Yashua Klos

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UTA Artist Space is pleased to present Yashua Klos’ solo show How We Hold It All Together, marking his first exhibition with the venue.

Klos, a Brooklyn-based Chicago native, created this body of work while living in Los Angeles during the pandemic. His works are full of illusionistic depth and space, appearing to be images of sculptural forms built from wood scraps, crystals and brick. Klos’ figures challenge singular notions of identity, as he often merges his own features with those of his models.

“Many of these images are of the family I’ve built throughout my life,” said Klos. “Being raised with very little family, I’ve learned that ‘family’ members are the people who we survive with and for.”

Avoiding direct portraiture, Klos depicts these ‘sculptural models’ of identities as if built from the construction materials of urban detritus. He employs a unique paper construction process by carving into blocks of wood, then inking and printing the relief surface onto archival papers. This source material is then collaged in several layers to create fractured planes.

Klos refers to Chicago’s urban planning for racial segregation through grids and axonometric block forms. Viewers witness heads falling from, and breaking through, grids of wood planks and bricks — as if being born from or negotiating their existence within these building materials.

Yashua Klos is a visual artist who employs a unique process of collaging his own woodblock printed textures to engage ideas about Blackness as an adaptive material for survival strategies. Klos’ work have been shown in museums and galleries across the states and internationally, including the Studio Museum of Harlem, the Weatherspoon Museum, Greensboro, North Carolina, and What If The World in Johannesburg, South Africa, and Tilton Gallery in New York City. Klos’ first solo museum show is in 2022 at the Wellin Museum in Clinton NY. Klos’ works have been reviewed in the NY Times, and he’s been awarded residencies at Skowhegan, The Vermont Studio Center, and Bemis. He is the recipient of a Joan Mitchell Fellowship and a NYFA grant. Klos was born in Chicago, Illinois, and now works from Brooklyn, New York.