Kim Gordon’s Solo Show “Count Your Chickens” Lands in Brooklyn

Art — 07.04.26

Words: Moe Wang

For her newly opened solo show at Amant in Brooklyn, Kim Gordon returns to her roots as an artist. Perhaps best known to many as a cutting-edge figure in music—and as the co-founder of the iconic rock band Sonic Youth—Gordon has always seen herself as an artist first. 

Battle for Pastures, 2024. Aquatint etching in frame. Courtesy of Lauren Pakradooni and Amant

Across the 21,000-square-foot space at Amant and its newly inaugurated space at 312 Maujer, Gordon takes center stage in two concurrent exhibitions, “Count Your Chickens” and “Folded Group”. The former is her solo show that brings together mixed media, ceramics, and paintings spanning the past three decades of her practice. Hand-painted names of gentrified Los Angeles neighborhoods on fabrics from her Early Suburbs (2023/2024) and Track Development Community (2021) series echo the urgency of protest banners. Within the gallery’s sterilized space, the works seem to press in on the viewers on the issue’s immediacy; the tension feels striking. 

In Proposal for a painting (2022), the artist overlays digital scribbles onto an iPhone-captured photo of a white-sheeted hotel bed. The seemingly random lines take on meaning as markers of where the privacy of the hotel room collides with its impersonal nature. Airbnb Series (2019) feels relevant in a similar vein, tracing the fleeting presence of bodies within the temporarily occupied interiors. Here, sparse pencil sketches and soft brushstrokes in red, black, and gold lightly etch female nudes on tracing paper—their swift rendering suggesting movement and transience.

Untitled, Wolf Eyes Lathe, 2023. Etched and painted on lathe cut record. Courtesy of Nate Young and Amant

 

Untitled Britney, 2021. Courtesy of Alivia Zivich and Amant

Meanwhile, a group show co-curated by Gordon and Bill Nace, her partner in the experimental band Body/Head, unfolds in the new 1,400-square-foot space at the rear of Zoli restaurant. “Folded Group” brings together paintings, woven tapestries, sculptural noise instruments, and more by nineteen artist-slash-musicians. Featuring works by Lizzi Bougatsos, Dan Greenwood, John Olson, and Alivia Zivich, among others, the exhibition reflects how music and visual art converge—folding into and informing one another.

Folded Group exhibition poster. Courtesy of Bill Nace and Amant

 

On view until August 16 at Amant, learn more about Kim Gordon’s Count Your Chickens exhibition and plan your visit online.