Katrina Majkut, "Kele (Purple Team)"
2023
Mixed media on vintage baseball card
EXHIBITION STATEMENT
The art series Fair Play by feminist and embroidery artist, Katrina Majkut reimagines the classical art practice of miniature portraits in an unlikely form: the baseball card. In Fair Play, Majkut is reinventing who the baseball card worships, values, represents, and celebrates with a little paint and a whole lot of glitter.
The baseball card, a tiny piece of cultural Americana, held the fascination of many American youths including Majkut herself. Kids and kids-at-heart traded and coveted various players to add to personal treasure troves of sports role models and to represent athletic hopes. These mini advertorials taught fans who was important. And considering that those worshipped were all cis, able-bodied, heteronormative men, baseball cards also taught us who was not important. Growing up in Boston’s hardcore Red Sox fandom (#SorryNotSorry New York fans), the Curse of the Bambino was not the only shadow over Majkut’s baseball experience. It never dawned on the young Majkut that she was placing such importance on people who did not represent her and would never welcome her into their ranks.
Fair Play reimagines the world of baseball as a place of healthy acceptance, inclusivity, and diversity; a place to see herself – and anyone who has felt excluded from or a complicated role in men’s professional baseball – as a truly welcomed teammate. Fair Play subverts the toxic masculinity of vintage baseball cards by obscuring the identity of the player, teams, and brands with mediums that have been stereotyped as domestic, feminine, queer, effeminate, and low-end. The new players’ intersectional ambiguity aims to bring balance to baseball’s male-dominated space, especially as women and queer players have been omitted from its history and present-day teams. The joyful cards celebrate all players with the whimsy of beads, sequins, paint, embroidery thread, glitter, and more. Transformed into equitable platforms, the beautiful and inclusive sports cards are now worthy of coveting because they exercise fair play.
ARTIST STATEMENT
My art practice highlights how social traditions affect social and civil rights. I am interested in how the gendered and patriarchal history of painting and embroidery and its limited motifs and representations have contributed to adverse identity politics. I represent the products and/or cultural practices that enable bodily autonomy. Sports are a cultural pastime that help people find strength, power, and health. Yet, American sports, teams and politics are full of biased gender politics that undermine the potential of sports to help people realize bodily autonomy, a sense of strength, self, and community. Historically, textiles and craft materials were used to subvert women’s participation in them by redirecting them to the home and more domestic pursuits. As an artist, I use those stereotyped materials such as beading, glitter, sequins, and embroidery to subvert sport’s toxic masculinity and exclusivity. I apply these materials in a way that converts the sports iconography, equipment, and paraphernalia into more inclusive and celebratory platforms for all athletes and people.
ARTIST BIO
Katrina Majkut (My’kut; She/They), a Ukrainian American visual artist, curator, and writer, is dedicated to understanding how social traditions impact social and civil rights. She uniquely pushes the boundaries of observational painting by using embroidery and craft materials as a painting medium and challenging its inherent social bias and history. Her heavy use of still lifes pioneer new intersectional, fourth-wave feminist strategies, which she calls Boomerang Intersectionalism. One of her most notable series is In Control, which features nearly all modern medical products and procedures related to family planning, reproductive health, and bodily autonomy, has been exhibited in solo and group shows over 40 times across the U.S. Majkut exhibits nationally in both commercial and college galleries, where she lectures on gender, art activism, and textile arts. Majkut was listed as one of four international artists starting a new chapter in feminist art by Mic Media and repeatedly listed as a must-see artist by Hyperallergic magazine.
In 2023, Majkut was part of national news when her artwork, Medical Abortion Pills, along with two other artists’ art, were censored by Lewis-Clark State College administrators in the show she curated called Unconditional Care. Working with the ACLU and National Coalition Against Censorship, Majkut and the artists spoke out against censorship, first amendment violations, and anti-abortion laws.
In 2024, she will have a solo show at the Ukrainian Institute of Modern Art in Chicago and be in a group show titled Get in the Game at SF MoMA. Past recent exhibitions include solo shows at Amos Eno Gallery, Delta State University (MS) and Coker University (SC). Fellowships include the Wassaic Projects Family fellowship, a Forge NYC fellowship, and Bronx Museum AIM fellowship (NY). Selected group exhibitions include the Spring Break Art Show, Bronx Museum Biennial, Every Women NFT Biennial, Dorksy Museum, Museum of Craft and Design (CA), Untitled Space Gallery (NY), AIR Gallery, and the Abortion is Normal exhibit at Eva Presenhuber and Arsenal Gallery (NY). Residencies include Elizabeth Murray/Collarworks, MASS MoCA, Jentel, Feminist Incubator Residency at Project for Empty Space (NJ), and the Social Practice Resident at Emmanuel College (MA). Majkut also co-curated the largest fine arts fundraiser for Ukrainian refugees on Artsy.com raising nearly $400k. Her artwork has recently been seen in The New York Times, Elle Magazine, and The Guardian.
Majkut published her first non-fiction book in 2018, The Adventures and Discoveries of A Feminist Bride, which aims to make weddings more egalitarian. Her art catalogue is in the library at the National Museum of Women in the Arts, D.C. Majkut earned her BA from Babson College and her MFA from SMFA at Tufts University. She lives and works in New York.
2023
Mixed media on vintage baseball card
EXHIBITION STATEMENT
The art series Fair Play by feminist and embroidery artist, Katrina Majkut reimagines the classical art practice of miniature portraits in an unlikely form: the baseball card. In Fair Play, Majkut is reinventing who the baseball card worships, values, represents, and celebrates with a little paint and a whole lot of glitter.
The baseball card, a tiny piece of cultural Americana, held the fascination of many American youths including Majkut herself. Kids and kids-at-heart traded and coveted various players to add to personal treasure troves of sports role models and to represent athletic hopes. These mini advertorials taught fans who was important. And considering that those worshipped were all cis, able-bodied, heteronormative men, baseball cards also taught us who was not important. Growing up in Boston’s hardcore Red Sox fandom (#SorryNotSorry New York fans), the Curse of the Bambino was not the only shadow over Majkut’s baseball experience. It never dawned on the young Majkut that she was placing such importance on people who did not represent her and would never welcome her into their ranks.
Fair Play reimagines the world of baseball as a place of healthy acceptance, inclusivity, and diversity; a place to see herself – and anyone who has felt excluded from or a complicated role in men’s professional baseball – as a truly welcomed teammate. Fair Play subverts the toxic masculinity of vintage baseball cards by obscuring the identity of the player, teams, and brands with mediums that have been stereotyped as domestic, feminine, queer, effeminate, and low-end. The new players’ intersectional ambiguity aims to bring balance to baseball’s male-dominated space, especially as women and queer players have been omitted from its history and present-day teams. The joyful cards celebrate all players with the whimsy of beads, sequins, paint, embroidery thread, glitter, and more. Transformed into equitable platforms, the beautiful and inclusive sports cards are now worthy of coveting because they exercise fair play.
ARTIST STATEMENT
My art practice highlights how social traditions affect social and civil rights. I am interested in how the gendered and patriarchal history of painting and embroidery and its limited motifs and representations have contributed to adverse identity politics. I represent the products and/or cultural practices that enable bodily autonomy. Sports are a cultural pastime that help people find strength, power, and health. Yet, American sports, teams and politics are full of biased gender politics that undermine the potential of sports to help people realize bodily autonomy, a sense of strength, self, and community. Historically, textiles and craft materials were used to subvert women’s participation in them by redirecting them to the home and more domestic pursuits. As an artist, I use those stereotyped materials such as beading, glitter, sequins, and embroidery to subvert sport’s toxic masculinity and exclusivity. I apply these materials in a way that converts the sports iconography, equipment, and paraphernalia into more inclusive and celebratory platforms for all athletes and people.
ARTIST BIO
Katrina Majkut (My’kut; She/They), a Ukrainian American visual artist, curator, and writer, is dedicated to understanding how social traditions impact social and civil rights. She uniquely pushes the boundaries of observational painting by using embroidery and craft materials as a painting medium and challenging its inherent social bias and history. Her heavy use of still lifes pioneer new intersectional, fourth-wave feminist strategies, which she calls Boomerang Intersectionalism. One of her most notable series is In Control, which features nearly all modern medical products and procedures related to family planning, reproductive health, and bodily autonomy, has been exhibited in solo and group shows over 40 times across the U.S. Majkut exhibits nationally in both commercial and college galleries, where she lectures on gender, art activism, and textile arts. Majkut was listed as one of four international artists starting a new chapter in feminist art by Mic Media and repeatedly listed as a must-see artist by Hyperallergic magazine.
In 2023, Majkut was part of national news when her artwork, Medical Abortion Pills, along with two other artists’ art, were censored by Lewis-Clark State College administrators in the show she curated called Unconditional Care. Working with the ACLU and National Coalition Against Censorship, Majkut and the artists spoke out against censorship, first amendment violations, and anti-abortion laws.
In 2024, she will have a solo show at the Ukrainian Institute of Modern Art in Chicago and be in a group show titled Get in the Game at SF MoMA. Past recent exhibitions include solo shows at Amos Eno Gallery, Delta State University (MS) and Coker University (SC). Fellowships include the Wassaic Projects Family fellowship, a Forge NYC fellowship, and Bronx Museum AIM fellowship (NY). Selected group exhibitions include the Spring Break Art Show, Bronx Museum Biennial, Every Women NFT Biennial, Dorksy Museum, Museum of Craft and Design (CA), Untitled Space Gallery (NY), AIR Gallery, and the Abortion is Normal exhibit at Eva Presenhuber and Arsenal Gallery (NY). Residencies include Elizabeth Murray/Collarworks, MASS MoCA, Jentel, Feminist Incubator Residency at Project for Empty Space (NJ), and the Social Practice Resident at Emmanuel College (MA). Majkut also co-curated the largest fine arts fundraiser for Ukrainian refugees on Artsy.com raising nearly $400k. Her artwork has recently been seen in The New York Times, Elle Magazine, and The Guardian.
Majkut published her first non-fiction book in 2018, The Adventures and Discoveries of A Feminist Bride, which aims to make weddings more egalitarian. Her art catalogue is in the library at the National Museum of Women in the Arts, D.C. Majkut earned her BA from Babson College and her MFA from SMFA at Tufts University. She lives and works in New York.
2023
Mixed media on vintage baseball card
EXHIBITION STATEMENT
The art series Fair Play by feminist and embroidery artist, Katrina Majkut reimagines the classical art practice of miniature portraits in an unlikely form: the baseball card. In Fair Play, Majkut is reinventing who the baseball card worships, values, represents, and celebrates with a little paint and a whole lot of glitter.
The baseball card, a tiny piece of cultural Americana, held the fascination of many American youths including Majkut herself. Kids and kids-at-heart traded and coveted various players to add to personal treasure troves of sports role models and to represent athletic hopes. These mini advertorials taught fans who was important. And considering that those worshipped were all cis, able-bodied, heteronormative men, baseball cards also taught us who was not important. Growing up in Boston’s hardcore Red Sox fandom (#SorryNotSorry New York fans), the Curse of the Bambino was not the only shadow over Majkut’s baseball experience. It never dawned on the young Majkut that she was placing such importance on people who did not represent her and would never welcome her into their ranks.
Fair Play reimagines the world of baseball as a place of healthy acceptance, inclusivity, and diversity; a place to see herself – and anyone who has felt excluded from or a complicated role in men’s professional baseball – as a truly welcomed teammate. Fair Play subverts the toxic masculinity of vintage baseball cards by obscuring the identity of the player, teams, and brands with mediums that have been stereotyped as domestic, feminine, queer, effeminate, and low-end. The new players’ intersectional ambiguity aims to bring balance to baseball’s male-dominated space, especially as women and queer players have been omitted from its history and present-day teams. The joyful cards celebrate all players with the whimsy of beads, sequins, paint, embroidery thread, glitter, and more. Transformed into equitable platforms, the beautiful and inclusive sports cards are now worthy of coveting because they exercise fair play.
ARTIST STATEMENT
My art practice highlights how social traditions affect social and civil rights. I am interested in how the gendered and patriarchal history of painting and embroidery and its limited motifs and representations have contributed to adverse identity politics. I represent the products and/or cultural practices that enable bodily autonomy. Sports are a cultural pastime that help people find strength, power, and health. Yet, American sports, teams and politics are full of biased gender politics that undermine the potential of sports to help people realize bodily autonomy, a sense of strength, self, and community. Historically, textiles and craft materials were used to subvert women’s participation in them by redirecting them to the home and more domestic pursuits. As an artist, I use those stereotyped materials such as beading, glitter, sequins, and embroidery to subvert sport’s toxic masculinity and exclusivity. I apply these materials in a way that converts the sports iconography, equipment, and paraphernalia into more inclusive and celebratory platforms for all athletes and people.
ARTIST BIO
Katrina Majkut (My’kut; She/They), a Ukrainian American visual artist, curator, and writer, is dedicated to understanding how social traditions impact social and civil rights. She uniquely pushes the boundaries of observational painting by using embroidery and craft materials as a painting medium and challenging its inherent social bias and history. Her heavy use of still lifes pioneer new intersectional, fourth-wave feminist strategies, which she calls Boomerang Intersectionalism. One of her most notable series is In Control, which features nearly all modern medical products and procedures related to family planning, reproductive health, and bodily autonomy, has been exhibited in solo and group shows over 40 times across the U.S. Majkut exhibits nationally in both commercial and college galleries, where she lectures on gender, art activism, and textile arts. Majkut was listed as one of four international artists starting a new chapter in feminist art by Mic Media and repeatedly listed as a must-see artist by Hyperallergic magazine.
In 2023, Majkut was part of national news when her artwork, Medical Abortion Pills, along with two other artists’ art, were censored by Lewis-Clark State College administrators in the show she curated called Unconditional Care. Working with the ACLU and National Coalition Against Censorship, Majkut and the artists spoke out against censorship, first amendment violations, and anti-abortion laws.
In 2024, she will have a solo show at the Ukrainian Institute of Modern Art in Chicago and be in a group show titled Get in the Game at SF MoMA. Past recent exhibitions include solo shows at Amos Eno Gallery, Delta State University (MS) and Coker University (SC). Fellowships include the Wassaic Projects Family fellowship, a Forge NYC fellowship, and Bronx Museum AIM fellowship (NY). Selected group exhibitions include the Spring Break Art Show, Bronx Museum Biennial, Every Women NFT Biennial, Dorksy Museum, Museum of Craft and Design (CA), Untitled Space Gallery (NY), AIR Gallery, and the Abortion is Normal exhibit at Eva Presenhuber and Arsenal Gallery (NY). Residencies include Elizabeth Murray/Collarworks, MASS MoCA, Jentel, Feminist Incubator Residency at Project for Empty Space (NJ), and the Social Practice Resident at Emmanuel College (MA). Majkut also co-curated the largest fine arts fundraiser for Ukrainian refugees on Artsy.com raising nearly $400k. Her artwork has recently been seen in The New York Times, Elle Magazine, and The Guardian.
Majkut published her first non-fiction book in 2018, The Adventures and Discoveries of A Feminist Bride, which aims to make weddings more egalitarian. Her art catalogue is in the library at the National Museum of Women in the Arts, D.C. Majkut earned her BA from Babson College and her MFA from SMFA at Tufts University. She lives and works in New York.