Opening First Friday, August 6, 5-8 PM / Exhibiting in the Main Gallery through August

Visit in-person during open hours: MON-SAT 10 AM to 6 PM, SUN 12 PM to 4 PM
Or browse and shop online via our Virtual Gallery beginning Tuesday, August 9: https://www.zootownarts.org/shows-events/galleries/virtual-gallery.html

*This show contains mature content which could be triggering. Viewer discretion is advised.

The ZACC is excited to host works by Aubrey Pongluelert and Mickey Haldi in our Main Gallery for the month of August, with an opening reception on First Friday, August 6, from 5 to 8 PM.

In her own words, Aubrey’s show, Pulling Yellow, “is the [partial & ongoing] story of my relationship with B. B who is burning yellow, who is bulimia, who is body.

the visual processing of this relationship has worked to bring recognition & embodiment to its [painted over] layers of roots & expressions - hunger & consumption, blood & bile, control & comfort, isolation & communion, emptiness & relief, taking & giving [up], shame & love, need & desire, disconnection & connection. all of which exist together, [making B, me & me, B] & many of which exist in each of our stories & relationships.

while this series uses color to attempt an untangling of a tangled relationship, pulling at yellow [like any thread] has only pulled at every other color, revealing the weaving & knotting that, in the end, render the palette a magnificent, muddy mess of relations beyond [connected to] our own. which is to say that though the creative intention behind this series is to reflect, process & find clarity in my story, its purpose is perhaps simply to share – to serve as a reminder that our yellows keep us in company, connecting us.

& as is true for any story, it is still in process.”

Aubrey is a Thai-American artist, food grower, and community organizer living on stolen Selis and Ktunaxa lands (Missoula, MT). Aubrey received her BA in Studio Art & Environmental Studies from Oberlin College, and her MS in Environmental Studies: Sustainable Food and Farming from the University of Montana. Aubrey's passion and work centers around the interconnections between food sovereignty, creative eco-storytelling, and intersectional ecofeminism. She finds delight in running fingers through bags of seeds, embroidering while listening to Joni Mitchell, and jumping into alpine lakes.

Mickey Haldi, whose show is titled ‘between you and me’, is a painter creating work in Missoula, Montana. The Pacific Northwest has always been home to them, having also lived in Boise, Idaho and Bellingham, Washington. The latter is where Haldi really interested in pursuing a life full of paint. Something about rainy days spent inside forced the artist to reflect on issues pertaining to identity, specifically, what it means to exist in such boundless perimeters while simultaneously experiencing societal constraints, norms, and unspoken rules.

As a non-binary, queer, and neurodivergent person, navigating the self and its response to given environments is an overarching investigation in Haldi’s paintings. More specifically, they are asking broad questions: “What does it mean to be me at this intersection? What does it mean to be you at yours?” Haldi has been a contributor to the arts scene in Missoula since 2015, exhibiting solo and in group settings and working in arts settings like Zootown Arts Community Center and The Montana Museum of Art and Culture.

Haldi aspires to sustain a lifelong journey as a practicing artist.