partner Alex, and their two children.